To Ride, or Not to Ride, the Rockies???

Steven and the Mayor and the small ones were in town last weekend, and I was hoping that I would get the skinny on the feasibility of the Ride the Rockies for old Norman.

I haven't truly committed to the idea of RTR yet.

Part of me is like, "oh, suck it up and do it. It will be hard, but you will be so glad you did."

And the other part of me is like, "are you f-ing insane? You haven't really lost any weight. It is only four months away, and you don't even know what a mountain ride looks like, let alone feels like. Don't be ridiculous."

(Of course, all this hemming and hawing might be moot because O'dells hasn't emailed me back.)

I was hoping that with some face-to-face contact with my mountain dwelling friends, I'd get some clarity.

First, I hoped we get a nice long chat in on the ride up to Ames, where we went to watch a basketball game. Unfortunately, there was an epic blizzard, so my comments were limited to, "uh-huh," and "oh shit," as I piloted the car north.

When we did broach the topic, if I may summarize what I took away from Steven's thoughts on the RTR, she was wavering as much as I am. Sometimes she seemed pretty suspicious. Then she suggested we just "flip a coin" to decide whether I do it nor not. She did say that she thinks that it will require the reappearance of "Super crazy Juice Norman."

This was a bit surprising. Normally when I suggest anything to Steven, I get a "c'mon, Normie!" or a "you can drive heave _______ miles/climbs/ISU basketball games." But not this time. There was more than plenty hesitation in her tone.

The Mayor too often scoffs as my fear with a casual flip of the wrist and a "meh," and a "you'll be fine." Not this time though. He kept saying, "Man, Normie. It was impossible to convince you to do the Copper Triangle. Now you want to do the Ride the Rockies!?!" He also kept saying, "that first day scares me," and "after I did the Triple ByPass I didn't want to move the next day."

The thing is that I don't want to ride the Rockies, per say. I was pretty intimidated by TOMROV which was my original plan for that time frame. It is just that this opportunity came up, and I feel the timing begs for serious consideration. I don't want to whimp out, but I also don't want to humiliate myself in front of a bunch of fit Coloradians and mar their ride with my impending heart attack.

I will admit, I am probably overly cautious about most things. I can't remember who said it but either Steven or the Mayor commented on me and the Tiger by saying, "that is not a house with a lot of confidence in it."

True.

But, typically, the way this goes down is I say, "I'm scared of _______" and Steven and the Mayor tell me that I am being ridiculous. Not this time.

This, of course, counter balances Masinga's opinion, which is "you can do it!"

And, the new-math provided by the Ranger:

You had a 4000 foot day last year so only 3 of those days are more, and the last one climbs early then mostly downhill. Survive day one and conserve 2,3,4. Grind day 5 and only Loveland to go!

(He is comparing RTR to last year's Ragby.)

I don't even know what he is saying, but it sounds promising, right?

(The Tiger thinks it is too expensive and I should just do a hard one-day randonee instead.)

I do have the time. I do have the money. But is this even possible? I just don't know...

So, I started looking around for training schedules, you know, just to get an idea...

Actually, I don't know if this is for RTR. I found it on a blog who claimed it was for RTR. Let's just pretend that it is for RTR.

Okay, not too bad. No more than 5 rides per week. The longest week is 185 miles. Seems doable...oh wait.

That schedule starts on February 25th (Saturday)--that's fifteen weeks. So, that would mean this schedule would start on Saturday, February 22nd.

Did I mention the blizzards we have survive and have planned for this week? Monday, Thursday, and Saturday?

The other plan I found is a 12-weeker, which the blog that I stole this from claims is from Outside magazine, and is the "harder version" of the training plan.

Can someone just explain to me where people are doing intervals? Do you find a nice open stretch of road or something? Do you ride their or drive your bike there? Do people do intervals on bike trails? Can someone program my computer for me?

On the positive side, if I managed to somehow survive the RTR, then both RAGBRAI and the Copper Triangle would be a piece of cake, so says Steven and the Mayor. So maybe I could skip all the other training I was going to do this summer and just pack it into one week?

I just don't know.

I am game for working hard, doing my best, and just seeing what the hell happens, but I don't feel like I know how hard it is going to be, so I don't know if I even know how to train for something like this? There are known knowns and there are unknown knowns, you know?

Meh.

You know what else I don't know? When and where are we going to do the Brewery 100?

Oh, gentle readers, do you know what I should do? Put it in the comments.