The final two “stages” of my Spring Break week were comprised of some solid LT work indoors on Friday on the TT bike, to simulate a 50-minute time trial effort, and then a full-on 200km ride on Saturday. The summary:

• Stage 7: 45km TT, 277 W, 117 TSS (including warm-up)
• Stage 8: 200km, 213 W, 322 TSS

Friday’s workout was nothing that spectacular, other than being hard but fortunately much shorter than the 3-4 hour rides I had been doing. Fatigue from the rest of the week was definitely setting in, and the rain forced me indoors. So much for that sweet weather and mountain stage I had planned. It wasn’t worth driving out there if the weather wasn’t going to cooperate.

Saturday was a tour of four or five surrounding counties with my buddy Rodney. The weather was cool & overcast, the roads damp from Friday’s rains, but it didn’t rain on us during the ride. On the whole we kept it pretty easy-going, just getting in the miles and burning some major calories. The nicest parts of the ride were a section of closed road crossing an old steel bridge, badly in need of repair, but completely passable by bike. Then had a wonderful fast, flat section travelling north from Clover to Phenix. When I got to Farmville, it was a quick stop at the cafe for a coffee and pastry celebration, then home for a shower and a whole lot of rest! My Epic Week was done! Grand total was about 875 kilometers (about 545 miles) and 28.5 hours of riding for 8 days straight.