Training Season 2023

Fourteen years!  That is a long time for anything in this fast changing world.  Our team has weathered all manner of challenges - babies, families, injuries, a global pandemic.  At our core has always been our commitment to the weird fellowship of road biker - early morning, long distances, and the friendships built in the spaces between.  I never guessed that the crazy team of 5 back in 2010 - who completed the a two day ride of 150 miles on the heaviest bikes made by man and a total lack of knowledge about training - would grow into a perennial team of 25-30 of the nicest people and friends!

This is the year we grow past your yearly commitment to the BikeMS.  The National MS Society head office killed of a few smaller rides around the country last year, and our beloved ride was one. It was a shock and a blow, and it still generates not particularly nice feelings (betrayal, anger, indifference).  We had a good run - raising over $325,000 for the MS Society - but our efforts where not enough, and the fellowship of the amazing people in NM were deemed not worth our local and national chapters efforts anymore.

So this we start with a clean slate and a new mission.  Our goal this year is to build and sustain our local rider community, as we work through what the next phase of our efforts should be.  Those of us passionate about having our own local event are organizing something new under the Pedal los Pueblos banner!  We will be co-sponsoring rides this year with other local groups and building toward a new future of our own local events - organized for the benefit of NM by NM!

Below is the schedule for the Saturday rides.  They are designed to be progressive - so will slowly build in length and intensity through the summer.  There will be an ride on Sunday too, but it is a bit more flexible, and is focused on shorter distances working up to about 50 miles by the end of the summer. Our normal departure time is 6 am from the O'Neill's parking lot on Central! 

SATURDAY RIDE SCHEDULE

6/17	Short city loop + Bike in Coffee	20
6/24	Inner City Loop CW	36.1
7/1	Modified City loop CCW	36.7
7/8	Bi Week - Mountain/Road Bike in Angel Fire
7/15	Benalillo Out and Back	43
7/22	City Loop CW	53
7/29	Ride to San Felipe Pueblo	69	Roads open this year? Hopefully?
8/5	South 14 + Gutirrez Canyon	63	Pending status of North 14
8/12	Crest Assault from Triangle	26
8/19	Ride to Placitas	66
8/26	Santa Fe	63
9/2	TBD
9/9	TDB
9/16	TBD
9/23	Lobo Cancer Challenge	25,50	Hope to see you out there!

Training Season 2022!

It is the start of the 13th season of the Penultimates!  It has been a strange two year for everyone, but after the false hope of last summer, we are hopefully moving toward more normalcy.  This year the Bike MS will be in ABQ again, but we will be back to a two day ride.  The routes have been significantly reworked to emphasize safety and bike friendliness.

At the 2021 ride!!

Below is the schedule for the Saturday rides.  They are designed to be progressive - so will slowly build in length and intensity through the summer.  There will be an ride on Sunday too, but it is a bit more flexible, and is focused on shorter distances working up to about 50 miles by the end of the summer. Our normal departure time is 6 am from the O'Neill's parking lot on Central!  

SATURDAY RIDE SCHEDULE

6/11	Short city loop + Bike in Coffee	20
6/18	Inner City Loop CW	36.1
6/25	Modified City loop CCW	36.7
7/2	Benalillo Out and Back	43
7/9	City Loop CW	53
7/16	Ride to San Felipe Pueblo	69	As of 5/21, roads north of Algodones still closed
7/23	South 14 + Gutirrez Canyon	63
7/30	Crest Assault from Triangle	26	As of 5/21, crest roads closed
8/6	Ride to Placitas	66
8/13	Santa Fe	63
8/20	Recovery weekend	~55	City Ride of some flavor
8/27	The Ride	0-150	In ABQ

Training Season 2021 - Return of In Person!

It is just about the start of the 12th season of the Penultimates!  It has been a rough year for everyone this year, and I for one am super excited to get back out there and train with people again.  We had a quiet 2020 season, where we broke up into small rides of 4-5 people scattered around town all sort of doing our own thing.  We had social challenges, and kept up with each other via Zoom call and random sightings around town.  We did one big in person ride at our first (and hopefully only) in person, socially distanced, self supported century ride around ABQ, in lieu of a normal in person ride, which had been canceled.

A weird ride, in a weird year, but great being with everyone!

But we are in a different place this year!  The pandemic is receding, the miracle of science vaccine is ready to go, and New Mexico is on its way to 70% vaccination rate.  We are not out of the wood yet, but for those of us that have had the vaccine, life is on its way to returning to normal.  If you are vaccinated, you can be mask free in the outdoors and ride with other people!  (Also free to be with other vaccinated people indoors and out - so seriously get your vaccine if you haven't already).

The BikeMS this year is also in person this year, but this year it will be different.  No two day adventure up in Espanola.  Instead, there will be a one day event in Albuquerque this year (details here) with an option of 22, 44, and 77 miles.

