Monday, March 19, 2012

It’s been a quiet past couple of weeks


I know, I know… the blog has been quiet too.  They say that for a blog to be successful, you should blog as often as you eat.  (I read that in a blog.)  Well, I kept it up for a couple of month anyway, but now even my once-a-day goal is pretty well shot.  And it’s probably just as well—it takes some of the pressure off.  But Brenda is still riding, and the 5,000 mile goal is still on. 

This has been a quiet bike-month though.  Through the first 2 weeks of the month Brenda had only been out riding 4 times for a grand total of 101 miles.  Yikes.  Good thing she had those fat weeks in February.  We made up for it a little bit last week though.  She went out for 42 miles on Thursday, and then we went out Friday for a 75-miler.  75 miles!  This was her longest ride ever, and she did great.  Traffic in town was a little bit heavier than it is on a typical weekend morning, but by the time we got out of town (headed to Ft. Christmas) traffic lightened up to the usual.  It’s so rural out there—there’s no more traffic during the week than there is on the weekend.  There was a little bit of wind out of the east—we were riding about 14 mph on the way out there, and then we were flying at 20 mph or so on the way back.  All things considered though, it was a great ride.  It was just the two of us, and we planned out our stops, and took a bunch of food with us.  We stopped at a Barnies coffee shop on the way out, then at about the 35-mile mark we stopped to get a gallon of water (the timing on that turned out to be perfect—we had both just emptied our bottles just a little bit before that.)  And then we thought about stopping at a Starbucks on the home stretch, but as we talked about it we realized that there is a Chick-Fil-A right next to that Starbucks.  At that point food was winning out over drink, so at the 68-mile mark we turned our bikes right into the Chick-Fil-A drive through and placed our order.  (I thought they might give us some grief over having bikes in the drive-through, but they were ok with it.)  And nothing tastes better on a long bike ride than real, hot food.  Yum.

So in 2 days Brenda got in about 20% more miles than she had the whole previous 2 weeks.  She’s probably still a little bit behind for this month, but it’d only be a little bit, and I think overall she’s still in good shape to make the goal.  We might have to take this weekend off (have a trip out of town planned) but the weather looks good for the week, so she might be able to get in a fair week in spite of not having the weekend.  And this is a 5-Saturday month, so that’s another help.  But it’ll be interesting to see if she’ll be able to match last month.  It’ll definitely be a come-from-behinder if she does!

Thursday, March 8, 2012

...and another flat tire


Maybe the epidemic isn’t over yet.  Brenda got another flat tire this morning, but this one was very unusual—it was on the front tire. 

I remember the first time I got a flat tire it was on the back and I thought, “Wouldn’t you know it—a 50-50 chance and I get it on the back tire…”  (It’s just a little more annoying to change a flat on the back tire because you have to deal with chain and the derailleur.)  As it turns out, nothing could be farther from the truth; it’s nothing even close to 50-50.  ALL of my flat tires, in all my years of riding, have been in the back tire.  And every time I’ve been on a ride where somebody else got a flat, it’s always been in the back tire.  I think it’s because that’s where so much of the weight is.  The front wheel can roll right up over a piece of glass or a little sticker or something and not really bear into it.  But when the back wheel goes up onto something sharp, nearly all of the rider's weight is pushing that wheel right down onto that sharp thing.  Ouch.  If I was a bike tire, I’d definitely want to be a front one.

So now here’s Brenda, breaking the mold again.  I was so surprised when she said it was the front tire that went out.  But then, that’s Brenda.  If it’s different, she’s right there in the middle of it.  And I love it!  All these years, and she’s the first flat front I’ve ever known about.  That’s my girl!

Tuesday, March 6, 2012

Back in the saddle again


Ok, after the weekend of wind it was back on the road again…in the wind.  This time of year you kind of expect a little wind, but dang, this is crazy.  Today probably wasn’t quite as windy as Saturday night & Sunday morning, but it was still more than you’d like to have on a riding day.  And they’re predicting more of the same through the end of the week.  This is what I mean when I say this sport is so weather-dependent. 

And after a camping weekend, it always takes a few days to get back into the swing.  Brenda got up this morning thinking much more about more sleep than about more bike riding so she didn’t ride out to the ride—I just put her bike in the car and she drove out there.  She said it was kind of a goofy ride today—the ride leader called and said he was sick, and without a shepherd the sheep got a little scattered.  Not that this particular ride leader is the best at keeping everybody together, but for whatever reason the group was kind of all over the map this morning.  So Brenda did her best in spite of the conditions, and made it home safely.  And as long as nobody got hurt and everybody made it back ok, then it qualifies as a good ride, even though it had it’s down side.

So let’s see what Thursday brings.  That’ll be the next regular riding day, and the last early morning start before we go back on Daylight Saving Time.  Here’s hoping we get back to that good-ride routine.

Monday, March 5, 2012

Three days with the bikes, zero miles


Well, we took the bikes on our little camping trip this weekend, but we didn't manage to get in the first mile on them.  We knew we were taking a bit of a chance on finding a campsite since we didn’t have a reservation anywhere, but it was a risk we were willing to take.  Every now and then you just roll the dice.  As it turned out, we got campsites on both Friday night and Saturday night, but at two different campgrounds, which meant that we had to do twice as much setup and tear-down as we had intended.  The end result—no riding all weekend.  We didn’t ride on Friday because it took us most of the day to figure out when we were going to stay where (and besides, it was really windy.)  We didn’t ride on Saturday because we had to move to the new campground in the morning (and besides, it was really, really windy.)  And we didn’t ride on Sunday because immediately after we broke camp (in fact about five minutes before we completely finished) it poured down rain (and besides, it was...you know, windy.)  Pretty much all weekend long there were sustained 25 mph winds with 30 to 40 mph gusts.  And as bad as that kind of thing is for riding, trust me—it’s just as bad for camping. 

And I didn’t take the computer with me, but even if I had, we weren't really in a wi-fi area, so there were no blog entries either.  I honestly wanted to blog every day this year, but it looks like that didn’t really work out too pretty good.  Oh well.  I hope the two of you that are reading this blog will forgive me. 

So tomorrow Brenda should be able to get back to the routine.  It’s a regular riding day, and I think the weather is supposed to be ok.  (Good thing she’s got all those miles in the bank, eh?)

Thursday, March 1, 2012

Time to change it up again


Well, it’s March now, which, around here anyway, means that we can pretty much put away the long sleeved jerseys, arm warmers, tights, and jackets.  It’s back to the short sleeves or sleeveless jerseys, and it’s also time to go back to the summer-time hydrating principles.  Brenda went out this morning with her usual 2 water bottles, but she ran out about 4 or 5 miles from the end of the 45-mile ride.  Warmer weather means more water, and moving into a different season of the feeding system.  So she was really really hot and really really thirsty when she got back home this morning.

