Post a Comment On: Transplant Athlete

I went to my first actual Spinning Class on Monday. When I did the NKF Spin-A-Thon at the WSC, Cynthia had invited me to the Spin class, so I thought I would give it a try (And yes she was there - unlike some people who invite you to really hard events and then fly to Africa). It wasn't especially brutal, but it could have been, it was almost as hard as the RBC Tuesday/Thursday rides. First of all, the instructor was using perceived exertion (PE) as a guide, since there weren't many people there with heart rate monitors. That's where you rate your level of exercise on a scale of 1 to 10. I don't have a lot of experience with PE, but to me, 10 is "Sprinting to the line against Super Mario" (the Lion King, not the Plumber). Tracy, the instructor kept yelling to crank up the resistance and then we were doing these dips, out of the saddle for two strokes back into the saddle for two strokes. At least the music was good. Tracy then invited us upstairs for the Pilates class she was teaching. The only thing I knew about Pilates was that they used those funky machines that look like the Chuck Norris Total Gym. BUT, this was a mat based class. It was a good core class and I keep telling myself I should get more core work in. Not satisfied with two hours in the gym, I hopped on a treadmill and ran/jogged/walked a 5k. I know, I should be focusing on bike specific exercises, but I wanted to stress my heart and lungs and the best way to do that is to throw something at them that they are not ready for. As you can imagine, my legs were feeling stellar at the start of the Tuesday RBC ride. I got dropped about 4 miles into the ride, which is probably about the time everyone was all warmed up. I caught up to Jeffrey on a Specialized Roubaix, his carbon seatpost slipped all the way down, so he stopped to raise it and tighten it. He pulled me around the course for the next 12 miles before breaking off to ride home. I rode the last 8 miles or so alone. I think my average was around 17 mph, but the group was probably averaging 19+.