Below is the schedule for the Saturday rides.  There will be an ride on Sunday too, but it is a bit more flexible, and is focused on shorter distances working up to about 50 miles by the end of the summer. Our normal departure time is 6 am from the O'Neill's parking lot on Central!  

6/12	Short city loop + Bike in Coffee	20
6/19	Inner City Loop CW	36.1
6/26	Modified City loop CCW	36.7
7/3	City Loop CW	53
7/10	Ride to San Felipe Pueblo	69	If roads open
7/17	South 14 + Gutirrez Canyon	63
7/24	Crest Assault from Triangle	26	?? Only if people want!
7/31	Ride to Placitas	66
8/7	Santa Fe	63	If Railrunner resumes
8/14	Recovery weekend (City Ride of some flavor)	55
8/21	The Ride?	0-77	(maybe 100?)

Donation Challenge 1: Navajo and Tribal Clinical Relief Support

We are asking for donations this week to benefit a local charity that is helping with the COVID-19 outbreak in local Navajo and Tribal communities.  Donations are made possible through a GoFundMe site and volunteer staff at the University of New Mexico, Community Environmental Health Program (UNM-CEHP) and the Southwest Research and Information Center. 

 

The purpose of this current donation is specifically to send boxes of food to people who have tested positive but are fortunately not sick enough to be admitted to the hospital. Most of the time, these people are quarantining in hotel rooms so they likely won't have access to a stovetop, but will have a microwave. 

Below is a list of items that have been going into each package. This can serve as more of a general guideline for what to purchase. If we get dried pasta, for instance, we will make sure it goes to good use. Really, any grains or beans will be well-received. These donations can be dropped at the CEHP office on campus. It's a converted home on the southeast corner of Marble and Stanford (1000 Stanford NE), and the bins will be under the gazebo in the back.  Groceries will be collected and brought inside daily.

The challenge this week is to donate a bag of the items below! Take a picture of your donation to get credit!  And if that is too much time & effort, we would also count a monetary donation here at the GoFundMe site.  Document your donation to get your points!

• Spam
• Can of meat 
• Soup
• Beans
• Canned fruit
• Vegetables (2 cans)
• Gatorade or juice 
• Peanut butter & jelly jar
• Brown rice and Quinoa
• Canned juice
• Fresh Fruit (orange and apple)
• Potato
• Canned condensed milk 
• Oatmeal or cereal 
• Water (4 bottles)
• Bread 
• Crackers
• Granola bars
• Toilet paper
• Paper towel roll
• Soap (Dish soap and Bar) 
• Cloth Mask
• Hand sanitizer (3oz.)

Week 1 Challenge Scores!

Thanks everyone for participating this week.  On the back end this was probably the most difficult just standing up the backend score collection and final scoring.  But hopefully it should be a smooth process going forward!

Here are the scores for week 1.  This week I assigned 4 points for the riding portion of the challenge and 4 points for the social portion of the challenge.  The scoring system now 3 points for completing the ride and 1 point for either cross training or additional rides.  The social aspect was for spotting other teammates in the wild, taking and sharing pictures (Strava, Facebook, or via email), participating in the virtual happy hour, and doing the challenge.

Next week will be slightly different, 2 points for completing the ride, 1 point for increasing your core ride over last week, and 1 point for extra rides/cross training.  We will also introduce some points for donations/volunteering.

We had a few perfect scores this week!  They are:

• Better Half
• Eric “T1000” Biedermann
• Laura
• Mr. Miyagi
• Pedal Plover
• Snookums
• Wolverine

The gory details are here!  If there is anything missing or incorrect please let me know.  Still working out kinks!

Training in the time of pandemic - the training plan for 2020

In normal times our regularly scheduled training would start this Saturday.  This schedule allows up to build up the mileage to do the full 150 mile ride at the Bike MS on 8/22.  We still don't know if we will have a "real" in person ride or a "virtual" ride this year - hopefully, we will hear soon. (But regardless, we will do it with our normal Penultimate panache!)

Having a team to train with and hold me accountable is basically why I formed the Penultimates 11 years ago!  (It is easier to sleep through your alarm if you are accountable only to yourself.)  So the focus this year is to put together some platform for us to train "together" while apart.  Some details still need to be worked through and things will change as we go, but all of us should be used to that uncertainty by now in the time of pandemic.  So here is our season as we see it:

Health & Safety - I take this really seriously.  No one want to get sick, so we want to minimize our chances of infection.  A great summary of the risks are spelled out here.  Basically - proximity x time = infection.  This is obviously minimized being outside, but still not a zero risk activity.  Also there is evidence that COVID infections can trigger relapses in those that have MS.  No bueno!

