Cycling, Fitness and Other Things
Cycling
My Ride Home
01309 days
Today I decided to ride my bike to work, and I did not anticipate the weather being 110 degrees outside on my ride home. But I iced my water bottle, got on my bike, and rode the ten and a half miles home, it was very hot, there was a lot of heat coming up from the concrete. The wind was up, with gusts at 20 mph. I do not like the wind and now the heat. It was warm, very warm (a new record high, 110.2), in fact the last half mile or so I got light headed, I took the remaining amount of my water, that was now jacuzzi temperature and poured it on my head.
While, it was hot, it was still doable. I hope to do it again this Thursday. Here is my motionbase activity. Average speed is 15.5 mph, it was slow, but hey it was hot and windy.
The image is from my weather station at the house. I think it is cool.
Rode to Work
01310 days
With gas prices being so high, I needed an excuse to ride to work, also my daughter can use the car, so it all worked out that I would ride.
I am not a morning person, so to start riding in the morning is hard on me. I felt tired from the first block. I managed to ride 16.5 mph average, but it is cool (for summer) and took me about 37 minutes to travel 10.3 miles.
When I got to my bike locker at work, the lock would not open and I was in a bit of a panic. My work will not allow bikes locked to anything they have to be place in the bike lockers. I have locker number two and the stupid lock would not open. I believe it must have been changed, but the combo was only off my one number, so I do not understand why it would not open. This was the second ride after winter, so there may be some corrosion, but the lock felt fine when I moved it around. I call my friend Mark to use his locker (number 4). I locked up my bike and went in and showered.
It is to be hot today (expected 110, man that is hot), so expect a whinny post about the ride home at 4:00pm.
Ride in the Afternoon
01311 days
For my second activity of the day I got on the bike and rode out to 110th West. It was a hard ride. It was about 100 degrees and I started in the middle of the day after church. The wind was up, and at times was blowing in my face at 25 mph.
It was much slower than Friday’s ride (17.2 average), today I managed to ride at a 15.5 mph average. The wind and heat much have been contributors to the slower speed. I came home kinda whipped, but nothing a small nap could not handle.
My heart rate was down comparing the last two rides. Average of 159 to today’s of 150. Overall it felt good to stop. My calf is getting tight after the ride, but that is to be expected.
Back From Injury!
11314 days
In my mind I set July 1st as the day I could return to running. I tore my right calf muscle playing softball on May 22nd. I thought I was healing well and re-injured it when in Las Vegas on the treadmill. At work my fitness partner, Tracy gave me an article that convicted me. Summed up, to lose belly fat (the thing I hate the most about my body) is to have calorie deficit by doing activities that include intensity X duration X frequency. I was convicted, I do my steps each day an average of about 16,000 but, I like to eat and drink. I was convicted, because I do not have much intensity or duration or frequency. I hang my head in shame. So, to offset this I set in my mind to increase my activities for this month. I am working on a list of things that I would like to do. I have two goals to run a 5K on August 2nd and enter a Splash and Dash or it is a 1/4 mile swim followed by a 5K. i am not sure of the date of the event. My pastor and his wife are doing it, so I thought I would like do it as well.
This morning, I got up, stretched, drink a small cup of juice and ran from the house to the light pole at Avenue H, and returned, by stopping at Starbucks as a reward. A new Starbucks had just opened yesterday by our house. Overall the running was 1.94 miles. This is the first run since my injury. I started to get a side stitch, but pressed on. Average speed of a 10:10 pace. Not bad for two months off.
I returned to the house to change into my cycling clothes and rode almost 22 miles. I wanted to get out before the heat came up. My leg felt like it had small cramp, but did not hurt. I managed to ride at average speed of 17.2 miles per hour.
Overall I was not disappointed so far in the day. Here are some results from motionbased.
Walking
01377 days
I have been walking for a goal of virtually walking across America in one year. I started in Mid January and set a goal of 16,000 steps a day.
