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Category Archives: Cycling

Changes…

Sunday, September 23, 2007

When I began commuting by bike this summer it had little impact on my schedule. I had to leave earlier to get to work, but since my work hours are very flexible even that was of minor consequence.

Now that school has started and has been going for almost a month things are a bit, shall we say, different. The choice to by bike has led to many more changes (and will lead to even more) than I originally predicted.

One thing it has highlighted quite well for me is my proclivity to procrastinate. Procrastination used to be a way of life for me. I used to (and to some degree still do) operate mostly, and generally quite well, in “Crisis” mode. Jumping from one frying pan to another, many of them of my own making through poor scheduling and procrastination.

Last fall I often pulled all-nighters to finish major papers, because I failed to schedule (or adhere to a schedule) to get the paper done early and over several days of moderate effort. Presentations were quite often pulled together in the last hour before I had to be on the podium presenting. This semester I am finding myself behind the 8 ball because I started to do the same thing, only with a bit less time, and too tired by 10pm to think about pulling all nighters.

The doubles as my exercise time and I am finding myself in far better shape physically and mentally than I have been in quite a while, so I can not really afford to lose that time. I guess at long last I have no choice but to become better at both the planning and execution of a schedule.

Guess it’s also time to really look into the whole “Getting Things Done” camp and find a way of making it work for me.

Last Ride

Date: September 21
Distance: 14.0 km ( 8.7 miles)
Ride type/Bike: Cyclocross / Tri-Cross
September Distance: 258.9 km (160.9 miles)
Year To Date Distance: 720.7 km (447.8 miles)
Weight Lost/Gained: -1.13 kg (-2.5 pounds)

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Only to Church on Sundays

Wednesday, September 19, 2007

Well, maybe we drive it a hair more than that, and it’s not to church, but unfortunately to an Environmental Law class. Still at this point, the bike has twice as many miles as the car! I just wish we could find an insurer who would bill us appropriately! No matter though, I feel good knowing that we have only driven 49 miles so far this month.

I have taken the bike in 3-4 days a week now, and generally feel great, though my thighs and quads are still yelling at each other and me. My times are getting shorter (dropped 6 minutes off the longer route in one month) and my fitness is increasing (measured by resting heart rate, max heart rate going up the 1km long, 8-11% grade out of Groton, and generally improving times at lower average heart rates).

Tammy and walk everywhere they need to in town, and only require the car for groceries and to get to the Stonington Library.

Last Ride

Date: September 17
Distance: 23.5 km ( 14.6 miles)
Ride type/Bike: / Tri-Cross
September Distance: 191.7 km (119.1 miles)
Year To Date Distance: 653.4 km (406.0 miles)
Weight Lost/Gained: -0.45 kg (-1.0 pounds)

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Gearing Up for Winter

Saturday, September 8, 2007

In new England my favorite months are April and May and September and October. These are the months when the weather is near ideal. I really love Spetember because the beaches are nearly empty, yet the water is as warm as it will get. Unfortunately now that it is September the storms are just around the corner (hopefully for our poor garden) and dark moonlit hours begin to intrude into the morning and evening commutes.

Fortunately Tammy will be knitting me some wool gloves for the inner layer for winter riding, over which I’ll pull some GloGlovs for increased visibility on those grey winter days.

I was looking at lighting systems and rain gear and had just read a review of the Rainlegs at UltaCycling and follwed their link to the manufacturer (in England). Fortunately they do have one American dealer, Wallingford Bicycle Parts in New Orleans.

Right as Tammy walked in their Odds and Ends page came up with the rainlegs on it. Just below that though was an item no cyclist should be without….

The one piece of safety gear (next to a helmet) no cyclist should ever be without!

Tammy, of course, did not know what I was researching or looking at and immediately had, er… questions.

Tammy “Is that to protect your…?”
Me:“Yep. Nothing worse than a crushed..”
Tammy:“But wouldn’t it be uncomfortable when you’re riding?”
Me:“No not really, just throw it in the bag or in your back pocket.”
Tammy: !!?

From the Banana Guard site…

Q: “Not all bananas are the same size or shape, so how can the Banana Guard fit them all?”

A: The Banana Guard was specially designed to accommodate the majority of banana sizes. Our testing indicates that over 90% of commercially available bananas will fit into the Banana Guard. Highly curved bananas can be straightened ever-so-slightly without harm to fit the Banana Guard shape. The opposite holds true of very straight bananas.