One of the cycling magazines has a fun page in each edition where they ask a fun kind of question like “If your bike could talk, what would it say?”  Then the readers write in their responses and the next issue of the magazine publishes the best answers.  One in particular that I remember was “How did you first know you were a serious cyclist?”  There were responses like “I knew I was a serious cyclist when I skipped a mortgage payment in order to buy a bike,” and “I knew I was a serious cyclist when I found myself squatting over a mirror naked to look at my first saddle sore.”  Brenda said that she had an answer for that question after today’s ride.  She said “You know you’re a serious cyclist when you come home dehydrated and you still put your bike away first, before getting a drink.  Then you also know you’re a serious cyclist when you down a whole bottle of water while you’re taking off you cycling clothes and putting them in the washer, and then you also know you’re a serious cyclist when you take a whole second bottle of water into the shower with you.  Yep—time to move into a different season of the feeding system.

Brenda has one of those Camel Back hydration backpacks that she really likes.  It’s been in the closet since last summer, and now it’s probably time to get it back out again.  Oh, we’ll still probably have another cold day or two before it gets hot for good.  But in general, it’s time to start getting ready; the heat is on the way.  But you know what we say:  We’re tough.  We can handle it.

Wednesday, February 29, 2012

Riding out of town


The thing about a year-long goal like Brenda’s 5,000-miler is that it can tend to get goofed up if you get out of a routine.  (That’s what prompted me to think about the “…and still staying sane” part of this blog.)  We like cycling a lot.  But that’s not all we like to do.  We also like camping, and kayaking, and traveling, and going to the Farmer’s Market on Saturday mornings, and spending weekends away, and stuff like that.  I think that people who meet a 5,000-mile cycling goal (or at least those who easily meet it) often don’t do much else that year.  But we’ve got plans to still do other stuff too.

Like this weekend for example—we’re planning on taking our little teardrop camper over to the beach on Friday, and spend Friday night, Saturday, and Saturday night incognito.  So here’s the question:  do we take the bikes or not?  (Actually, we’ve even thought about taking both the bikes and our tandem kayak.)  Taking the bikes on out-of-town weekend trips is fun because you get to ride in new areas and on roads you’ve never ridden on before.  But sometimes taking the bikes on out-of-town weekend trips is kind of scary because you have to ride in new areas and on roads you’ve never ridden on before.  I’ve done a lot of out-of-town event rides, so I’m pretty much used to it by now.  But on those rides, somebody else has (at least theoretically) done a lot of research to find bike-friendly roads.  When we do it by ourselves we’re on the hook for finding our own places to ride.

Now, this is one of the good things about local cycling clubs—if you can hook up with one of them, you can often join them on one of their regular rides.  I’ve done this before on a trip to Gainesville to visit my parents.  This works out really well because somebody else has already done the research, and you get to ride with a group.  The trick is you have to make sure your ability matches up with the group's ability.  When I rode in Gainesville I found a B group, and I hung with them for most of the ride, but got dropped about 5 miles from the end.  (Good thing I had a map, so I could find my way back to the car.)

So I think we’ll take the bikes, but we’ll have to see if we’ll be able to hook up with a good C group over there.  If not, we’ll just have to see what we can do.  Either way it’ll be alright—we’ll be able to ride with each other, and that’s what counts!

Tuesday, February 28, 2012

Statistics time


Two months into it.  One sixth down.  16.7 %.  (Yeah, I know there is one more day in February this year, but Brenda doesn’t have any plans to ride tomorrow, so it looks today was the end of this riding month.)
So here’s where she stands—1,154 miles, or 23%.  Not bad… 23% of the miles in less than 17% of the time.  February actually turned out to be a pretty good month.  She rode 14 days in January and 15 days in February.  Here’s the breakdown:

January: 
-  14 rides
-  553 total miles
-  Average 39.5 miles per ride
-  Longest ride, 60 miles
-  Shortest ride, 24 miles
-  Average speed, 14.7 mph
-  Fastest speed, 16.1 mph
-  Slowest speed, 13.9 mph

February:
-  15 rides
-  601 total miles
-  Average 40.0 miles per ride
-  Longest ride, 65 miles
-  Shortest ride, 25 miles
-  Average speed, 14.9 mph
-  Fastest speed, 16.3 mph
-  Slowest speed, 14.1 mph

She’s making progress on all counts!  I remember last summer when she started, it was a big deal to get out to the 24- or 25-mile mark.  Now she considers anything under 30 to be a short ride.  She’s deliberately not really working on speed right now, and I’ve encouraged her that she doesn’t have to.  Unless you’re a racer (and we’re not) speed doesn’t really matter just as long as you can keep up with, and pull from time to time, the group you want to ride with.  I keep track of average speed because I think it’s a real good indicator of the “strength” of a ride (that is, how strong we felt on it.)  But if she's anything like me, she won’t have to work on speed—her average speed will just naturally go up as she gets in more and more miles.

So now it’s on to March and the 25% mark.  We’d like for this to be a good month because it’s in April that she starts teaching her swim lessons, and then she won’t have time for the weekday morning rides.  Let’s see what we can work out to take their place…

Monday, February 27, 2012

Road or trail?


On several occasions in this blog about riding on roads, I’ve mentioned something about riding on trails.  I understand this may have some readers wondering, “What’s up with that—I thought road riders didn’t like to take their bikes off road?”  Well, that’s right… we don’t.  But we’ve got two kinds of trails around here. 

There are the off-road trails that the mountain bikers use.  But then there are also the trails that are part of the Rails-to-Trails efforts.  I’m not sure if this is nation-wide, or if it’s something that they’re just doing here in Florida, but here’s what they’ve done.  There are a lot of old, abandoned railroad tracks around.  Somebody got the great idea to rip out the rails and the ties, and then pave the surface with asphalt.  The result is a “road” about 10 feet wide, on which no motor vehicles are allowed.  How cool is that?  Of course, like anything else, trails have a good side and a not-so-good side.  The good side is that you can ride for miles and miles without having to pat attention to a single car.  The not-so-good side is that everybody likes the trails.  So even though you don’t have any cars to deal with, you do have to pay attention to things like joggers, people walking their dogs, squirrels taunting the dogs because apparently they know the dogs are on leashes, roller bladers, little kids chasing things, people pushing strollers, and various other people who may or may not realize the implications of 10 or 15 cyclists riding toward them at 15-18 mph. 

Some people in our group prefer riding on the trails to riding on roads.  For others, it’s just the opposite.  My roots are strictly on the roads, but Brenda has kind of grown up with this group that is about half and half.  So I’m getting used to riding on the trails.  They’re not so bad, really—you do have to go a lot slower on the trails than you can on a road.  But I’m getting used to it—in fact there is one section of trail that Brenda and I have come to appreciate enough that we are starting to work it into our default ride.  It’s just another aspect of the variety that we both so appreciate about cycling.  And who doesn’t love a little variety every now and then?

