Had a good follow-up ride to WNW, which turned out to be a nice hammerfest of a hill ride thanks to Brandon Manske (Cat 3, soon to be Cat 2) of Balanced Cycling. That dude has been putting some time in during this spell of crappy weather we’ve been grudgingly referring to as “spring.”

My knee felt decent during the ride, much of it attributable to 800 mg of Ibuprofen and some KT tape. It’s tough for me to hold anything back, especially when a guy like Brandon shows up for the first time to WNW after I invite him. There’s a need to show him what this sprinting and climbing ride is all about. Well, he showed us:

Midway through the ride I remembered that I was going to raise my seat post a couple millimeters. I took care of that, and I’m thinking it’s helping. This is where Mark Long comes in (one of my REI cycling brethren). Previously, I had lowered my seat post to accommodate for the lower stack height of the Bont a-two road shoes I picked up for this season. Mark suggested that maybe that wasn’t the right correction, given my sudden knee issue. I’m hoping you’re right, Mark!

I’m still icing after each ride, and heat treating in the morning. Kind of some guess-timation work, but I think it’s helping. I’m wearing that KT tape during each ride to support the knee also. The last two rides, the knee has felt like garbage to start, but seems to get warmed up and locked in rhythm after about 30 minutes.

Racing will be another story, I’m sure. I’m hoping none of my fellow racers read this. There’s a good chance they won’t. Their loss! Although, the knee has been hampering the amount of miles I’ve been able to put in so much that I’m really not a threat out there yet anyway.

Once I get out of a rhythm, which happens constantly during races, it takes me much longer than I would like to adjust to a new pace, and the power just isn’t there yet. The more power I put on that bad knee, the more pain I get. Who knows when it will be close to 100 percent again. I’m getting more optimistic, but the gains are minimal.

Oh yeah, I almost forgot. As I was riding west on Old Excelsior Blvd. through Minnetonka, a Garmin Transitions dude passed me doing at least 23 mph on a mountain bike, so I decided to tail him about 50 feet back to see what this animal was up to. Going around Christmas Lake (it gets narrow there) we both almost clipped an OUCH Maxxis dude hammering around the tight turns in the opposite direction. What’s with all the pro kits in Minneto…oh right, MinneTONKA.