Uhm…yeah.

I can’t wait to see what she thinks of the glow in the dark one when it comes out though!

Last Ride

Date: September 7
Distance: 12.2 km ( 7.6 miles)
Ride type/Bike: / Tri-Cross
September Distance: 64.2 km (39.9 miles)
Year To Date Distance: 525.9 km (326.8 miles)
Weight Lost/Gained: +0.91 kg (+2.0 pounds)

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Commute + Swim Test = Pain!!!

Sunday, September 2, 2007

The change over from car to bike is going well, I have been upping the number of days I as my rear and my legs get used to being on the bike (and a new one at that!) after some 8-9 months off.

Since buying the new bike I have logged 287 miles on it, most of which have come from commuting to work/school or running short errands that would have required the car before. There have been 5 family outings of 4-6 miles round trip and the one father & son ride of 10 miles.

Unfortunately the route is not a, shall we say, forgiving route. There is no path between here and Avery Point that does not include a number of relatively short but intense hills. Considering my current 200+ pound weight any hill over a 5% grade can be a pain. The end result is that my ends up being a real workout with my heart rate spiking into zone 3 or 4 within five minutes of the start and staying between 145 and 164 for almost the entire . Not a leisurely aerobic , but rather a hard 45-50 minute anaerobic workout with brief respites (downhill!!!!!).

The good news is my average heart rate has been steadily coming down for the route and the max heart rate I hit have been coming down as well. The bad news is my legs have been very carefully and emphatically letting me know they do not like this new situation at all!

That’s all well and good and I know the pain will pass with more time in the saddle and (hopefully) more miles in the aerobic zone to balance the hills.

Yesterday I had my first class which will lead to my “certification” as a science diver with UCONN and the AAUS. Since I already hold recreational open water dive certification I can get by with a 1 credit class that builds on that to the base AAUS dive qualifications. My dive physical came out with a great result…strong heart, good lungs (Miracle considering 20 years as a smoker - makes me wonder what my lungs would have been like without smoking!) so yesterday came the first lecture at 9:30 followed by a swim test in the afternoon.

Leading up to yesterday, as my legs built up in soreness I considered biking in, but possibly having Tammy and pick me up in the afternoon. That way they could have the car to go to the library in Stonington. Tammy suggested yesterday that I go ahead and drive in as well, but I decided to bike in anyways since I thought they were still going to the library. (Little did I know, since I didn’t ask, they needed to stay home to finish getting ready for a visit from Tammy’s sister and her boyfriend.)

So…off I took at 8:40 for my , sore legs and all. As usual when the legs are heavy the first few minutes really felt off, even hurt a bit, but slowly they loosened up and I found a rhythm. After that the ride went fine, I finished more tired and with my legs a little more leaden than after Thursday’s in, but still a good ride.

After the lecture was over I worked for a bit, and found myself invited to the Graduate student orientation lunch which was refreshing. I met the new professors and grad students and was able to talk with the professors and grad students I hadn’t seen over the summer. The lasagna was mighty good too.

Of course just as I finished the lasagna I realized it was time for the swim test down at the docks.So I changed quickly and ran down to the dive locker, then on to the docks for the test. First up was a 400m swim test (in under 12 minutes) followed by treading water with legs only for 2 minutes, a 25m swimmer rescue tow and finally an under water swim for 25 meters. The water was 60 degrees and felt down right frigid as I dove in.

After only one 25m leg of the 400m swim I knew I was in trouble…already swallowed some seawater, felt the lasagna like a brick in my belly and my legs felt as if they were made of lead. Only the desire to get the dang thing over with and to not have to be fished out by the DSO kept me going. By the end my arms were burning as much as my legs had been and my whole body felt like lead.

Unfortunately I was taking this swim test with two other people, both far younger and, erm, in much better shape than I. Fortunately I was able to keep from “feeding the fish”, passed the test and finished only a minute behind the young lady and a minute before the young man. The rest of the test went rather smoothly, though the underwater swim is far easier in a pool!

Somehow I managed to ride back home at the end of the day, though it was the slowest yet that direction. now, two days later…my legs are screaming at me even harder! Thank goodness tomorrow is an “off” day for the !

