Lactate and a Latte'.

Earlier this morning, I tagged along while Erich and Barry tackled a short (but tough!) time-trialing effort. The end result, we hoped, would yield some numbers we could tweak for the purposes of more focused training. We decided earlier that the parking lot at Groves Stadium would be the perfect site for the test, especially with today's status as a national holiday and its forecast of gorgeous sunshine. So around 10:30am, the guys left our house, electing to bike over to the stadium for a good warm-up, while I drove over and listened to Reba McEntire's newest album. Perfect.

Admittedly, this outing was much more fun for me than for the two athletes/victims. My main responsibilities were timing their rides and snapping a few photos. This particular test required maximum exertion at a duration of 20 minutes. Both guys really hammered out nice rides, metering out their efforts appropriately. Below, Barry gets out of the saddle to bang out a few extra Watts for his test.And Erich stomps on the pedals in anger late in his ride. Following their tests, the guys were tired, and more importantly, anxious to figure out the fastest route to West End Cafe' for lunch. So now I'm back home, settling in for my favorite part. My all-time favorite cyclist just made me a pumpkin spice latte', so the only thing left for me to do is to crunch out some numbers and try to remember their significance. I've grabbed a few books off the shelf from my grad-school days, and it's kind of nice to weave through the cobwebs to my old bookmarks for VO2 max estimates and lactate thresholds.It's been a while, to be sure, but those old equations are slowly but surely coming back to me. Now to put them to good use...