The Race That Never Was

The list of reasons (excuses) that riders had for not returning to the 2nd Annual Team Terpening 3 Day Race was long and varied: just got a new job, moved away, out of town, had to work, hadn't been riding, etc. I still managed to have a good time though. I was the only rider for the TT on friday evening. That was fine because it gave me a chance to do a longer TT, thus gathering important data for further work with my new power meter. After a 30 min. warm up, I put the hammer down for another solid 30 minutes of all out effort. I ended up doing just under ten miles with an average heart rate of 164 and average power of 283 watts. The weather on saturday was pretty abysmal for this time of year, windy and 40 degrees. Still, Benson made it out for the ride (remember he just got run over by a car last summer, so what was your excuse again?). The only other rider to join me was a new one. Tom skied on Sarah's team this winter, and we'd been trying to get together with him off and on throughout the spring. It was his first ride of the year, so Chris and I took it easy on him. We did a really leisurely lap on the Loop and around Pond Hill Farm. We got in an hour and a half, thus justifying the Bell's beer to consumed afterwards. I had no takers for the sunday morning ride, and so I rode alone. I'm really getting way too used to riding alone, and I hope I'm able to tolerate Hugh's company on rides when he returns from France in a couple of weeks. Sunday ended up being 23 miles on the mountain bike with just over 3000 ft. of climbing in under 2.5 hours. I followed up the ride with a little upper body workout by helping Sarah plant a new pine tree and moving some dirt around. So, I've come to the conclusion that the stage race format may in fact be intimidating to some of our fellow riders. I'm going to give it one more go next year with more of a friendly festival theme. So far, I'm thinking no race numbers/times/results. Maybe have some games: bobbing for tubes, wheelie contests, log ride contests, etc. (I'm open to suggestions here). Hell, I'll even do a kid's ride sunday morning if anyone would be interested. So put it on your calenders right now. The weekend BEFORE memorial day 2009: 1st Annual Team Terpening Mountain Bike Festival. By the way, I gave out something way cooler than a t-shirt this year. Now you're gonna have to do something special to get one. Ride of Silence this week for the WNR, let's all get out and represent.