Clean Teeth and a Left Hook (almost)
Had a teeth cleaning scheduled. Rode the Redline 925 Fixie, which is my most winterized bike. Mud, salt, rain on the streets, wind, all in all pretty gnarly riding conditions, but the good news it’s not raining, right now. Forecast though is for record rain fall and flooding. We’ve been hit my a little Pineapple Express so the temperature is up to high 40’s almost 50f.
Teeth cleaning was uneventful… I actually enjoy that process.
But on the way home, I had a little thrill… One guy try to pull a left hook on me.
The Left Hook? That’s a car that turns left INTO you or your path of progress. Today it was at an intersection, car facing me with left turn signal on… so I was aware of him. Car in front of me driving in my lane same direction as me. Light turns green, car in front of me goes through intersection. Car facing me starts to try to gun it, as if he’s going to fit between me and the car in front of me.
What the HECK!
I yell “Hey!”
Fortunately he stops, I swerve, contact averted.
Clean teeth, and thanks to missing the Left Hook, all of them are still firmly connected to my jaw bone!
Workout:
- Type: Cycle
- Date: 01/07/2009
- Time: 12:19:09
- Total Time: 00:40:00.00
- Calories: 523
- Distance: 10 miles
- Average Speed: 15 mph
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Finding Time for Fitness
Finding time… isn’t that the problem that most of us have when it comes to fitness? At this time of year, most of us set goals, resolutions, we develop our big plans and make promises to ourselves. “This year is going to be different!”, we promise!
Now, I’d love to tell you there’s are easy steps to keep your goals. Some advice I’ve heard that tends to help is to make your goals “SMART” (Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic, and Timely), and certainly this advice will help. But the truth is, sticking to a plan is hard! Don’t be surprised when you get tested… especially early on in your quest.
Last year, my plan was simple… I wasn’t going to have a plan. I was going to just be active and enjoy my fitness. All in all, I think the plan was a success. I was happy, I enjoyed myself, I integrated fitness into many everyday activities (like running to the store for groceries). I even completed another Ironman and marathon.
But there were a couple of downsides to this strategy. First of all, from a performance perspective, this wasn’t exactly a plan that was going to improve my race performance. That was ok, because my bigger picture goal didn’t include improved race performance. But the biggest problem with last year’s plan is that I could have easily cheated, fallen off plan, since the plan was simply too vague (note SMART).
This year, I’ve set some more specific goals. I’m not going to worry about race performance, per se, but I do hope that my new goals will result in measurable performance gains. Big picture: I want to complete a couple of Ironman races this year, a 50mile ultra run, as well as my standard rides/races like the Seattle to Portland double century.
In order to reach my 50 miler goal, I know I need to increase my running volume, and max distance. My plan to reach this goal includes a regiment of running every day. So far, so good… but I’m just starting out. The good news here is that this will encourage me to run off the bike… an important training technique for improving my triathlon performance.
But what about improving my cycling? Well, as part of my 2009 goals, I am planning on riding 5,000 miles by doing 100 miles of cycling per week. This shouldn’t be too hard, I’ve done 5,000 miles a year before multiple times. But in the last couple years, I’ve let my volume of cycling slide, and my cycling performance has suffered because of it.
So far, I’m doing fine on my goals… 3 days in, I’ve run every day, and already done the inaugural bike ride of the year, but if I’m going to stick with my 5,000 miles of cycling goal, I needed to get out today. I planned to do the Lake Washington Loop. But I’ve had work to do, and the forecast was for rain, wind, and snow. In fact, as I type this post, I’m watching the evening news about our latest snow storm (4 inches, which might not be much for my Midwestern friends, it’s a near blizzard for Seattle).
So, here was my first real test of the year. Was I going to get out there and ride 50miles in the rain, and probably snow? I could have come up with plenty of excuses… but I knew that if I got out there, and got going, I was going to be happy I did.
And as expected, I had a great ride. I did get snowed on a little, and rained on a lot, but I got home before the bulk of the snow came down. I even got my run in.