As of first of May, I have walked 1,593,289 steps or an average of 15,933 a day (a little shy of my goal). The distance so far is 779.5 miles. On the map that is about walking from Santa Monica Pier in California to Albuquerque New Mexico.
Tour de Sewer
01424 days
The Lion’s Club of Bell Gardens has put on the Tour de Sewer for 23 years. This ride is 15, 30 or 62 miles. I rode with Jim Pike (we are married to cousins, Teri and Mary Jo). We arrived at 7:30 at the John Anson Ford Park in Bell Gardens, and got our t-shirts, bibs, entered the raffle, and Jim purchased a riding jersey. We mounted our bikes and got in line to start the ride around 8:00 am.
The first easy six miles was on a bike path along the river, then over the dam and on to the street. The first climb was not expected. When I looked at the ride’s website, they had an elevation graph and it had one spike. When I reread it, the only graph was for the 30 mile ride. We were doing the 62 mile ride. Pettalling along towns of the streets of Whitter, Hacienda Heights, Rowland Heights, La Habra Heights, there were some hills. The ride was rated as moderate. It did not take to long to notice the town names ending in “Heights”, there is a reason for that. They are hilly. Jim and I climbed those hills. It was a bigger set of climbs then I expected, but we made each one of them. We continued back to the 605 freeway’s bike path along the San Gabriel River. We petalled down to around the 105 freeway and back up the 710 freeway bike path where we started.
Overall, we did near 62 miles, a Mertic Century (100 KM) in about five hours. We did stop at each rest stop and had orange slices, grapes, bannahs and Famous Amos cookies. I had refill one water bottle, once. The day was a bit cold, so I did not need to drink too much.
Ride, prep for Tour De Sewer
01428 days
Today I took a vacation day from work to get out on the road. I needed to get in a long ride to help prepare me for this Saturday’s 62 mile ride, the Tour De Sewer in Bell Gardens. I have not been on the bike much this year. I think this was my third ride this year. Last Friday I did a 26 miles, and today was almost 45 miles. I got past by a guy named Randy. He is a serious rider, and flew by me. It was warmer than I expected, so I know I was going to stop and get a power drink at the corner store in Leona Valley. When I arrived Randy was there. He mentioned that he would ride with me back down to Highland HS and up 30th West. He did and that helped to pace me. He saw his brother drive back and they stopped to chat, but I kept going.
While I was tired, it did not hurt too much. Overall I am happy with my ride.
Back in the Saddle
01432 days
Today was a beautiful day. I got off work at noon, came home and got out on the rode bike. In an earlier post, I mentioned that I signed up for a metric century (62 miles). That ride is coming up fast and I have not been on the bike in quite a while. I hurt my hip running, and been swimming, and to be honest it has been too cold to ride. I do not think I rode but once in six weeks. Today it was around 72 degree and NO wind, that was so nice.
Bike Ride – Tour De Sewer
01437 days
by douglaspaulwade
in Cycling
My wife’s cousin Mary-Jo’s husband Jim Pike is a cyclist at or about the same level as me. At family parties, we have talked about doing a ride together. I asked him if he wanted to ride in the Tour De Sewer in Bell Garden’s. It is put on by the Lions Club. he said yes!
I signed up for the 62 miler, or Metric Century. Since, I have not been on the bike in over a month, I have under two weeks to get some miles on my bike.
Hip Injury, So I Rode
01481 days
Since, last Thursday, my right hip was been this great pain for me. I was thinking that I had a stress facture. I have not been able to put my full weight on it. However, each day I have stayed off it, it has been getting better. So I ran on the threadmill on Saturday and that was a mistake. So the only thing I can do this week is ride. Today, the wind was up (15 mph) but I had the afternoon. It was about 55 degrees and sunny.
I got out on the road with the bike and went 24 miles. It was really nice. The average speed was about 16.9 compared to last week’s 17.7 mph.
