A Cold but Sunny Day in Southern Minnesota

Wow! have I ever fallen off the wagon with my training and my blogging! Well I am back from Pittsburgh, Spring break is over, sometimes it is not raining, spring has almost sprung, so I am back on the saddle again. Today was a nice, calm, but cold day (about 34 degrees when we finished). I rode with the Owatonna group, something I do not often get a chance to do these days. Most of them have been spending quite a bit of time on trainers this past winter. (unlike Scott, who though he has had his rode bike "stabled" at his friend Kathleen's House of Pain, a Tuesday/Thursday roller ride to nowhere, did not get very many roller miles in). I had great intentions, I really did... Anyway the Owatonna group, and my wife Kathy in particular seemed to be pretty strong today.

I rode my cross bike, because my rode bike is still idling in Kathleen's basement in Cedar Falls. I was great to get out. I think I my intensity was a little higher than it should have been, here is a link to our route and my Heart Rate data: Saturday's Ride

Hill intervals on a Nice Day

Today was a great day in Cedar Falls. It started out warm and then got warmer! I again tagged along with John and Kat on their workout. 3 sets, 9x30 sec. hill repeats with 30 sec recoveries. My cross bike is starting to get awfully noisy, I think I better give it a major overhaul pretty soon.

Todays hill intervals

Intervals and a Kayak Issue

I checked the weather last night and it looked like it was going to be warm enough to ride, so I guessed John and Kat would show up at the usual time at Cup a Joes. When I went outside, it sure felt a lot colder than the 24 degrees that the thermometer in my apartment read! Well John and Kat did show up. They planned to do 2 sets of 10x60 second intervals with 60 sec rests at 90% effort. I tagged along. It was a good workout and I manged to stay under control with a max heart rate of around 170.

Todays workout data: Intervals

On the Kayak front, I have had to go to some pretty extreme lengths to straight the bottom of the surf Kayak I am building. When I joined the top and the bottom the panel on the bottom center taco ed up about an inch. Not really understanding this sort of Kayak, I thought "wow that is an interesting design feature." However after checking with my local whitewater kayak expert Tye, I discovered this was going to be a problem and could be why the instructions said that I should not substituted thinner plywood than the 4mm Oukume that was recommended (I used 3mm :-). Hmmmm so now I have the hull filled with temporary braces and shims hoping that the outside layers of glass will hold it in place after it cures.

I mixed pigment with the resin on the bottom in an attempt to cover over the stain disaster. So far so good.

The canoe is fairing quite well. I leveled the strips with a slow rpm disk sander with 36 grit-- at little too course, but that is what I had. I am trying to decide what fiberglass to use on it S or E.