The key to my success today? Not allowing myself to use excuses to avoid my workout. I fought the urge to give in, and I got the gift of a great workout and another positive step toward my 2009 goals in exchange.
Workout:
- Type: Cycle
- Date: 01/04/2009
- Time: 13:47:00
- Total Time: 3:07:42.00
- Average Heart rate: 137
- Max Heart rate: 168
- Calories: 2940
- Distance: 52 miles
- Average Speed: 16.62 mph
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First Ride of 2009 - New Bike Day!
Today was the day to go out and ride our new bikes! Well, I didn’t get a new bike for Christmas, but since I have 5 bikes I can’t exactly complain. 
But… my eldest daughter got a new bike, and my Dad got a new bike… and so Aunt Sheba came down and little sister tagged along and we went for a very cold (for Seattle) inaugural ride of 2009.
Workout:
- Type: Cycle
- Date: 01/03/2009
- Time: 16:03:26
- Total Time: 1:42:00.00
- Calories: 532
- Distance: 14.23 miles
- Average Speed: 8.37 mph
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My Bikes - Rebuilding my Redline 925 Fixie
Before my 51 miler the other day, I rebuilt my Redline 925 fixed gear. It had been hanging from the ceiling in my garage mostly disassembled. It was missing a seat, it had no chain, the tires were flat and not winter weather appropriate (I had road racing slicks on it)… my bike had looked like this for probably a year… so sad.
You might ask, why would you have a perfectly good bike in parts like this? Well… that’s a good question, and really I have no good answer. The truth is, I have an embarrassment of riches when it comes to bikes… in that, I have more bikes that any one really needs to have.
My first bike is a Trek 7200 hybrid… which I’ve modified to be almost mountain bike ready… but it’s really a basic commuter bike. Interestingly the photo above is a recent year 7200, which almost looks like a my bike… in particular it has a more popular straight handlebar. When I bought mine back in 2002, they sold them with more of a bent old school “kids bike” handle bar. You can also see the stock seat is huge, and the seat post has a shock on it.. these are very impractical features for lots of riding… so I modified mine with a new seat, new bars, a new seat post, etc.
It’s heavy duty, sturdy, and good for carrying the kids around on the half-bike with. My wife has a matching version of this bike, which we bought at the same time. We bought this bike before I was “the fit guy” and so it sat in my garage for years before I actually rode it… and then when I started riding it, I went a little crazy… and rode it 150 miles a week for about 6 months straight.
My second bike was my no-name (Scattante CFR) carbon road bike. It’s a pretty nice road bike, except for the brand. But all the parts are definitely top shelf… Shimano Ultegra, carbon frame, forks, seat post, handle bars, etc. It’s a great road bike, which for the first two years of riding, I pretty much rode it all the time… logging 5,000 miles each year on it.
My third bike was my first Fixie… my Redline 925. I bought it because I had become obsessed with the idea of riding fixed. And this bike was perfect. It cost me $400 all in, brand new. Not as cheap as my Trek Hybrid, but the cheapest new fixie I could find. It’s a solid bike and I rode it constantly for the year I bought it… also clocking about 4,000 miles on it, including riding the STP double century on it that summer.
My fourth bike, My Shogun Kaze Funny Bike, was my first BUILT fixie… I say first, because I suspect I will build more fixies in the future. If my wife complains that I have too many bikes, I don’t claim this bike as mine… I say it’s my friend Dave’s bike… even though it’s the bike I love the most in my collection. See this is Dave’s frame, he said I could have it to make a chopper… I decided it was too beautiful to chop… so I made it fixed. This is my main horse, I ride it everywhere. I rode it in the 2008 STP… good times!
My fifth bike is my Cervelo P2C Triathlon bike… it’s a sweet ride indeed, but not very practical for everyday riding… In fact, none of my bikes are very practical for everyday riding… although, my Redline 925 is probably the most practical for winter riding, especially when I have the fenders installed.
So… winter is fully upon us, and I have decided I want to do much more riding in 2009, so I decided it was time to fix up my most practical winter bike… my Redline 925. This is what it looked like when I pulled it off the ceiling…
I had to reinstall the seat, and add back a chain, replace the tires… After a couple minutes of work, she was back to a ridable condition!