Sunday, February 26, 2012

Don't spit like a girl


Road riding, like most things I suppose, has a certain etiquette associated with it.  There are some things that are acceptable, and some things that, no matter what group you’re riding with, will probably be considered non-preferred.  Of course two of the most important are: no snot rockets at the front of the line, and don’t spit like a girl. 

On long rides, and especially early in the morning, it’s not uncommon for one’s nose to sooner or later start dripping like a faucet.  Thankfully, cycling gloves are usually made with a terry cloth section around the thumb that works real well for wiping sweat or whatever else might need to be wiped from time to time.  But every now and then the only thing that really works is holding a finger on one nostril and blowing a good shot out of the other.  The only thing is… please wait till you’re at the back of the line for this.  As helpful as this procedure is for the shooter, it’s usually that annoying for the next two or three people in the line. 

Now sometimes it’s not so much that your nose gets too wet, it’s that your mouth gets too dry.  And what is it about this that so often makes people want to spit?  I’ve ridden entire century rides without ever having an irresistible urge to spit.  But apparently this is one thing that hits different people differently because I’ve also been on rides where sooner or later somebody feels a need to spit in very dramatic fashion.  Ok, fine.  Go ahead and spit.  Just don’t spit like a girl.  You know—make it a good clean shot out to the side.  None of that spraying stuff that ends up going as far back as it does out.  Yuck. 

In fact, that’s another thing that is probably better left until you’re in the back of the line.  And actually, that’s one of the good things about being in back.  You can kind of do your own thing when you’re in the back.  Eat, drink, look around, adjust things…  Yeah, sometimes that’s the best place to be.

Saturday, February 25, 2012

Windy but good


We finished a good, strong 49-mile ride this morning in spite of a very stiff wind.  The club had planned a ride out toward Altamonte Springs today using a couple of roads (including North Street) that are typically kind of notorious for traffic.  As soon as I saw the map for this ride (earlier in the week) my first thought was “I don’t know about that—that road is very much a 1-out-of-3 road.”  Yeah, the road surface may be good, but there is absolutely no shoulder, and even early on a Saturday morning I was pretty sure there would be way more traffic than would be safe.  So Brenda and I said starting about Tuesday that we weren’t going to do that ride.  Several other people felt the same way, but in the end, only Brenda & I, and one other guy opted for something safer.

The three of us left from the same shopping center parking lot that the rest of the group would leave from, but we left about a half hour ahead of them.  We went out on some very familiar roads, going in the exact opposite direction—out toward Oviedo.  There was a very strong wind out of the north for most of the day, but otherwise the weather was pretty nice.  Temperatures were in the low 60s, and it was a little bit cloudy, but not rain clouds, and we had some sun too.  We went out with no specific plan in mind—we just wanted to stay on roads that we were familiar with and felt safe on.  At about the 18-mile mark we pulled into a coffee shop with outdoor tables and sat and talked about it for awhile.  This is one of the really fun things about non-club rides—you get to go out and just kind of make it up as you go along.  After awhile we decided on a route, and headed back out. 

We had a great ride, and Brenda had some really strong, 17 mph pulls against a very stiff cross-wind toward the end of the ride.  I love being able to bail out of the lead and know that she is not only comfortable with, but fully capable of taking over.  (In fact I think she even picked up our pace a little.)  When we got back to the start-finish parking lot, the other group was there.  I was curious to find out what they thought about riding down North Street, and out under I-4 on 434.  Before I even got a chance to ask, they jumped all over it—“We’ll never do this ride again!”  Ok…I had a feeling that was going to be the case.  I’m glad we went out on our own.  Bike clubs are a great thing, and I’m a big fan of clubs in general and this one in particular.  But you still have to use your own judgment.  

Friday, February 24, 2012

What about Lance?


What’s all this stuff about professional bike racers and drugs, anyway?  Sometimes it seems that professional cycling is even worse than professional baseball.  One winner after another has been accused of doping, and even Lance Armstrong’s name has been mentioned.  Is Lance a doper?  I don’t know; I like to think not.  Yes, I know it takes an immense amount of physical strength to do what he’s done.  But I also know that you can have all the physical strength in the world and still not be able to do what he’s done, because it also takes quick thinking, spur-of-the-moment strategy, and real high-end overall physical & mental health.  And I also know that he’s successfully passed more drug tests than most professional athletes will ever take. 

This issue bugs me.  Clearly some professional cyclists are dopers.  They’ve been busted.  They failed the tests.  And why did they do that?  Did they think they weren’t going to get caught?  But even if they hadn’t gotten caught, don’t they have any conscience?  Would they really have thought of their “victory” as a real victory?   How phony is that?  Could you really walk around as though you were the winner of something if you knew you had to do something that you had to hide in order to win it?  Ok, so some of them take the Barry Bonds approach—“I didn’t know he was injecting me with steroids, he told me it was flaxseed oil.”  Oh come on.  I think you’d be better off waving your hand like Obi-wan Kenobi and saying, “There are no drugs here.” 

Yes, this issue bugs me.  And I think that, as much as the dopers are hurting themselves, they’re hurting the sport much more.  They cheapen their wins, and they cheapen themselves.  But here’s the thing:  I still like cycling.  And I still like watching the Tour de France on TV.  It’s fun watching them make their breakaways, and watching the peloton reel the attackers back in.  It’s fun doing the same things on our group rides (only of course on a much, much slower scale). 

Part of me says that somebody really needs to get to the bottom of this and find a way to end it.  But another part of me recognizes the impossibility of that ever happening, so I just say those guys can dope all they want—it’s not going to lessen my enjoyment of the sport.  I say let’s ride!

Thursday, February 23, 2012

17 riders, 6 flat tires


Yikes!  What a day.  This was the usual Thursday morning, 46-mile ride, on familiar roads with familiar people, but there was a pretty fierce rain storm last night, with a lot of wind.  That combination tends to put a lot of stuff in the roads, and especially on the trails, all of which makes for an increased opportunity for flats.  And even without big weather, sometimes flat tires seem to come in waves.  I’ve ridden whole summers in big groups with no flat tires.  Then there are times like this.  A guy in our group had a flat tire about 3 weekends ago, then Brenda had hers 2 weekends ago, then a guy had a flat tire last weekend, and then it all went nuts today.

Tires can get cut so easily out there on these roads, especially in our section.  Whatever garbage there is on a road sooner or later ends up over on the side, right where we ride.  Glass, screws, chunks of sheet metal, car parts, dead animals, various unidentified sharp things—it’s all there, just waiting to stick right up into the first tire that rolls by.  And sometimes flats can be kind of tricky because it’s surprising how little a thing can poke a hole in a tube.  So if you get a flat tire you have to not only put in a new tube (please—forget about trying to patch a tube) you also have to run you finger around the inside of the tire feeling for sharp stuff.  Whatever stuck into that tube might still be in the tire, and if it is, you can count on your new tube going flat in just a few miles.  If you find something sharp in the tire, that’s a good thing (even though the way you probably found it was by it poking a hole in your finger just like it did the tube.)  If you don’t find anything sharp in the tire, then you’re kind of guessing that whatever caused the flat is gone now.  (And you may or may not be right.) 

