Back-to-back Centuries Cap Off Week 6 of Training

Saturday and Sunday – No cycling, but worked around the house until tired. Whew!

Monday – 38 miles on my Keiser exercise bike watching a movie, low intensity, just getting the miles in.

Tuesday -.Yoga and 125 pushups and 100 situps in my room. Ran a little further.

Rode 57 miles with Joel with some hills and finished along the trail about 11:00. My quads tightened up during the stop at Lasar’s in Bowlus and the ride to Holdlingford hurt. After stretching, I kept changing my pedal stroke the rest of the way to Albany and felt OK at the end. I don’t know if it was nutrition, hydration, the pace or the too long rest, but that is the worst I have felt on a ride since some of the winter fat bike rides.

Wednesday – Rest and recovery.

Thursday – 10 miles easy with the Central Minnesota Bicycling Club from St. Joseph. Yoga and 125 pushups and 100 situps in my room. Ran a little further still. Slowly making progress towards being able to run a 5K by August 8.

Friday – Rest day.

Saturday and Sunday – Rode 106 miles with Gary Westrup from the  Crow Wing State Park south of Brainerd to Bemidji along the Paul Bunyan Trail. We did not push the pace, but rode mostly 15-18 mph, with a lot of 17. Slight tailwind most of the way, but got into the upper 80’s, with lots of 84 degrees. We had to pay attention to hydration. We planned to ride to Lake Bemidji State Park to do 120 miles, but rain threatened (with tornado watches going on west of us), so we were satisfied with 106 miles. (well, actually a bit relieved) :)

Sunday we rode back to Crow Wing State Park. We had planned to ride the 9 mile longer route SW of Walker along the Heartland Trail, then east to rejoin the Paul Bunyan Trail, but we wimped out, with the extra 9 miles with 8% grades not sounding like a good idea with over 65 miles to go after that stretch. I finished with 110 miles (3.5 miles further than Gary, due to my riding from my motel to his before we began). 

We ran into some construction and urban traffic in and near Brainerd, but estimate that we otherwise would have finished the 100 in about 6 hours and 15 minutes of riding time, not that far off from the 6 hours I will need to do to qualify to ride the FastAmericaSouth next spring. Progress!

Goal: 80-100 miles during the week, plus whatever on the weekend

Total week miles: 105 during week, with 106 and 110 on the weekend. Weekly goal achieved sixth week in a row. Still on track.

Still on Track With Training

Saturday and Sunday - See my last post regarding my completing my sentence of 3 days of hard labor.

Monday - Qualified for work release, so went to Foley in the morning. Crashed and needed a nap in the afternoon. That helped A LOT! Rode 16 miles after work and before the Board meeting which did not end until after 10:00.


Tuesday - Upped the repetitions per rotation to 22 on my room morning exercises, so did the 5 rotations for 110 pushups and situps, (plus 10 "bonus" pushups on the last rotation). Loving this progress!

Completed 35 miles on the Keiser trainer watching "A Good Day to Die Hard" at an easy 4 minutes followed by a minute standing in the pedals.


Wednesday - A great ride with Joel and Gary totaling 43.3 miles along the trails north and west of Albany, most at 18+ miles per hour. This was great training for me, and despite my saying early in the ride that I really could not feel that I was making progress, was really feeling it later. Yea!


Ended the room exercises with 42 pushups, for a total of 130. I had not done 42 pushups in a row since doing 50 each day while training for Mt. McKinley in 1977.


Thursday - Room exercises only. But oh, took a short run also (with an emphasis on "short").

Friday - Room exercises. Ran just a bit further as well.

Saturday - Completed work on the fire pit and beach patio area we have been working on the past three weeks. Linda and Kirk laid the 3 ton of top stone during the week, and Linda and I finished the last few steps today. Amazing how I am more tired than two weeks ago when I rode the 100 mile Tour de Pepin.

