Friday was too gorgeous to sit in an office building, so I skipped out circa 2pm and headed to Boulder for some time on the Yeti. I thought about hitting up the Dirty Bismark loop, but with winds starting to pick up I opted to head to the foothills for some cover. Heil Ranch ended up being my destination, as I wanted to check out the newly created Wild Turkey loop. I make good work of the climb, passing 4 or 5 others without getting caught myself, and then headed for a loop on Wild Turkey. The loop was a welcome change from the loose rocks of the existing loops, and it had me smiling. Finished out the Wild Turkey loop, then the rest of the Ponderosa loop before bombing back down to the car. Got in a bit over 10 miles, with 1300ft of climbing, in about 1:08.
Saturday started out busy and stayed that way. Jill and I started with some over due yard work, then grabbed some lunch. After a bit of procrastinating, I hopped on the road bike to head up to Carter Lake for a solid 2.5 hours of saddle time. I had a really good surge up the climb to the dam, likely setting a person best as I've never ever been able to upshift mid-climb like I did yesterday. I threw in some intermediate sprints just to work that aspect a bit, and ended up being able to produce 1200 watts for a full 5 seconds. Not great, but an improvement nonetheless.
On the way home I found some "rabbits" up in front of me, which had me keeping the pace pretty high despite the serious head wind. On a short, but steep climb headed back to Longmont I blasted past 3 people on the climb which felt good. Its the first time since I moved here that I can actually pass people on the climbs.
Got in about 45 miles in 2.5 hours of saddle time with some good climbing for the early season. Legs felt remarkably good considering the hard effort at Heil the day before. Everything was really good, with the exception that somehow while digging for stuff in my jersey pockets I pulled it up exposing my lower back to the intense Colorado sun. So now I've got a tramp stamp sun burn. It hurts, I'm not pleased about it.
Today we washed both cars, finished painting Thor's room and then I decided I'd get another ride in since it was super nice again. I did an easy 1:15 without getting too far from home.
Had a big week, logging 130ish miles with about 8 hours total time on the bike. Any week that I can average more than an hour a day on the bike is a good week for sure. The fitness is definitely better than years past, and the power meter makes me a much better climber as I can properly dose my output unlike trying to use heart rate. Still 6 pounds from my goal weight of 185, but with the weather improving I still think I'm on track to get there by mid-May.
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