Then when you get everything all set with the new tube and you’re ready to put the tire back on the rim you still have to be careful.  That tube is going to get inflated to over 100 psi, so there is a lot of pressure in there.  If you’re not careful, it’s easy to get part of that tube pinched in between the tire and the rim, or sometimes a part of the tube can even kind of get kind of folded up on itself, and if either of those things happens, your new tube will last anywhere from about 30 seconds to maybe one or two miles at the most.

So they got all the flats fixed, except for the last one—it was so close to the end of the ride that instead of fixing it, the guy just gave his car keys to one of the other riders and said, “Come back and get me”.  Sometimes it’s just about getting back home.

Wednesday, February 22, 2012

Good roads and bad roads

One thing about cycling on the road that pretty much everybody can understand is that some roads are better than others for bike riding.  I’ve ridden for enough years now that I’m pretty comfortable riding on a lot of different kinds of roads, but there are some roads that even I just don’t want to ride on. 

I’ve always said that there are three things that make a good bike riding road:  a smooth finish, a wide shoulder, and no traffic.  Of course, I know I typically can’t expect to get “no” traffic (except maybe very early in the morning on a holiday) so I’m willing to take very little traffic.  And another thing that I know I typically can’t expect is to get all three of those things on the same road, so my rule is that any two of the three make for a good bike riding road.  SR 46, for example, has a nice new surface and a nice wide shoulder.  So even though it has some pretty high-speed, sometimes relatively heavy traffic, I feel like it’s available for rides.  Howard Avenue is another road that we like, even though it has no shoulder whatsoever.  But it qualifies as a good road because it has an ok surface, and we can ride from one end to the other (about 2 miles) and very seldom see a car. 

And even though it’d be non-preferred, there are some selected instances when I’m even willing to ride on a road where I only get just one of the three.  For example, Stone Road for the longest time had one of the most horrible surfaces ever, and absolutely zero shoulder.  But we’d still ride on it (grudgingly) because we’d almost never see a car on it (and you pretty much had to use if it you wanted to use Howard Avenue.)  (The good news about that one is that last year just before Christmas Brenda and I were out there and when we turned onto Stone Road we found that it had a fresh, new, smooth-as-a-baby’s-butt surface!  It was one of our favorite Christmas presents.)  Of course the whole one-out-of-three thing is by no means universal.  For example 426 heading out to Geneva has a nice smooth surface, but it has nothing for a shoulder and at times it is very traffic-intense.  Early on a Saturday morning it’s not too traffic-loaded, so it gets a 2-out-of-3 then, but by the time Saturday afternoon rolls around traffic picks up and it reverts to a 1-out-of-3 road.  And in this case, (the one being comfort-related in stead of safety-related) it gets disqualified.

But for us, the roads that we ride on most are either wide shoulder and smooth surface, or smooth surface and very little traffic.  And we’re pretty comfortable on either of those types.  It’s sort of like Meatloaf said, “Two out of three aint bad...”

Tuesday, February 21, 2012

1,000 down, 4,000 to go


Today was major milestone # 1 toward Brenda’s 5,000-mile goal—the first 1,000 miles.  Who would’ve thought that the year was already 1/5 over?  (Ok, the year isn’t exactly 1/5 over yet, but I think that's an indicator of how well she’s doing.)  She cruised through the 1,000 mile mark 21 miles into today’s ride, which means that now she has about 3 weeks or so in the bank.  I’m so impressed.  I’m quite sure that for the first two or three years I rode, I never got much more than 1,000 miles or so in the whole year.  But that’s just milestone #1, so we won’t go crazy celebrating just yet. 

It was still pretty cold at the start of the ride this morning, which meant she went out with a hat under her helmet, a long-sleeved jersey, tights, and a jacket.  She said that she rode with the pack just fine until about the last ¼ of the ride, when she got just plain too hot.  Ok—de-layering time.  Then after she took off the jacket and hat she cooled right back down and rode strong the rest of the way.  This is listed as a C ride, and during the ride they do keep the pace down and the group together.  But if you choose to ride to and from the ride (which Brenda likes to do) then it’s a little different.  She typically meets one or two of the guys just down the street a little ways and then they ride out to the ride together.  In the morning that’s typically a slower pace—about the pace of the C ride—because it’s still early and nobody’s really warmed up yet.  But on the way home it can be a different story.  One of these guys has found new ability and likes to pick up the pace on his way home.  There have been times when Brenda has had a hard time keeping up with that pace, but for the past several rides she’s been careful to put herself in a good position at the end, and she’s been able to keep up his faster pace all the way home.  Today she not only kept up, but she even took a turn out in front of him for part of it. 

So now it’s on to the next 1,000.  Hopefully she’ll make it to that milestone before she starts teaching her swim lessons.  That’d be ideal because during swim season she’ll lose those weekday morning rides.  I don’t know if she’ll make it all the way to 2,000 before swim season starts or not, but she should be close.  That’ll be one of our mini-goals.  

Monday, February 20, 2012

Animals vs. Cyclists (continued)


In case you’re wondering, it’s not just squirrels that can get in the way of cyclists here in Central Florida.  One of my other close calls with animals came during the ’09 Horrible Hundred.  This is one of the premier century events in this area, called “horrible” because it takes into account every hill in the area.  (I know what you’re thinking—Florida, right?  What hills could there possibly be?  And no, this is nothing like the Alps, or even 6-Gap, but there are some short, steep hills in Lake County, and we take what we can get.)  There is a section of this ride, out in the range of about the 50- or 60-mile mark that we call "the land that time forgot". (It's miles and miles of nothing, that is miles and miles from anywhere--you don't really see too much in that section that reminds you of civilization...) I was riding with 2 other guys at that point, and as we looked ahead down the road, we saw, running towards us at full tilt on the right-hand shoulder of the road, a bull—one of those really big bulls, with those really long horns, with the really pointy tips.

We had no idea why a bull would be running along the road, but as we looked closer we could see that he was being chased by a horse.  No rider, no saddle, no reins—just a horse.  So what do you do when a bull is running right at you, being chased by a horse?  We didn't know either. (Especially since it was a really big bull, with—you know—those really long horns, with the really pointy tips.)  So we just kind of slid over into the middle of the road, and hoped that the bull would stay on the shoulder.  Well, apparently the bull thought that the middle-of-the-road idea was a good one, because right after we made our move, he came out into the road, still running full speed ahead, still being chased by the horse.  Now, not only do I know nothing about how to out-think a squirrel, I really don't know how to out-think a bull and I had no idea what to do then.  And the other 2 guys were in the same position, so without even saying anything we all just kind of clamped up the brakes and stopped in the middle of the road.  Apparently the bull was just setting himself up for a right-turn at the next intersection because he kept drifting over to the other side of the road, and ran right past us on our left, with the horse right on his heels. 