Goal: 80-100 miles during the week, plus whatever on the weekend

Total week miles: 94 during week, with nothing on the weekend. Weekly goal achieved fifth week in a row. Still on track.

A "Down" Training Week, But Got it Done With a Lot of Help From My Friends

Saturday - Rode the 100 mile Tour de Pepin, starting in Lake City, reported in the last blog posting.

Sunday - Walked the 4 miles around Cleary Lake with Linda. Did a lot of yard work and other projects around the house.

Monday – Took a nap after work with the intention of riding my Keiser trainer 30+ miles. After napping for 3 hours, began to ride while watching a movie, but quit after a mile. Yup, only 1 mile. I just was not motivated.

Tuesday - Morning room exercises, moving up to 20 repetitions per rotation. Rode 20 miles in the evening with my friends in the Central Minnesota Bicycle Club.Just what I needed.

Wednesday - Morning room exercises. Rode 10 miles from work.

Thursday - Enjoyed a 57.3 mile ride with Joel (and Jan and Jen Lasar for about 27 miles). averaged 16.0 for the entire ride, with the last 30 miles at a faster pace. The sunset riding west from Albany was spectacular! We finished after 10:00 p.m. with our lights along the trail. A great ride! Morning room exercises.

Friday - Rest day. Well, it was planned that way, but I ended up on the end of a shovel and rake, moving much of the 6 tons of class 5 gravel and a lot of sand on Friday, Saturday and Sunday helping construct a fire pit on our beach. Ended each day exhausted. Walked the 4 miles around Cleary Lake with Linda on Sunday morning.

Goal: 80-100 miles during the week, plus whatever on the weekend

Total week miles: 88 during week, with nothing on the weekend. Weekly goal achieved four weeks in a row, but this was a “down” week. Without my riding with my friends, I never would have reached my minimum quota.

Week Three of training complete - Finished with a Century

Saturday - Rode 51.8 miles with Rick (the guy who will be on the crew for the Race Across America starting June 20) leaving from the Michael's Cycles store in Chaska. It was a good training ride despite the wind, with some hills - 15.1 mph average and GREAT company!

Walked around Fish Lake with Linda, 3.26 miles according to MapMyRide, to get acquainted with our neighborhood.

Sunday - Walked the 4 miles around Cleary Lake. Less energetic than last week, never did feel like jogging.

Ended up shoveling sand out of our future fire pit area for a couple of hours. ti was a workout, but not the kind I had planned. I am going to need a hot bath and Ibuprofen tonight.

Monday - I felt amazingly good, despite the Sunday workout.

Rode a total of 56.8 miles with the Central Minnesota Bicycle Club starting from Albany to the Bowlus trailhead, then 20 miles, then back to Albany. Joel and I ended with a beautiful 16+ mile ride back to Albany with virtually no wind, 62 degrees, moonlight, smooth trail and easy pace to complete our 56.8 mile evening. Biking at its best!

Tuesday - Morning room exercises, moving up to 18 repetitions per rotation.

Wednesday - Morning room exercises. Rainy day.

Thursday - 37 miles on my Keiser. Room exercises.

Friday - Rest day

Saturday - Rode the 100 mile Tour de Pepin, starting in Lake City. Averaged 15.0 mph, slower than hoped and much slower than the 16.5 average I need to qualify to ride the Fast America South next spring. But considering the stage in my training program and the winds and hills, I need to feel satisfied with the ride. 

The course was a lot of up and down, gently rolling, with the hills not too bad except the longer hill on the Wisconsin side. However, at mile 58, the Century route began a 32 mile loop with 2159 feet of climbing, much of it into the headwind. It was a challenge, especially at that stage of the ride. Nonetheless, I finished. Interestingly, I did not see another cyclist for over 25 miles on that 32 mile stretch. Either there were not many who rode that, or the fast ones were waaaaaay ahead of me.

Goal: 80-100 miles during the week, plus whatever on the weekend

Total week miles: 94 during week plus the previous Saturday 52 miles. Weekly goal achieved three weeks in a row.