It took my legs a long time to get going in the race today. Two days of little riding can really make you legs shut down and not want to produce. I ended up riding in a three rider break for about 30 miles early in the race, and that really seemed to help my legs open up and start firing. We were riding fast - but not super fast in the break. I averaged around 300 watts and 155 HR for 1:10 while in the break.

The course in San Ardo has a few rolling hills, but no significant climb. It often ends in a sprint, and today was no different. There was a dangerous two man break about 20 or 30 seconds up with 3 or 4 miles to go, so we rallied the team, and put in a wicked chase to pull them back with just about 250 m to go. We don't really have a sprinter, and Marc finished 5th and Patrick 7th, but it was so much fun to do such a pro chase and leadout. Our team never seems to be able to get a good chase organized, but today we almost looked like Telecom or Acqua e Sapone.

Tomorrow is going to be a tough one. Not only is the race super hard with some ridiculous amount of climbing, but I also have to do another two hours of solid endurance pace riding after for training.

This is going to be a really hard three-day weekend of training and racing. I'm feeling a bit aprehensive because I know that at some point its going to hurt - a lot.

Sunday and Monday are double days - with both racing and additional endurance pace riding. Those are going to hurt.

Today I rode piano for an hour - and I mean piano. Little ring putt-putting along the flattest roads I could find. I didn't even bother with a heart rate monitor today. I barely broke a sweat.

The big project at work is right on schedule, which is something to be celebrated. The Vice President of Engineering dropped by the hardware development lab and toasted our little project team with some really, really fine Champagne. A bit of an indulgence, and it sure doesn't help my fitness any, but I'm feeling much more relaxed this evening, and ready to put in a big effort on the bike this weekend.

Cyclists who work face two little major roadblocks - little michievious sprites really - that can derail all the hard training they put in.

The first is all the free food companies provide. Your boss may not give you a raise. The company's board of directors may not be willing to replace your worthless stock options with some that actually might be worth something more than toilet paper some day. But free bagels in the morning? Cookies at lunch? No problem! I can be pretty willful, but I crack so easily when offered free food, that I have to try and avoid the break room on days when I know there's going to be free food. Days that are particularly stressful for some reason are really dangerous because my resistance to temptation is less when I'm using energy stressing about something.

The other major problem are the parties and social functions you have to attend. Don't get me wrong - I really enjoy a nice party. The temptations can be so strong though, and a night of overindulgence can undo several days of hard workouts on the bike. I think I may have come pretty close to the edge last night. My teamate Gordon is moving to Kentucky, so we had a little going away soiree at a nice Mexican restaraunt. I was able to restrain myself to one margarita, and some mole enchiladas, but I definately ate too many tortilla chips. We had a lot of fun, and watching Gordon drink a huge cup of hot salsa really helped release some of the tensions built up at work.

By the time I got home, it was way to late to go out for a spin on the bike, so I just did some stretching and went to bed. Missing a short recovery spin isn't optimal, but its not going to be too bad in the long run. My legs probably won't be feeling so stellar today. Thankfully all I have on tap is another recovery ride.

Yesterdays training session was so hard I had a headache by the end.

I was so exhausted when I got home, all I could do was grab a bit to eat for dinner before popping some Advil and collapsing on the couch. Hence the diary entry this morning instead of last night.

My coach modified my program a bit after some feedback from the session on Fillmore last Sunday. Instead of doing 2x6 1 minute intervals, we went for 2x12 30 second intervals. Each steep pitch on Fillmore is about 30 seconds long, and the goal was to try and mimic the climb as much as possible. I did the intervals on Quinnhill - a short, steep climb that is only 0.2 miles long, but 19% grade all the way up. When you climb it in a 39x17, your cadence is almost the same as on Fillmore. I made sure that I used the same style of climbing that is required to not tip over on Fillmore so that I would train the same muscles that I'll need in the race.

I think it was a success - my upper shoulders were cramping at the end of last night's workout session - just the same as what happened last year in San Francisco. It was a real power workout. I don't seem to be able to build up lactic acid in short efforts. My body is able to buffer and process all the lactic acid I produce in less than 20 seconds. For the last 10 seconds of each workout I'd start to build up a bit of acid in my legs, and the last 2 to 3 seconds were pretty painful. I was putting out a ton of watts at a really low cadence, and my legs felt really rubbery and weak by the end. With two days of easy spinning before the weekend, I'm sure I'll be fresh and recovered for my next races. I doubt that I'll do more than spin around the block tonight on the flattest roads I can find! I'd be surprised if I hit 15 mph tonight!

