Hell repeats

"Complete 4-5 hill repeats, in zone 4- staying seated as long as

possible, recover on the way down"

I went out and met up with Ian to do my morning swim and then came home. Had a few things to do at home first before I went out to ride. Wingman was home today so he came out with me for this ride. We went down to CR 51, the location of my nemesis hill. I have to climb this thing 4-5 times. I told Wingman he could do the hell repeats with me, or just climb it once and ride around on 51. With this hill, there is a downhill section just before the uphill, but oddly enough you can't really use momentum to get anywhere up the hill. And what made it worse was it seems there was a bit of a headwind so I didn't even fly down hill! Everyone is conspiring against me today!

I managed to do the first climb with ease........well, sort of. I did the climb and then when the road levels off is a u-turn area to cross the median in the road. I crossed the road, rode downhill (with the wind) and got to another turnaround so I can attempt climb #2. As I started the climb, I realized that maybe the PBJ sandwich I ate just prior to riding was not a good idea. My GI system was saying "Hold on a minute, idiot girl. You can't eat and ride. Pick one." I managed to make the climb with no issues, but I waited at the top and told Wingman "I have to make a pit stop." We stop over at the park I swim at so I can use the facilities.

Once everything was in order, I went out for climb #3. I told Wingman he didn't have to keep climbing with me if he didn't want to, that he could ride south and then come back for me. So we make climb #3 together and now I can feel the burn.



My legs are telling me to stop but my head is saying "you gotta keep going, at least one more". So my head wins out for now and I make the turn around for one last climb. Wingman rode off instead of turning around so I was going solo for #4. I kept my head down a bit on this one as I did not want to see how much more I had to do. With each climb as I got closer to the top, I would pedal a little harder so I could "power" up over the top. I use the word power loosely because if you could actually see me ride, power is one of the last words that comes to mind.

#4 was in the books. Now I rode down 51 a bit to loosen up my legs from the climb and celebrate a job well done. I have no idea where the Wingman is so I double back the parking lot figuring he was there. Nope, I see him on the north side of the road approaching the downhill section just prior to the climb. I stop on the south side of the road to gesture to him that I was done. This is a 4 lane road with a big median in the middle. Shouting is not really an option. We break into our "military" sign language to communicate. He holds up one finger, then points to himself and then the hill. That means he wants to climb one more time. I gesture back with the hand back and forth in front of the neck. This means "No way. I'm done." He repeats his gesture, but this time points at me. I repeat my gesture, and point at me. Next thing I hear is "Get your lazy ass up that hill." Oh hell no. He did not just say that to me.

So now I am publicly shamed into doing repeat #5. I head to a turn around and make my way over to the hill. And to be sure I actually do the climb, he waits near the bottom of it until I ride by and start climbing. My legs are on fire at this point. I get aggressive near the top of the climb and pull away. So once again, I won the "King of the Mountain" jersey:

We did a nice 9 mile recovery ride afterwards to keep the blood moving before driving home. We went cruising around some back roads to avoid traffic. When we finally made it back to the car, I kinda looked like this:

I was done for the day. Though it was a good kind of tired. We got home and I managed to not need a nap this time ;-)