Justin Park

Harmons Best Dam Bike Ride Day 2 - 75 miles. Blog entry to come later.

A.M. - 60 minute treadmill workout at the gym. Surprisingly good effort despite the big cycling miles the last couple of days:

5 minutes @ 9.5 mph, flat
10 mins @ 10.0, flat
20 mins @ 10.5, flat
25 mins @ 11.0, flat

Was happy to be able to hold this pace today. Endurance seemed to be good. I certainly didn't feel like I could take on inclines today. Maybe on Wednesday.

Had to go into the office today and tomorrow for mandatory training. No P.M. ride today as I want to let my back side recover a bit.

A.M. - Extended Little Cottonwood Rd/Wasatch triangle with the Sego Lily stretch. Warm morning (at least 75-78 degrees when I started at 5:45 AM). The pesky southwest wind continued. No watch, but I was going pretty slow. Tomorrow is supposed to be a gym day, but if I was smart I'd take advantage of the cooler morning temps and go outside.

P.M. - Yesterday, I reached $600 in total donations for MS which meant I qualified for the 'spokes club' jersey. Thank you to any reading this who contributed to my drive! Our work training got out early today, so I stopped by the Utah MS Society Chapter at Highland Dr and ~6400 So. and got my jersey. Its actually pretty good quality. I wore it for this afternoon's 40 mile ride to the top of Millcreek and back. Awesome ride, as always. Climbing legs are still feeling a bit tired from this past weekend which is to be expected.

A.M. - 60 minutes on the treadmill at the Life Centre. As suspected yesterday, it would have been a good morning to go out today, but my wife took the early shift and slept in a bit. So I decided to stick with the original gym plan.

5 minutes @ 9.5 mph, flat

5 mins @ 10.0, flat

15 mins @ 10.0 with progressive inclines of 3 mins each at 1.0, 1.5, 2.0, 2.5, and 3.0 (couldn't hold for the 3.5 today).

5 mins @ 10.0, flat

25 mins @ 10.5, flat (didn't feel like going any harder than this effort so I stayed here for most of the run)

5 mins @ 11.0, flat

Just an okay overall effort.

P.M. - 40 mile ride up Big Cottonwood Canyon to Brighton and back. Got a flat while screaming down the canyon, but was able to fix it quickly and get home just fine. I should be most grateful that it didn't cause me to wipe-out.

A.M. - Standard Little Cottonwood Rd/Wasatch Blvd triangle today. Was warm and windy throughout, as is the norm lately. Went real slow, it was a slog. I think the afternoon bike rides impact the quality of the next mornings' run. I want to go riding tonight, but I'm debating whether I will or not.

A.M. - 60 minutes on the treadmill:

5 minutes @ 9.5 mph, flat
5 mins @ 10.0, flat
15 mins @ 10.0 progressives inclines with 3 minutes each at 1.0, 1.5, 2.0, 2.5, and 3.0 (again, still couldn't hit the 3.5 today)
5 mins @ 10.0, flat
10 mins @ 10.5, flat
20 mins @ 11.0, flat

Similar to Wednesday's run, but today's effort was a little better.

A.M. - Long run. Two times around on the Little Cottonwood Rd/Wasatch Blvd triangle route. Once in the normal direction, once in reverse. Up nice and early today to beat the heat. Cooler and less wind than last week. 6:54 ave/mi.

P.M. - 68.5 mile bike ride up Emigration and East Canyon to the Big Mountain summitt. First time that I've biked up Big Mountain although I've driven it a million times going boating to East Canyon Reservoir with the family. It was a bit harder than I anticipated, but definitely a good ride and one I hope to continue doing. It was kind of an eventful ride. I got a flat on Wasatch (about 7 miles into the ride). I fixed it and rode to Millcreek Bicycles where they gave me a tube, adjusted my pedal tension, and got my tire pressure where it needed to be. It's so nice to have a good bike shop on the route! The climbs up Little and Big Mountain were good (although, as mentioned, Big Mountain was a  little tough). I saw a few other cyclists, but not as many as I would have normally expected, probably because of warm weather. On the last hairpin of the Big Mountain climb I caught up to a cool dude named Ben. We chatted at the top for a bit and I learned that he's a LOTOJA vet and has done it several times. He'll be doing it again this year as a Cat 5, which is the lowest racing category and also the one I'll be in. He is also doing the Ultimate Challenge in August which I'm also planning to do. So hopefully our paths will cross again. He shared some of his bike racing/LOTOJA wisdom which I'm grateful for and will gladly take whenever people are willing to share it with me. He was riding from Cottonwood Heights, so we ended up riding most of the way home together and we made one stop to fill our water. We rode mostly at an easy pace, but we pushed it a little in a few spots. On Wasatch Blvd on the way home at about 5500 S. there were a ton of cops, firetrucks, and ambulances, and a helicopter and they had Wasatch completely blocked off and wouldn't let us through. I don't know what the deal was, I've haven't bothered to see if its on the news, but maybe some bad car wreck or someone was stuck on the mountain or something like that. Needless to say, we were forced to back track to 4500 S. and then down to 2300 E. Ben and I parted ways at the Cotton Bottom intersection and I took 2300 E. and Highland home. Ride was good, but took quite a while to do. Sad thing is, it was a good bread-and-butter ride, but not long enough to constitute the type of "long ride" I need to be doing for my LOTOJA training. Somehow I'm going to have to figure how and when to work those rides into my training schedule.