Last Ride

Date: August 31
Distance: 33.10 km (20.57 miles)
Ride type/Bike: / Tri-Cross
August Distance: 461.9 km (287 miles)
Year To Date Distance: 461.9 km (287 miles)
Weight Lost/Gained: +0.95 kg (+2.1 pounds)

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Biking Errands

Tuesday, August 28, 2007

This summer I have been riding a new bike for the to work and school. It’s been fun in many ways because the bike, a Specialized Tri-Cross, is a capable bike off road as well as being a decent road bike. What’s really nice is the bike feels much better than my older racer when ’s tandem attachment is mounted. The racer was so stiff and the geometry of the bike so tight that the tandem swamped it and every movement of made the bike twitchy under me. Very uncomfortable. Tammy, and I have now done a number of family rides to the beach or up River Road and back and the new setup is great.

Today Tammy wasn’t up to a ride, so and I headed out for a ride up River Road. Before we have always stopped just shy of a hill that has a 7% grade and is about 1/4 mile long. wanted to try it today (and last time too) so we charged up with him pedalling the whole way. Since he conquered the hill we went on through Old Mystic and did an errand at the hardware store then went to visit his favorite shop in Olde Mistick Village where he tries to stop in and say “Hi” to the store manager at least once a month.

We looped around and discovered that, besides the sense of accomplishment for climbing the hill, he also gets to “rocket” back down it on the way home.

We also get to look at the statistics of each ride thanks to a Garmin bike computer and MotionBased.com

Map of Mystic Errands

Clicking through the graphic will take you to the ride at MotionBased.com where you can also “see” the ride.

Last Ride Stats

Date: August 28
Distance: 16.6 km (10.3 miles)
Ride type/Bike: / Tri-Cross
August Distance: 395.8 km (245.9 miles)
Year To Date Distance: 395.8 km (245.9 miles)
Weight Lost/Gained: +0.82 kg (+1.8 pounds)

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Adiós Señor Petacchi

Monday, September 11, 2006

Caught in the wrong position, Milram’s ace sprinter Alessandro Petacchi was blocked out of the final sprint by a left hand turn just before the finish. Petacchi has been looking pretty good and coming back on form, especially considering that he sat out half the season after his accident in the Giro. With the worlds coming up he is looking like a contender for any sprint finish there…except…

In an attempt to vent his frustrations of the day, Petacchi decided to punch the team bus. In what he later admitted was a stupid mistake, Ale-Jet learned a few physics lessons I’m sure he will not soon forget…at least not before the bones are fully healed.

So Petacchi’s Veulta and his chance to do well at the worlds is over.

Read more at TdFBlog.

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Garden Fresh Cycling

Monday, September 11, 2006

Yesterday was a pretty good day…

We decided to take some of the cash from Tammy’s bootie earnings (Er…make sure you enunciate the “t” there!) (Editor’s note: The author seems to have a real issue with his beloved wife referring to her extra cash as her “bootie money”. The first time she used that phrase, he did a double-take and inquired as to whether she meant the slang term referring to her gluteus maximus or the word meaning a baby’s knitted or crocheted sock. What exactly was she doing to earn this extra cash?) and get some fresh vegetables from the organic Denison farmers’ market just outside town. We got there just after they had set up and made our rounds of the vendors, talking and buying a bit as we went. It’s not a huge affair, but it does have about 8 farms, 2 bakeries, and the lady from Stonington who makes Portuguese sweet breads.

One of our favorite farmers was back, this time with some salsa, in addition to his fresh vegetables. He offered me a taste of his “Dad’s Deadly Salsa”. Quite tasty, but a bit on the mild side for the title to really fit. It will be good on eggs and with chips for Tammy and me. A nice break from our beloved standard. One of the things we really like from him he was out of…a good lettuce mix and a mustard leaf that we really want to try in salads. He never fails to pull out some old curiosity, a different 100+-year-old item each week, from his family’s old farm. This week he had two. One was an old rug beater for cleaning rugs. The other was a grinder for an old horse-pulled bar scyth mower. Both were a hit with , of course. We were also excited to discover Beltane Farm at the market, selling their chèvre cheese there, but also offering fresh goat’s milk, which we will be picking up next week!

After making the rounds, we ended up getting the salsa, 8 pounds of tomatoes, around a pound of mixed hot peppers, a baker’s dozen of sweet corn ears, fresh picked very early this morning, green frying peppers, huge scallions, and a pint of blackberries. We decided on a tomato pie one night, tomato confit with roasted garlic and homemade French bread another, and some homemade salsa with fresh tortillas and eggs another.

