Spin Class Redux

Now that I've showered, eaten (awesome omelets a la Stuart) and had a nap, I'm ready to think rationally about today's workout.

The planned workout today was a 3hr bike ride, which I knew wasn't going to happen either outside or on the trainer. Best we could hope for was to drag ourselves out of bed and do the 8:30 and 10am spin classes back to back, shooting for at least 2 and 1/2hrs. We succeeded in obeying the alarm clock, and were on the spin bikes and pedaling away by 8:20. Good start! First hour was pretty good - a motivating instructor, someone who acknowledged that she was a cyclist and therefore did cycling-like workouts. I held back a bit, knowing I had a much longer workout scheduled than the instructor did, and redlining it for the first hour would make the next 90min sheer hell. Holding back didn't mean soft-pedaling, though...my quads were burning by 9:30.

First class over, all but one other girl cleared out. Stuart and I took quick turns refilling our water bottles and popped a couple of shot bloks with a nice Zone 2 effort.

Second instructor arrives, this class is much more full than the previous one. She asks if anyone minds if we use an 80s mix. I'm a little skeptical, but what the heck. First song comes on and it's "Kyrie Eleison", which I happen to love and is on my iPod. So, I'm smiling. The hour goes really quickly - she actually chose a great selection of music, but I'm less than thrilled with her. To me, when the instructor says "On a scale of 1-10, with 10 as the toughest, spin at a 5." Ok, I'm there. "Now, crank it to an 8 and speed up! Now to a 10. And then harder still!". Um, wasn't 8 supposed to be really damn hard, and 10 has me about to die and fall off my bike? Then how come you are still spinning at 90rpm and you want me to go even harder than 10 which is supposed to be the hardest amount of resistance I can still pedal against? We decided on the way home that instructor girl wasn't very good at faking working hard, or at understanding what a RPE scale is about.

In any event, we survived the second hour. Didn't get the full 3hrs, but I did the equivalent of 40-something miles of biking. And boy are we feeling it! This is the longest nonstop ride I've done since October. A good kick in the pants that I have a half ironman in less than 4 months.