Riding Up Hills...

I felt better on the bike today than I have at anytime in the last five years. I rode in the long way this morning and there is a mile long hill towards the end of the ride that I watch my time on.

Hold on, back up, back in the old days, when Lee and I or Mike and I would ride all over the Eastside, I could climb hills like a mountain goat. I loved climbing the hills on my bike, the bigger and the steeper the better. Inglewood Hill Road was a fave, as was 24th from 40th to 132nd, and of course 51st and 70th.

FWIW - 70th was the first King of the Mountains points back when they had the Road Nationals in Redmond, the other points were had at the top of the hill on 116th above the soccer fields.

Anywho, the first time I timed myself coming up this particular hill I was getting up in about 6 minutes and the best time I had managed before this morning was 5:15, I made it in under 5 minutes today! (4:48). It may not sound like much to you, but for me to see an improvement in my climbing ability like that is HUGE. You'd be surprised how much having one lung can hamper your ability to put the large muscle groups into hard labor.

Then at lunch I decided to ride halfway to Moscow and back, it's a 12 mile ride, and on the way back onto campus I decided to try to climb the steepest hill on campus, College Street from Riverview to Spokane, it's about a quarter mile from bottom to Spokane at a 24% grade! This is a street that is too steep to open in the winter and the sidewalks have stairs on them. For you folks in Seattle, it's like riding up Madison from First to Second down by Pioneer Square. I felt like I was going to explode, but I was able to make it to the top and back to Bohler in one piece.

After that, the ride home after work up Larry Street and it's 5% grade was a piece of cake. Or at least that's my story and I'm sticking to it...