Whew!  Squirrels are one thing, but a bull running at full speed, being chased by a horse—that’s something else altogether.  Yeah, if you want to ride around here, you’ve got to be ready to deal with the wildlife.

Sunday, February 19, 2012

Squirrels and the CU factor


I think that just about any part of the country (or the world for that matter) where people ride bikes there are going to be those specific, local challenges that make riding there, well, special.  One of those local challenges to riding here in Central Florida is wild animals.  No, I don’t mean wild animals as in lions and tigers and bears.  I mean wild animals as in, you know… squirrels.

How can squirrels affect a bike rider you ask?  Well, I admit, a squirrel isn’t big enough to throw you off your bike.  And they’re not tall enough to bite your ankle.  And they’re not mea n enough to bite your ankle even if they were tall enough.  But they’re just distracting enough to take your concentration off of your riding, and when you’re not concentrating on riding you can very easily end up riding into things that you wouldn’t ordinarily ride into, like a hole in the road, or another cyclist.  The thing about squirrels is what one cyclist here calls the CU factor (Crazy Unpredictability.)  The only thing you know about what a squirrel is going to do next is that you have no idea what a squirrel is going to do next.  I’ve had a squirrel run in front of me from the left side of the trail, all the way across, make it safely to the right side of the trail, and then change his mind, turn around, and run back the other way only to end up right under my front wheel.  (I think he kind of bounced into the back wheel a little bit too.)   And there was absolutely nothing I could have done about it—I was cruising at close to 20 mph, and when you get a road bike going straight at 20 mph you can’t really turn on a dime.  If I would’ve tried to dodge him I would no doubt have ended up in his position—under my bike with a really bad road rash.  No thanks.  I’d rather stay on top of the bike.  Squirrels, know now that you’re on your own if you start running back and forth in front of a cyclist.

And I’m not sure if it’s because spring is in the air or what, but right now it seems like the CU factor in squirrels is somehow intensified.  This weekend the squirrels were in full bizarro mode—running around full speed ahead, stopping in a heartbeat, first one way, and then another...  Go.  Stop.  Go again.  Run like crazy.  Stop.  Run back.  Stop.  Who can keep up with a squirrel?  I think even the other squirrels were confused.  I think they all need to get little bikes and just go for a nice easy bike ride.  I think it’d do ‘em some good.

Saturday, February 18, 2012

Two new personal records


One of the great things about cycling is that you can make little goals for yourself, and then when you hit them you have something to celebrate even though it may not have look like any great thing.  This morning was an example of that. 

In road riding we have what we call “false flats.”  That’s a section of road that looks like it would be flat—if you were driving it in your car you’d never know it wasn’t—but it’s really a long, gradual uphill.  They’re the sort of thing that kind of take you by surprise.  You can see hills coming—there’s no surprise to them.  But on a false flat you just sort of realize after awhile that it’s really hard pedaling or you’re going slower than usual for no apparent reason.  Then you realize you’re on a false flat.  So there are several of these around here, one in particular on a road that we ride on fairly frequently.  Brenda had set a goal for herself that she wanted to be able to ride that whole false flat one day at 15+ mph.  And today was that day!  She powered up the whole thing, maybe dipping down below 16 at one point, but never going below 15.  It didn’t look like anything special to the rest of the group, but for us, it was a woo-hoo moment!  Can I get a woo-hoo?

And the next record came at the end of the day.  This was a 46-mile ride, but probably about 15 miles or so of that is on a trail.  Trails are notorious for slowing down your average speed because you’ve got to slow down to go around people walking their dogs, or their kids, and you’ve got to go real slow to negotiate a handful of sharp turns and stuff like that.  But after we got off the trail, toward the end of the ride, we went down Tuscawilla and East Lake at 19-20 mph the whole way.  And Brenda was right in there, about the 3rd one from the front, hanging with the group the whole way.  And she ended the day with an average of 16.3 mph.  Again—that doesn’t sound like anything very earth-shaking, but it’s her personal best for a ride of that length.  And we count it as a special accomplishment because she did it on a trail ride, and she did it with a very strong finish!  It’s always a good thing when you finish strong, and Brenda did a great job of it today.  I think that ought to count for an extra woo-hoo!

Friday, February 17, 2012

Cheating the rain


So, I don’t know about anyplace else, but here’s the way it works around here.  Last night when we went to bed the forecast called for 20% chance of rain this morning, going up to 40% at around noon or so.  Great.  20% is low enough that I was sure we’d be able to get in a good ride in the morning and then if it rained in the afternoon, fine.  Then this morning when we got up it was pretty cloudy so I checked again and now the forecast called for a 95% chance of rain starting at around 10:00.  What’s up with that?  20% is nothing—I don’t even think twice about riding when it’s a 20% chance of rain.  But 95%?  That’s different.  They usually don’t say 95% unless it’s already raining.  We were scheduled to go out with another couple at 8:30.  I thought very seriously about blowing it off because I thought that we’d only be able to get in probably an hour or so of riding before it started raining.  But when we talked about it to gather a consensus, the other guy said very confidently, “Let’s ride!”  His wife was up for it, and Brenda just laughed and said ok, she was up for it too, so what could I do?  We went riding.

We figured we’d stick mostly to the trails.  If we’re on the street and it starts raining then we’d have to deal with the rain and the traffic.  If we’re on the trails and it starts raining then all we’d have to deal with would be the rain.  So we went about 10 miles on a trail and it didn’t look or feel any more like rain than it did when we started.  So we went out on the road.  We did about another 10 miles or so, including a bathroom break, and it still didn’t look or feel any more like rain than when we started.  We were so confident that all the talk about rain was just a bunch of hooey that we even stopped at one of our typical coffee shop stops.  Ha!  95%, my foot….  (Of course you know what happened when we were at the coffee shop—it started raining.) 

Ok, so we got a little wet on the way back.  At least it wasn’t a gully-washer.  It was just one of those light little rains that, if you were driving in it you’d put your wipers on intermittent and at the slowest setting.  And I bet it didn’t even last five miles.  Afterwards Brenda said she was so glad we went out.  Me too.  It was good to get in a nice easy 30 miles.  And tomorrow is supposed to be pretty nice, so we’ll see what happens then.

Thursday, February 16, 2012

Closing in on milestone #1


Brenda got in another 41 miles today, which puts her over the 900-mile mark for the year, and fast closing in on her first 1,000 miles.  It was a good riding day and she said she kicked butt on the ride, staying out at the front most of the time.  Oh, and that cold snap from last weekend?  It’s ancient history now.  She started riding this morning before the sun was all the way up and the temperature was in the mid-60s then.  Before the ride was over it had warmed up to the mid-70s. 

