My daily shot of adreniline

Last night Jeremy came home from the velodrome with quite the story. While he was waiting for his open track time to start, he was watching the end of an intermediate class (like what I'm taking). The instructor was having the class do a very difficult race, something Jeremy didn't try until the advanced class. And when Jeremy tried it, there were only 4 people on the track and last night there were 7. What it came down to was the race was supposed to end with a two lap sprint. There were 2 or 3 people in front sprinting it out and one of them lost their line and took down the others. Then there were still 5 people on the track that had to avoid the pileup on an 8 lane track. One guy ended up taking out the instructor. In the end, there were 3 broken bikes and one broken collar bone.

And then today, I had my track class. And luckily, I have a sane instructor - who was quite shocked at what that class was doing. And I was the only one the class (making crashing into others slightly more difficult). But I had my own "oh shit" moment today. We were doing a drill where we were riding slowly and stopping at the top of the track on the straights. Riding slowly is actually pretty hard because you need to ride about 15-18 mph to keep traction with the track. And so your natural inclination is to ride at least 18 mph. I was having trouble going slow and stopping and on one curve I overshot and forgot I was on a track. Suddenly I found myself doing a real live track stand on the corner - on the 45 deg bank, about 10 feet above the apron. My first reaction was to clip out and put my foot down but thankfully I overcame that urge. I pointed my bike down the curve and somehow managed not to slip. I still don't know how I didn't slide out and now, even 7 hours later, I'm still buzzing from the adrenaline a little. Or, that could just be a beer buzz, I did go to a Rally sponsored happy hour this afternoon. Free daycare, free tapas, and a free drink at Laudisio's. I heart my gym.

And in running news, my running group is now over. The group was mostly for some women doing Ironman Arizona, which is the weekend after Thanksgiving. I still have my running plan but I guess I'm on my own now. Yesterday I did 10 x 400 by myself and it was very lonely. And I didn't want to run on a track in the dark by myself, so I went in the morning and marked out 1/4 of a mile an a flat, straight road by myself. Tomorrow I have 10 x 30 second hill repeats and the Saturday is a 5k race.