After a nice block of running in the mountains, we gave our legs some different turnover for a bit. Saturday we did some nice mountain biking on the Santa Fe trail to the north boundary of the US Air Force Academy. It was a pleasantly mild day after the Front Range posting mid-90's for a week solid. We had a strong headwind on the way back, which hindered the whole leg recovery theme - welcome to Colorado! We rode 21 miles and had a good day of spinning.
Sunday we did a very nice road loop on the quiet roads on the northwest side of town. We had to do some climbs but we REALLY enjoy not riding in traffic. It is especially nice to ride early on Sundays as there is even less car volume on the roads. Surprisingly, the running is really keeping our legs strong even when we hop on the bikes. The spinning endurance has dropped some but the climbing power is still quite respectable. That is the trail running advantage - strong legs from the hills and uneven terrain! It is interesting that on most of our road riding routes on the west side of Colorado Springs, we average about 1000' climb per 10 miles of riding. That is right where we ended up Sunday - 20 miles with about 2000' climb. Good day in the saddle and the legs are really adapting well to the increased load.Kathleen was able to ride with Becky on Monday on the trails around Mt Herman in Monument. That is always good times for them - some single track and a long climb, mountain biking at it's best!!!
Thursday night, Steve snuck in a trail run at Garden of the Gods - about 6.5 miles. Ran a good loop on the outer perimeter of the park. There was some cloud cover, which made the heat dissipate nicely. It was surprising to see 6 or 8 other runners out on the trail, about a dozen hikers, and some horses (and their riders) leaving their calling cards.
Anyone watching the Tour De France? We always enjoy watching and the racing has been good this year. The two American sponsored teams, Garmin-Chipotle and Columbia are doing quite well. The speedy little British sprinter from Team Columbia, Mark Cavendish, picked up his 4th sprint stage win today - WOW! And wily American veteran, Christian VandeVelde from the Garmin squad sits in 3rd place overall after 13 stages. Also of note - the dopers. What on earth is up with these morons? The cycling federations and Tour organizers have promised an all out assault to weed out the dopers and these guys are still taking stuff. Complete idiots. And then their responses are priceless - I have no idea how the EPO got into my body... unless of course those "vitamin" shots I have been taking have something in them!!! Guess there will always be cheaters, but we're happy that cycling is taking a stand to get them out of the sport.