After the market we headed to the grocery store where we confirmed that we got fresher, bigger, better-looking produce at a better price from the market. But we also needed some things we couldn’t get from the market. When we got home, we put everything away and turned around to go past the “Taste of Mystic” and head over to the Seaport for a bit. On our way, a very nice gentleman offered us two of his tickets from the “Taste of Mystic“. (They were leaving town for the day, and so couldn’t use them.) While we hadn’t originally planned on getting anything today, we combined his gift of $2 worth of tickets with another dollar to get some sushi from our friends from Zhangs, who were at the near end of the street. When the owners saw us, they gave a double portion of their good California rolls.

We sat down in the small park near the flagpole to eat the California rolls, which has now declared as his favorite sushi. He wolfed down almost half of them himself. Finally, we carried on to the Seaport for a combination of fun and Shanti School field trip. We watched the blacksmith practicing his craft for half an hour and then talked to the staff member in the old printer’s shop. Now really can understand the work that went into publishing a newspaper or flyer back in the days before the linotype or the computer. Tammy and just finished studying Benjamin Franklin. thoroughly enjoyed seeing how the printer’s shop was run and what Ben Franklin would have done as a young apprentice.

After the Seaport closed, we returned home for corn on the cob, fresh tomatoes, and hot dogs, while we watched the USA Cycling Professional Championships from last weekend on OLN. We were all happy to see Dave Zabriske take the TT title and George get the road championship win, especially after his injury in the Paris-Roubaix and the controversial end to the Eneco Tour. I was especially happy to see the US Pro finally win a US Pro Championship, never again to watch for the number 3 man across to become the US Champion. What a crock that system was. It looked like Greenville did a bang-up job with what looked like a great route.

Victorious George kisses his wife

Hey George, Don’t you know you’re not supposed to kiss the podium girls, even if you are the national champ?
Actually of course that’s his wife, an ex-podium girl.

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My Specialized Ride

Sunday, September 10, 2006

While I had no desire to, I looked into trading my road bike in towards a bike more geared to commuting (a cyclocross bike, basically) but that I could still go out for some nice road rides on. I had no dreams of the road bike trade-in completely covering the new bike, but thought it would knock a good amount off, and the balance I could make up with selling my Computrainer (again not desired, but a solid daily commuter that can double for road training is more needed now than the road racer + indoor trainer). Unfortunately the “trade-in” value for the road bike is virtually nill. Granted it’s a 14-year-old bike, but it’s a sweet 14-year-old.

I got my road bike when I was in Arizona in the Army. Doing lots of riding year ’round and getting into doing regular centuries and tackling Mule Mountain. The old Cannondale with it’s super stiff ride was great, but the aluminum transmitted every single crack and bump in the southern Arizona roads straight to my bum. The local bike shop had just built up a road bike from one of Specialized’s new Metal Matix M2 frames. After riding that bike, I knew it was the bike for me. Still stiff and very responsive, but the ceramics in the Matrix dampened the small bumps down really well. Unfortunately, they didn’t have a bike in prebuilt configuration, so I had them build one up custom. I decided to go for the — at the time — new 8 speed Shimano 600 (later called Ultegra) STI indexed shifting. Actually I went with all Shimano 600 groupo except pedals and pads.

All told it came in at 19lbs and a hair under $2000. And it’s been a beautiful bike. Still is. Almost all the good qualities of my Cannondale, but few of the downsides. It’s not perfect, still a harsher ride than good steel or (now) carbon, but much better than oversized aluminum. In the intervening years I have had periods of active riding, trainer-only riding, and a few (but all too long) periods of no riding. My understated gunmetal grey road bike has been with me through Arizona, Virginia, Texas, Idaho and now Connecticut with never a problem worse than a flat tire. Now though, for economy, etc… I was ready to let it go, for a good cause. Of course that was before they told me my old friend was essentially worthless to them (while looking at it nostalgically and drooling over it mind you.)

It may be worthless to them as a business, but to me, it still has future, as well as historical, value. So it stays. Better that way…now I have no excuse to sell the Computrainer, so even when the is not realistic because of snow and time of day (I’m not commuting with a foot of fresh snow for a 7 am class!! Go ahead, call me a wimp…), I can still get some time spinning on the Computrainer and maybe even training for some centuries in the spring. The commuter will have to wait, but hey, that just means I will be able to replace the rear cogset with a 9 speed Ultegra set since they need replacing anyways.

