Oh sweet rest, how I missed you.

 

Today is the first day I've had off the bike in close to two weeks.  A steady dose of Endurance, Tempo, and Threshold intervals have torn me up to the point where I am a ready to sit on the couch and be a sloth.  Both my wife and I are fighting off the lingering crud that seems to impact most people in an office place this time of year which just seems to sap your energy.  It took some goading from teammates to get out yesterday for a freaking recovery ride....

The good news is that all the work is paying off already.  Knee recovery is doing very well and the muscles are getting stronger every day.  My fitness is catching up to where it needs to be and I'm at least able to hang with the team on our rides the past few weeks.  I hope to be back to where I was last year by mid May.

In non bike related news, holy cow what a game.  My mom is from Pittsburgh and my dad went to University of Pitt for his Masters degree, so I grew up in a Steelers household.  That coupled with living in the Boston area during the 80's and 90's where the Patriots were so bad the games were blacked out meant that Pitt was my favorite NFL team growing up.  While I don't watch the NFL all that often, I still follow them and I was excited to see them win their 5th title a few years ago.  (In an interesting twist of fate Dennis Dixon, the former QB from Oregon, was drafted by them this year so I paid them a bit more attention to see if he played.)

This game had all the makings of a historic clash.  AZ was the first 9 win team to make it to the big game in years.. Warner having a resurgence.. the Steelers' defense doing what it does year in and year out.  This was one year the game held my interest over the commercials!  (Which I think were really bad this year.) The last 5 minutes of the game had my heart racing.  I thought AZ had finally figured out the Steelers vaunted D and the Steelers offense had burnt its last match in the third quarter.  But like sports have done so many times in the past, the greatest stage creates the greatest comebacks.