Mask policy - Our mandatory team policy is that all riders should be carrying a mask with them on any team event.  At a minimum, you have them for rest stops.  Whether you wear them while riding is up to you, and there is great debate on the efficacy of wearing masks while doing aerobic activity (a NYT article here behind a pay wall here but the short of it, it's hard to wear a mask and little research proving its benefit).

"Group" Rides - There is safety in numbers while riding - beyond companionship - visibility, support, in case of emergencies, etc... and many won't ride by themselves. So the plan is to have small groups of 4-6 people that will be organized geographically.  Each squadron will have 1-2 leaders and 2-4 wing people. As part of this group, we will still maintain social distance (unless you live with the person) when necessary both exercising and taking breaks.  Those training groups will then do the team ride of the week (or whatever they agree upon) when best for the group.  For example, Nob Hill Squadron 1 leaves Sat at 6 am, while the Heights Squadron 1 leaves Sun at 7 am. Our typical ride schedule is posted here, and I think we can do most rides safely with the exception of the ride to Santa Fe.  Rest stops are the biggest question now, but we will figure it out as we go.

Social Media - This is a tool we should use to the maximum this year. If you are on Strava we already have a Penultimates team and you can see the rides and activities that others do.  If you are on Facebook we will do lots of challenges related to posting fun pictures from our rides and events.

Special events - We are organizing a scavenger hunt for one of the weekends.  In this, you will need to decipher the clues and ride to every feature and take a picture to prove you were there.  We will have metrics for doing it the first, the fastest, with the most style, solo and team, etc...

Team Challenge 2020 - Combining all the above together - we are finalizing a team challenge that will take place every weekend this summer.  Participation can take many forms, and will not be only centered around mileage (you may be able to participate while never getting on a bike). We are making a scoring system to incentive participation.  So points for say:  

• completing the weekend ride
• completing any weekday rides
• increasing your mileage/elevation over your last weeks training
• taking fun pictures, seeing other riders out in the wild, etc..
• participation in social media (posting pictures etc..)
• bringing new riders along (provided you don't violate our small team model)
• attending a weekly virtual team happy hour Saturday evenings
• donations to BikeMS and other local charities 

We hope to have weekly prizes, and of course, the always important bragging rights.  We also have vague plans to design a 2020 quarantine jersey which you will be eligible for it you participate!

I want to participate! - Look, times are weird, right? But likely you are not traveling anywhere this summer, and most activities are cancelled.  So regardless of your comfort level regarding riding, we hope you can join us and participate in some way!  Because of the increased effort organizing everything this year, I will need to collect some information.  So if you are interested in riding to please click here and fill out the form ASAP and use the best email address to communicate with you!  It's just a few questions and should take less than 5 minute. 

Thanks everyone!  

David aka Captain Snookums

Training Season 2020 - Quarentine Edition

Strange days, these...

At the start of our 11th season we are in a weird position.  The state of the 2020 ride is still uncertain.  All BikeMS events through July 15th are virtual, and we really don't know what will happen with ours.  It might be a virtual event, which certainly requires less training!

I founded this team long ago because I trained by myself for one season and made every mistake one could do.  I learned by trial and error.  The Penultimates prides ourselves as a no drop team where anyone of any level can come out and get to learn cycling.  We are more a family now with riders participating multiple years, and we always pick up new riders every year that end up in this camp.

However, this year will be different because of the COVID-19 global pandemic.  We won't be able to so 20-30 people rides like we are used to.  But we are figuring out what we can do to engage everyone and provide a support and accountability to your fitness goals this summer.  I know personally that I am unlikely to wake up at 6 am every Saturday to ride unless I am accountable to people, so that is my driver.

The exact details are still being worked out, but we will still have a suggest distance and ride for every weekend.  We will likely be trying out different combinations of small 2-5 member teams that will ride socially distantly to minimize our risks.  We will be running a team wide challenge as all to keep us all accountable and have bonus points you can earn every week that will be fun and keep us engaged as a team, even though we might be riding alone.

A picture from the before times where your only risk getting this close was B.O., not respitory illness.

So stay tuned, we will update this as we decide what our season will look like.  Here is our yearly training schedule and we may stick pretty close to it.  Our normal departure time is 6 am from O'Neill's but we will see this year!

6/13	Short city loop + Bike in Coffee	20
6/20	Inner City Loop CW	36.1
6/27	Modified City loop CCW	36.7
7/4	City Loop CW	53
7/11	Ride to San Felipe Pueblo	69
7/18	South 14 + Gutirrez Canyon	63
7/25	Crest Assault from Triangle	26
8/1	Ride to Placitas	66
8/8	Santa Fe	63	Unlikely this year
8/15	Recovery weekend (City Ride of some flavor)	55
8/22	The Ride?	0-150	Maybe?