Not quite like summer-time riding, but nothing like winter-time riding either, not even here in Central Florida.  Around here, though, February is a weirdo time of year.  It’s bizarro weather.  It can be anything from sunny to rainy, and from cold, cold, cold, to almost hot.  And it’s usually windy.  I guess it has something to do with that whole transition from cold to warm.  In any case, we can enjoy it when it’s good, and deal with it when it’s not because we know what’s coming—hot, hot, hot. 

I’ve always said that I’d rather ride when it’s hot than when it’s cold.  But in the last couple of years I have to admit that even I have noticed a little bit less of a desire to ride when it’s really, really hot.  And that’s the way it gets here in the summer.  About the only thing we can do is just make sure to get out there early in the morning.  Good thing the sunrise is early enough even with daylight saving time.  And that’s the next thing that we’ll have to deal with in a few weeks.  Right now sunrise is just after 7:00, so on those Tuesday & Thursday morning rides Brenda can safely head out about that same time.  But when we make the time change there’ll be a few weeks when it’ll still be dark out at that time.  Good thing she’s got that high-end headlight!

Wednesday, February 15, 2012

How many speeds is that?


When non-cyclists see our bikes they either take no interest at all, or typically ask, “How many speeds is that?”  A question like this of course dates back to the days when bikes like ours were all called “10-speed” bikes, because they all had two gears (aka “chain rings”) in the front and a cluster, or cassette, of five gears in the back—two times five equals 10 possible gear combinations.  As technology (and competition in the bicycle market) progressed, manufacturers started adding a 6th gear into the cassette in back, or a 3rd chain ring in the front, thus making what would be known as a 12-speed or a 15-speed bike (which presumably would be better than a 10-speed bike and therefore would justify a higher price tag.) 

But as this trend continued, the whole idea of referring to a bike by the total number of possible gear combinations sort of fell apart on a couple of counts.  For one thing, even if it made sense to determine the total possible number of "speeds", the thing that would count would be the total number of distinct gear ratios, that is, the ratio of the number teeth on the front gear to the number of teeth on the back gear.  It is these distinct gear ratios that would determine the number speeds that a bike would have.  For example, if you put the chain on a 39-tooth chain ring in the front, and a 15-tooth gear in the back, that’s a gear ratio of 39:15 or 2.6.  Likewise, if you put the chain on a 52-tooth chain ring in the front, and a 20-tooth gear in back, that would be a gear ratio of 52:20, or, again, 2.6.  So if you have a 39-52 chain ring set in front, and your cassette in the back includes both a 15-tooth and a 20-tooth gear, you can put you chain in either of those two different gear combinations, and each of them would each give you the exact same gear ratio, or same “speed”.  This means that even though a bike might have 18 or 20 or 27 different possible gear combinations, there will actually be far fewer distinctly different gear ratios, or speeds. 

And for another thing, there are some gear combinations that a rider will want to make sure to never use.  A bicycle chain is designed to bend in one axis only—that is, it’s not like a rope, which can flop in any direction.  Each link of a bike chain has those side plates that kind of restrict its side-to-side floppiness.  So it’s really non-preferred to put your chain on the outer-most chain ring in the front, and on the inner-most gear in the back, or vice-versa.  A combination like this forces the chain to take more of a side-to-side bend that it would otherwise want to, and that stresses the joints on those side plates causing them to loosen up a little.  Too much of this makes the chain start to get kind of sloppy, and the next thing you know shifting gears starts to become a bit of an adventure.

So how many speeds is my bike?  I have no idea.  But it seems to be enough to let me keep up with Brenda, and that’s what counts!

Tuesday, February 14, 2012

Love those Florida cold snaps


Oh, sometimes it can get cold here for a week or so at a time, sometimes maybe even two weeks.  But usually it’s more often a number of days, not weeks.  This one was that way.  On Saturday it was really, really windy as the cold front moved in.  Then on Sunday it was really, really cold (of course I mean Florida cold—mid to upper 30s.)  Then yesterday it started to recover a little, and today it got up into the 70s.  If you have to have a cold snap, I say that’s the way to do it.

It was still cold this morning, but we knew it was going to heat up as the day went on, so Brenda put on her tights & long sleeved jersey and rode out to the ride.  They went a new route this morning, so the whole ride, including out and back was 38 miles.  And by the time they headed back home, Brenda was in the front. 

This Friday would ordinarily be a riding day, but they’ve got a 30% chance of rain in the forecast, (and for that matter, on Saturday too.)  We’ll have to see how the weekend works out.  (Yeah, that's right--here it is Tuesday and I'm already looking toward the weekend.)

Monday, February 13, 2012

When we're 72...


When Brenda and I are in our 70s, I hope we’re still out there riding our bikes.  There is a guy we ride with who just recently turned 72, and he still goes out and rides every week.  This just tickles both of us.  He mentioned the other day that somewhere between the age of 67 and 68 he noticed a significant decrease in the amount of power he could generate in his legs—that is, he noticed that he wasn’t sprinting quite as fast and that he couldn’t go long quite as often as he used to.  But that didn’t stop him.  He just learned to adjust his expectations, and kept on going.  And even though he may not go long as often as he used to, he still goes long—one day just recently he went out and did 60 or 65 miles by himself.  He talks about having slowed down—I’m impressed with the fact that he’s still out there. 

In fact, this club that we’ve been riding with seems to attract a lot of grey hairs.  Most of the people that Brenda rides with on Tuesday & Thursday mornings are retired (which explains how they have time to go out bike riding on weekday mornings.)  And when I did the Horrible Hundred in ’09 (this is the club’s signature annual event, so named because it takes place in Lake County which is the hilliest area in Central Florida) they celebrated a guy who had ridden in that event every year since its inception—30 years—and he was 90 years old.  Good for him, I say.  God bless him.  This is one of the things that I really like about cycling—it’s not nearly as hard on the body as so many other sports.  And there is a real variety of ways to participate.  If your back can’t handle the traditional posture on a road bike, there are recumbent bikes which put you in an entirely different position and yet still allow you to go fast enough to ride with the road groups.  And there are groups for all ability levels, and there are even social rides, where the goal of the ride isn’t to go out and maintain any particular speed at all, but rather is just to ride out to a coffee shop where you can sit and visit with everybody, and then ride back again.  What a great way to spend a morning!

Isn’t it odd that the so-called second most dangerous sport also has such a high number of active participants in the over-65 age group?  Yep, and “Danger” is their middle name…

Sunday, February 12, 2012

Taking the lane


One of the most important things to know in road riding is when to take the lane.  And it’s a subject that brings a lot of controversy with it too, usually related to the fact that motorists typically don’t understand the laws relating to cyclists.  (But heck, even some cyclists don’t understand the laws relating to cyclists.)

