Sunday, July 13, 2008

Inspired

I've been catching the Tour de France at night before I go to bed. It's amazing to see the speed these guys are going. First, they're riding hundreds of km's per day and secondly they're sustaining speeds I can barely hit.

Lately I've been pushing to see how fast I can get home from work. I did 5km in 8:46 (avg of 34.22 km/hr) and the other day I hit a new PB top speed of 57.5 km/hr (yes, a downhill was involved). Today I set a new best for my time home, 5km in 8:02 (avg of 37.34 km/hr). There was a great tail wind and I was running late, so I just pushed it the whole way. The bike makes an incredible sound at that speed. The tire hiss, the road is almost smoother and the pedaling feels effortless. But I couldn't keep that up for more than half an hour.

The Tour riders sustain speeds over 45km/hr for hours at a time. It's insane. Yesterday, in the rain, they were pushing 55 km/hr on flat ground at the end of hours on the road. How is that even possible?

2 comments:

Unknown said...

I've seen highlight clips here and there and their speeds freak me out! I know what it feels like to do 38.8 on my bike (downhill, in rush hour traffic no less) but only for short bursts.

Cliff said...

Their speed is very impressive.

I am most impress with the mountains they have to climb :)

Crazy crazy stuff.