Wet Mercer Island Saturday Loop

It was about 44 degrees (F), and raining today. Perfect almost-spring riding weather, and a good warmup for tomorrow's 100km Populaire.

So I went out in the mid afternoon rain, decked out in wool knickers, two underlayer t-shirts, and my long sleeve SIR jersey. Even in the light rain it felt great. So far, I'm loving the fact that most of the terrible weather is over. Well, at least that's what I'm hoping. Last year it seems like it was cold all the way up until May/June..

An extra layer between my shoes & the semi-waterproof booties (plastic bag pieces):


The Ciocc on Lake Wa Blvd.


I think this was 19th Ave, somewhere around there heading up Capitol Hill. I took Crescent Ave off of 23rd (which sucks to ride up), which was a decent climb.
This was a "short but hard" ride - 44 km or so, 28 km/h average speed. I actually averaged 30 km/h for the first hour or so (from the hill around Mercer), which was the highest I've done in a while. But that was no accident, as I used the heart rate monitor to keep the BPMs around 180 or so (90% of max HR, or the upper edge of zone 4). Like they say, I'm trying to "make the hard rides harder, and the easy rides easier."

It was probably best that this was a solo ride, considering the drool/snot that riding hard seemed to generate.

But I think the (semi-structured) training has been paying off. My Functional Threshold has risen to a new level as of today, 3.25 w/kg (228 watts / 69.5 kg).

It's a decent improvement over my last best of 3.10 w/kg, a 4% increase. Nothing major, but something! I'll take it.