The way the law works (at least here in Florida) is like this:  in simple terms, the law states that cyclists have to stay as far to the right of the lane as possible, and follow all aspects of the law as though they were cars.  And that right there is where most people often want to leave it.  Oh, that may sound good on the surface, at least to most motorists.  But the thing is, there are (at least in Florida) four exceptions to that law, and people, especially motorists, often don’t know about these exceptions. 

The exceptions are that cyclists are not required to stay to the far right side of the lane if 1) they are avoiding a road hazard, like a pothole or debris in the road, 2) they are passing a slower vehicle, 3) they are not impeding the flow of traffic, or 4) if it is a sub-standard lane, that is, one which is not wide enough for a bike and a car to safely be side-by-side.  The two big ones here are the 1st and the 4th.  When motorist think of road hazards, they think of things that would be hazardous to a car.  They don’t realize that even just a little bit of sand on the side of the road can be extremely hazardous when you’re on 2 tires that are only 23 cm wide.  If there is sand on the side of the road, cyclists will need to come out into the lane to avoid it.  And here’s the deal on lane width:  A car requires 10 feet of lane width.  A cyclist requires 3 feet.  That’s right—3 feet.  Our tires may be skinny, but that doesn’t mean we can fit in 8 or 10 inches of shoulder on the side of the road.  So in order for a lane to be wide enough for both a car and a bike to safely be side-by-side, the lane needs to be 13 feet from the inside of the white line on the right to the inside of the yellow line on the left.  If a lane is smaller than that (as the vast majority of lanes are) then it goes into the exceptions category and the cyclist is no longer required to stay as far to the right as possible.  To be clear, we do stay as far to the right as possible, but that means we stay in the right-hand 3 feet of the lane.  And if the lane is only 10 feet wide then many motorists will think that we’re taking up way too much of it.

This all gets intensified as we approach an intersection, especially if there’s a red light.  In this situation, it’s usually best for the cyclists to move over and take up the whole lane.  This is, first, allowed by law, because we at that point are not impeding the flow of traffic (the cars have to slow down too when they approach that red light) and second, it’s the smart thing to do to prevent cars from coming up alongside of us.  It doesn’t do either the motorists or the cyclists any good for the cyclist to be squeezed in between a car and the curb.

This is a tricky subject, but the bottom line to it all is that motorists and cyclists have to share the road.  To all my road-riding partners I say, use eye contact, hand signals, whole arm signals, or whatever it takes to make sure the motorists know what you intend to do, especially when you’re coming to an intersection.  And to all my car-driving partners I say, relax and give a cyclist a break.  You’ll still get there in plenty of time.

Saturday, February 11, 2012

It’s a good thing it was sunny…


It was cloudy & yucky all day yesterday, and the weather forecasters last night were talking about nothing but rain and colder weather.  So we went to bed thinking that if was nice in the morning we’d ride, but if not, we’d just head right up to G’ville to visit my mom.  The rain stopped sometime during the middle of the night, and it was sunny when we got up.  Good thing, too, because it was also a little bit colder and a whole lot windier.  Cold and windy can be tolerable if it’s a nice, sunny day—sunshine can make up for a lot.  If it had been the same temperature & wind conditions with a cloudy sky, we probably wouldn’t have gone out.

But as it was, we got in a nice 42 miles, in spite of the wind, and there was some heavy-duty wind.  We knew that the wind was going to be about 10 -15 mph, but afterwards we found out that it had been gusting to 20 or 30 mph.  You really know you’ve been out bike riding when you’ve done it in 20-30 mph wind gusts.  And it took some getting used to—the combination of the wind and the cooler temperature made it one of those too-cold-without-a-jacket-too-sweaty-with-one-nose-running-like-a-fawcet kind of days.  But after a few miles we figured out how much to take off and what to leave on, and it worked out all right.  It was supposed to be a group ride, but Brenda and I were the only two who showed up, so we took it at our own pace, and even got to make a stop at a Panera for a cherry-cheese Danish at about the 30-mile mark.  (There are some advantages to being on your own—you get to stop where and when you want.)

So it looks like she will finish a little short this week—only 92 miles.  But that’s not so bad really—it’s not so short that it’s a cause for concern.  She’s still doing very well; she’ll very likely be at 1,000 miles well before the end of the month, which will keep her in a very good position to make the goal.  And it’s only supposed to be a short cold-snap, so it looks like she’ll be able to ride this week.  She’s ready—let’s ride!

Friday, February 10, 2012

Cycling Nutrition (continued)


I think most serious road cyclists are probably pretty careful about what they eat.  I don’t see too many 300-pounders out there on road bikes.  And Brenda & I too, try to eat well.  We basically never stop for fast food, we’re both very conscious of added sugar, we don’t really like high fat content stuff, and we don’t eat a lot of junk food.  But that’s not to say that we don’t both have our weaknesses.

Every now and then in the cafeteria at work they make from-scratch cinnamon rolls in the morning.  These and the sticky buns at Whole Foods are, I admit, two things over which I am absolutely powerless.  It’s real easy for me to pass up anything in a wrapper, that is, anything factory-made.  Twinkies might have had a hold on me when I was eight, but I’ve long since outgrown that.  But these things are a whole different story.  (Next time you’re at Whole Foods, look for their sticky buns and see if you don’t agree.)  So the question is, “What will all that sugar do to my bike riding ability?”  Well all I know is, I remember reading in Lance Armstrong’s book about how, when he was going through the chemotherapy, the only food that he could keep down was apple fritters—he said he’d eat apple fritters by the boxful.  And then he went on to win a handful of big bike races.  Say what you will about what might have empowered him to that level of athletic greatness, I think it was the apple fritters.  (I wonder if he still eats them?) 

Brenda will get on a dark chocolate kick every now and then.  And of course there are all kinds of sources out there that tout the antioxidant properties and just general goodness of dark chocolate.  (Like she really needs any encouragement in that area…)  She can very easily pass on the sticky buns and the cinnamon rolls, and she can even go for months at a time without any chocolate.  But then all of a sudden she’ll start wanting chocolate everything for awhile.  But that’s Brenda for you—you could never accuse her of being wishy-washy.  If she’s in the game, she’s all in.  This bike riding thing is a perfect example.  When I started riding, I just started riding.  It took me a couple of years before I did a century, and it was a couple more years before I set the only big bike riding goal I’ve ever set for myself.  (That was to do six centuries in one year.)  (Yes, I made it.)  But Brenda starts riding, and the very next January she’s setting this goal to do the 5,000 miles.  I wonder how much chocolate this is going to take…

Thursday, February 9, 2012

One of those short weeks?


