Endurace Block 2 is in the books!

With some of the interruptions over the holidays to the training, I replanned the first two weeks of the Race Block to be more Endurance... sort of a addendum to Endurance Block 2.  The first week was a bit of a bust, I missed Saturday completely, just did not feel like sitting on the bike for 8+ hours, and just stayed home.  So I didn't.  Somedays are like that.  The next day I got in a ride around Park Link, 78 miles.  Six months ago, this would have seemed like a long ride, now it seems like not much at all.  This week, I got the wheels back on.  My mood improved as the new RAW 2019 custom jerseys came in, Light & Motion offered to support me with discounted lighting, and I'm likely to be adding a charity partner for RAW 2019 supporting cause Cathy and I both feel passionately about.  Uplifted by all of this, I finished up the block with back to back 7-8 hour rides, the first with 6400 ft of climbing, and the second with 5.5 hours of headwinds.   It was a 503 mile/29 hour week of training.  I'm tired.  

​The progression to 10 h rides has been elusive with the cold weather and short days.  I need that to improve.  I've managed to work the on-bike feed up to 400 calories an hour, and now half my calories on the bike are from the homemade Keto-Butter/Honey Stinger Gel/MCT oil.  Its tasty, amazingly calorically dense and easy to carry on the long unsupported rides.   Now I go into five weeks of racing, with alternating weekends off and open for more endurance.

There are only 134 days left until the race.  The vehicle inspections and photos are scheduled in Oceanside, and there is so much more to do.  Cathy will be organizing crew meetings in the next weeks.  We are going to put up an Amazon wish list soon... ultracycling needs a lot of stuff.  It will help us organize, and several people have asked how they can help.  Soon we can say, "well, there is this Amazon wish list..."  And there is a lot of training to do.

Saturday's ride was epic fun.  The area up beyond Oracle is a great place to ride.  Big rolling climbs, little or no traffic, great scenery, and some of the biggest and best Saguaro  cactus in the world.  The only downside is the 8 miles of Oracle Highway between Saddlebrook and Oracle to get there.  I got to pre-ride most of the race course for the Oracle Road Race next week.  Hydrating was tough, as I lost my $10 bill, must have blow away while I was taking pictures, so I had to resupply on less than $5.   

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I finally did the ride to Marsh Station.   Marsh Station is an old ghost town along the Union Pacific Railroad southeast of Vail.  There is not much there except an old water tank and a few concrete walls.  On the way, you pass the Cienega Creek Trestle, a rather famous railfan spot where the two lines of the spilt Union Pacific mainline cross, one on a high steel trestle, the other down along the river bed.  The road, on a historic concrete arch bridge built in 1921 which originally carried US 80, which was later rerouted then replaced by I-10.

​My RAW Story. Day 78.  134 days, 16 hours to RAW 2019.

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