Some kids on mountain bikes were riding around in front of their house at the base of Quinnhill while I was doing my intervals, and got a bit curious about what I was doing. I think they must have thought I was crazy or something. "Are you training for the Tour de France?" one asked. "No, but I going to be racing against Lance Armstrong in a big race in San Francisco in a couple of weeks!" I replied. I gave them all the details about the race - I think I might have a couple more folks in my cheering section now.

I love seeing all the interesting diets in the supermarket tabloids.

Brocoli diet. Ice cream diet. Low carb. Low fat. Zone.

Tonight in the grocery store these diets went upscale with a front page article in Time magazine.

Dieting is pretty simple, and I'm rather amazed that no physicist has stepped into the debate. The first law of thermo says: eat less than you burn and you WILL lose weight. Eat whatever you want! Just eat less than you use.

Right now I'm trying to maintain my weight right around 164 lbs, and maybe lose a pound or two in the coming weeks. The focus of today's ride was to bump up my metabolism, and burn calories. Two hours of rolling, twisty roads in the Los Altos hills, including the climbs of Loyola, Valley View, Quinnhill, Anacapa, La Paloma, and Elena. Averaged 132 bpm for 1:52 and about 245 Watts. Burned around 1650 Calories. Add in 2500 for my BMR and you get around 4150 Calories for the day. Oatmeal and OJ for breakfast, Indian food for lunch, salmon steaks with brocoli and potatoes for dinner, with some cherries as a snack, totals to approximately 3000 Calories.

I'm pretty sure I lost a bit of weight today - about a quarter pound. Slow and steady weight loss is the way to go.

Another really wonderful day of rest.

Total physical activity today consisted of 15 minutes of stretching in the morning, 15 minutes of stretching in the evening, and walking around the office a bit.

Nice hour long nap in the evening - and now I feel nicely refreshed. Did a bit of reading, played guitar a bit, just took the time to not do anything related to work or cycling.

I think I'm going to rest my typing fingers as well and just end this diary entry right now.

I kind of overdid things today I think.

111 miles in 6 hours with quite a bit of climbing, and a lot of hard tempo riding. Oh boy! My legs are sore tonight. I think I better have an Advil before bed.

The day started off relaxed, with a pit stop at Peet's coffee in Los Altos for coffee and some scones. The goal of the day - like the race in Winters on Saturday - was to work on my ability to ride fast from a cold start. Almost every race begins really fast with lots of attacks until the break gets established, so its pretty critical to train the body to respond to this sort of effort. My teamates wanted to head up to San Francisco to do a little reconnaisance on Fillmore, so I was kind enough to tow them up there while riding some hard tempo. Actually, they got bored of this pretty quick and we rotated through most of the way up to the city. I might have taken a bit longer pulls perhaps, but Patrick in particular did a good job at ripping my legs off. A tough headwind made this a pretty hard trip up. My legs felt reasonably good though, and I knew we'd have a nice tailwind to blow us home.

Here's where I started to overdo things...I joined my teamates for a little interval session up Fillmore instead of just riding for a few more hours easy like my coach prescribed. Oh wow that climb is steep! In retrospect though, I learned some really valuable little lessons that will might help during the race: (1) Fillmore is steep, (2) really steep, (3) it might be easier the faster you climb it. That last lesson seems counterintuitive, but I think its the truth.

After refueling at Crepe's a Go Go, we headed back towards home. My teamate Teddy was on a mission now, as he had to get back quickly so he could go to a barbeque. Patrick and Greg - my other teamates - seemed interested in joining Ted in setting this ridiculous pace home. Oh, just to make life interesting, the wind had shifted and it was cross head all the way, with me groveling in the gutter. I finally had to beg for mercy when we were about 20 miles from home when Greg set a blistering pace up a false flat and I was sitting on the very tippy-tip of my saddle trying to squeeze every last erg of energy out of my body just to hang on. It was touch and go there. I somehow managed to stay on though, and we putted home from there with a nice truce in place (though I did seem to roll through the Atherton town line at the front - hehehe).

My legs are sore tonight, but that is typically a good sign. A couple of days from now I know that my body will supercompensate and I'll be better than before. I just need to make sure that I spend the next couple of days in recovery mode.