We got this notice from the city a couple of weeks ago that they would be shutting off the water for a day this week so they could work on replacing the main.  Ok, not too unusual—they’ve gotta work on the infrastructure sooner or later, right?  What we didn’t realize is that apparently there is some kind of main valve-thing right under our driveway.  So when the shutoff day arrived (yesterday) we didn’t realize that for us it meant more than just having the water shut off for the day, it also meant having access to our driveway and garage taken out by a huge hole in our front yard that took out half of our driveway.  So last night they kind of filled in the hole, but it’s still just in a temporary state because apparently this is a 2-stage fix.  Day one was yesterday, and day two will be next week. 

So, what, you might be asking, does any of that have to do with bike riding?  Well, it’s just that it makes it Brenda a little uncomfortable with riding out from the house.  The driveway is torn up, the front yard is torn up, and even the street is torn up.  We kept the car parked in the street last night, in front of the neighbor's house, so I put her bike in the car this morning before I left for work and she just drove out to the ride again.  And that means that, with today’s 25 miles, she only has 50 miles so far this week, when she’d ordinarily have closer to 80.   So we either have to ride more on the weekend, or be especially thankful for last week’s 220 miles.  And, looking at the weather forecast for Saturday, I think it’s going to be the latter.

You ever watch one of those 5-day weather forecasts?  Earlier in the week it said 50% chance of rain for Saturday.  Then on Tuesday or Wednesday it went down to 20%, which we can usually deal with.  And now it’s back up to 50%, and they’re even saying specifically that the rain will be in the morning.  Rats.  Ok, well, we need to make a trip up to Gainesville pretty soon to visit my 92-year old mother.  Maybe we’ll make that this weekend if it’s going to be lousy bike riding weather anyway.  One more day to figure it out…

Wednesday, February 8, 2012

Danger on two wheels (?)


I read this factoid today (one of those things that had some source to it, but I didn’t pay attention to what the source was) that ranked different sports based on which are the most dangerous.  It reported that the second most dangerous sport, measured by overall number of injuries, is… (are you ready for this?) bicycling.  Go figure.  And then I thought, “Well, ok, that’s because of all those mountain bikers out there crashing into trees and taking those crazy jumps and stuff.”  But no.  Mountain biking was called out as a separate sport, and it was only the 8th most dangerous or something like that.  Number one?  Basketball.  Football, which I would’ve thought would be at the top was number three.  (Badminton was number 14.  Hmmmm…)

But all this was based on the total number of injuries recorded.  So all that means is that a lot of people play basketball and ride bikes—more than play football.  I can understand that.  Then the study ranked them based on injuries as a percentage of the people who actually play that sport.  Here, football, as I would’ve expected, came out number one.  That is, more people who play football end up getting injured than in any other sport—and this was by a wide margin.  Bicycling still ranked number three though, behind skateboarding which came in second. 

One of the conspicuous holes in this study was a comparison of the severity of the injuries.  Now don’t get me wrong—I know cycling can have some pretty serious injuries, even more serious than Brenda’s broken hand last year, and I consider a broken hand to be a pretty serious sports injury.  But I also believe that many of cycling’s injuries are in the form of the skinned knees of kids just learning how to ride.  I’m not trying to discount this study, but I was just really surprised to see cycling so high on the list, and I don’t want people to think that we’re a bunch of crazy people out there doing crazy, dangerous stuff.  Among the people we ride with, and I believe among most road cyclists, safety is a very big issue.  I think it has to be, since we’re so outnumbered and outweighed, and outpowered by even the smallest cars that we share the road with.  In some ways, it is a bit of a David-and-Goliath situation out there.  But I wonder what the study would show if it normalized the number of injuries over time—that is, how many injuries are there per hour of activity?  I don’t know, but my bet would be that one that score cycling would come in pretty low. 
  
Whatever the case though, there are at least two things for sure about road cycling:  1) It is possible to get in a serious accident if you don’t pay close attention to the situations around you, and 2) it is possible to have years of fun and enjoyment if you do pay close attention to the situations around you.  Here’s to safe cycling!

Tuesday, February 7, 2012

Between the fog and the rain


Ok, not bad—it turns out today wasn’t a complete washout after all…  The Tuesday morning ride is scheduled to start from a shopping center parking lot at 8:00, and ordinarily Brenda will ride out there from the house with a couple of other riders.  But to do that they have to start out here at about 7:15 or so, and today it was not only really foggy then, but it was also cloudy enough that it still had that feel of almost dark to it.  So before I left for work I put her bike in the car and she drove out there.  That helped a little because the fog had some time to burn off a little, and the sun was a little higher in the sky (although you’d never have known it because it was still really, really cloudy.)  The goal was to see if they would be able to ride at all because it was supposed to start raining at about 10:00.

There was a pretty good turnout, considering the weather (that weekday morning group is really pretty consistent), and they got in the whole ride without getting gushed on.  It’s a short ride on Tuesdays—just 25 miles, so that kind of helped too.  And this ridegoes up over some hills (what we call hills) (anybody else would call them overpasses) and Brenda said she felt really strong on them.  I was glad to hear that.  Sometimes when you’ve had a higher-than-usual mileage total in a week it’s not unusual to be a little off after that. 

But even if it had rained hard, we really wouldn’t be able to complain very much about the weather we’ve been having this winter.  I don’t know what it’s been like around the rest of the world, but around here it’s been great!  Must be one of those “la nina” things or something.  Whatever the cause though, it’s been great riding weather.  I only hope it isn’t setting us up for the hottest summer in the history of summers.  But if it is, that’s ok—we’re tough.  We can handle it.  (I hope.)

Monday, February 6, 2012

A well-deserved day off


Ok, so you know what comes after a 114-mile weekend and a 220-mile week?  A day off, that’s what! 

At a rest stop on our ride yesterday we met a girl who was re-habbing a hip injury that she attributed to a lack of stretching after hard rides.  (As Brenda and I sat there listening, we both found ourselves subconsciously reaching down and stretching out our legs...)  And I get it too—I’ve noticed before how stiff I can get for example if I get off the bike and sit right down in the car to drive home without stretching first.  Getting out of the car in the driveway at home is significantly different from getting in the car in the ride parking lot.

A couple of years ago Brenda and I both started doing a little yoga at the Y.  We both really enjoy it, but the only thing is, we’ve found that the more we ride, the less we find ourselves at the Y.  So Brenda made sure to make today a yoga day.  (Even though we both made it a point to stretch pretty well before we got in the car yesterday, it’s one thing to do a couple of stretches for a few minutes, but it’s a whole different thing to do an hour or so of yoga.  Now that’s stretching.) 

So now we’ll have to see whether or not the weather makes tomorrow a day off too.  It rained last night (a real gully-washer at one point) and it’s been cloudy most of the day.  They’re predicting some rain for tomorrow, but we’ll see what happens.  Either way, though, it’ll be good.  If it rains, she gets another recovery day (two in a row never hurt, and she's got enough miles in the bank now that it won't put her in the hole.)  And if the weather is nice then she gets to do her regular Tuesday morning ride.  It's a win-win!