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Eneco Tour — Vuelta Ramp Up

Sunday, August 27, 2006

The Eneco Tour was a great race with short time trials, great racing and excellent sprint finishes. Quickstep’s textbook perfect lead out to deliver Tom Boonen to the win in his hometown while wearing the world champion’s jersey was magic. It was also great to watch Eki seting a blistering pace a couple of times on the final stage as he was working to protect George Hincapies race lead. Eneco was Ekimov’s final race tour, he will be racing at the one day classic Grand Prix Plouay and then stepping into the shoes of a DS this Labor Day Weekend at the USA Cycling Professional Championships when George and some of the other Dicovery boys make their bids to wear the champions jersey. (OLN will broadcast the coverage of the champonships on Sunday, September 10th.)

Unfortunately as great as the Eneco Tour was to watch, the finish was significantly marred by spectator interference and, in my opinion, poor judging robbing George of a much deserved win. Stefan Schumacher, who put in a beautiful performance during the tour, made it perfectly clear he did not want the victory the way it was. Unfortunately it was a hard situation made worse by a bad judges decision.

While I’ve always been a fan of George and root for him, especially during the classics, I am beginning to believe that maybe, just maybe, he really is cursed.

Vuelta Ramping Up
The Vuelta a España started today and we watched the time trial in the late afternoon. One thing I like about Cycling.tv is if I choose or have to miss the live broadcast of the stage I can catch the rebroadcast later the same day, or the highlights anytime later. I avoided all the cycling web sites until after we could watch the stage as well. ‘Fraid with school I’ll have to do that for almost all of the stages.

Today’s prologue was a bit different, being a TTT. There were few real surprises in store as the CSC team (Carlos Sastre, Fabian Cancellara, Volodymir Gustov, Lars Bak, Kurt Asle Arvesen, Inigo Cuesta, Marcus Ljungqvist, Nicki Sørensen and Stuart O’Grady) dominated the event and helped Carlos Sastre into the golden fleece — his first grand tour leaders jersey.

The only big surprise really came from Gerolsteiner as they lost their leader in a messy transition through a roundabout. Riders in front of David Rebellin slowed abruptly as they went though a small dip in the road and into a roundabout. Unfortunately David couldn’t stop himself from touching wheels and going down rather hard into the turn. While 6 men from Gerolsteiner finished the stage 19″ off the CSC time, they left their main contender for the GC (and another rider) to limp in 2′50″ behind the race leader Sastre. Maybe the DS figured waiting for and pulling Rebellin to the finish would take too long in such a short ride. Of course maybe Rebellin wasn’t going to be the leader after all (cetainly won’t be now)? Maybe they have decided to pull for Markus Fothen (second in the TdF Young Rider this year) instead? … I don’t know, but it was not a good way to start the Vuelta.

From PelotonJim we learned that the Vuelta this year is they will be using some of the camera angles and advances we saw and enjoyed on Cycling.tv for the Deutschland Tour and the Eneco Tour. Specifically the under the seat camera. A small wireless camera placed under a domestique’s saddle and aimed back and slightly up which gives a good view of the one or two riders directly behind and riders diagonally back to either side of the camera bike. It also give a really good idea of just how tight the bunch is in the peloton sometimes. I’m hoping they have one of those camera’s tagged on Petacchi’s lead out man. Watching the Milram milk men run out a great lead and Petacchi being delivered from both the normal view and the view from the lead out man’s seat would be something I would really like to see.

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How it is supposed to be

Tuesday, August 15, 2006

With all the talk of doping scandals, people already condemning Floyd, questioning other riders performances and the entire sport and destroying teams one thing that remains is that much of the damage in the past month has been done not by the doping itself, but by the violation of protocol. Floyd (and the riders implicated in Operacion Puerto) have been tried entirely in the court of public opinion. The damage to the riders, teams and the sport in general are evident in conversations (”So what do think about riding now that you know all the pro’s are doping?”) and the press.

What most people do not stop to think about, or realize, is that the and the Tour organizers breached some major protocols in their announcements on Floyd. For a complete overview of the process the way it is supposed to happen, read Hey Norton’s great article.

The way it is suppposed to work may not be ideal, but it does protect the riders, the teams and indeed the sport and it’s governing bodies from needless scandal. Too bad they decided to short circuit that process this time. And one does have to wonder why? Why with Floyd? Especially when they refuse to short circuit an “internal process” in order to conclusively prove or disprove riders guilt in the Operación Puerto scandal.