BUT to really make it winter read, I also wanted to add a “fender extender”… Do you know what a fender extender is? Well, it’s a half of a water bottle attached to the bottom of a bike fender giving you a little more dirt protection… it works really well, and looks like this:
Bonus points for sporting the logo of the shop you bought the bike at!
Oh yeah… I got one more ride in for the year as I rode this bike to a meeting with Phil… in the rain…. at night… Ah SEATTLE!
Workout:
- Type: Cycle
- Date: 12/30/2008
- Total Time: 00:30:00.00
- Calories: 157
- Distance: 5 miles
- Average Speed: 10 mph
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Last Lake Loop of 2008 w @lynchSeattle
I did my last Lake Washington Loop of 2008 today with my twitter pal @lynchseattle. The Lake Washington Loop is by far one of my favorite rides in Seattle. Not that it’s the most beautiful, no, not by any stretch, there is simply too much competition for that prize around here… but because it is beautiful in parts, challenging enough in parts, and starts and ends half a mile from my house. (Of course, since you’re riding in a big circle around a lake, many of Seattle’s one million residents could make this claim!)
I’ve been looking forward to this ride for a couple weeks, which is in and of itself kind of an odd thing to say, since the reason I love to do this ride so much is that it is so accessible, it’s ever-present, it’s the kind of ride you could take for granted… many Seattle cyclists probably do. But for me, it’s simplicity, and accessibility, and it’s balanced mix of urban toughness and suburban natural beauty makes it the perfect ride to just go out and do. But Seattle has been snow bound for the last couple weeks. And that has made this perfect side kick, beer drinking buddy on a Friday night kind of friend of a ride unavailable. And I’ve missed my dear old friend.
I tweeted my plans to ride and @lynchseattle said he’d be interested in joining me. I’ve ridden with Chris before and he’s a good sport, so I figured we’d both enjoy our last ride of the year.
The ride was pretty wild… at first we had to deal with bitter cold, more slush and snow on the trail, honking and swerving cars, and then the real fun began… the WIND.
I don’t recall riding in this much wind in Seattle in a long time. We had about 35mph sustained winds with gusts of easily 50mph. We were being blown all over the road, and when we came down from Jaunita hill toward Jaunita and downtown Kirkland, it looked like we were driving around the famous Oahu North Shore… the wind was creating these lines of breaking waves like I’d never seen in Lake Washington before.
We also had to deal with a lot more aggressive drivers than I’d seen in a long time. Maybe it was because everyone in Seattle had been cooped up in their houses and had finally gotten out to go places… they didn’t feel like dealing with those annoying bikes on the road! We had several people honk and swerve around us. I felt like I was riding with a giant “Kick ME!” sign on my back.
Chris and I had a pretty good ride. I’m sure I annoyed him with my nearly effortless climbs on my fixed gear, while he was huffing and puffing away. But I was impressed that he kept at it. It was a long ride for him, but if he’s going to compete at Ironman Canada this year, he’s going to need to step up his distance training. We had a long chat about this along the ride.
All in all, I was glad to get the ride in! And it made me that much more excited about doing more riding in 2009 than I did in 2008. That will surely be one of my 2009 goals… get back to the 5,000 mile level that I’d been at a couple years ago.
Workout:
- Type: Cycle
- Date: 12/29/2008
- Time: 18:35:36
- Total Time: 4:00:00.00
- Average Heart rate: 119
- Max Heart rate: 161
- Calories: 2504
- Distance: 51 miles
- Average Speed: 12.75 mph
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Commute in the Slush and Rain
Why don’t I own rain gear for my bike? Why didn’t I get some for Christmas? I guess my excuse goes something like this… usually when I used to ride, I would be thinking fitness and cycling as a sport, and so I would where my biking shorts and knickers and if it was really cold my long tights. If you’re wearing this, it doesn’t really matter if you get rained on, either way you’re going to be wet (from sweat)…
But lately, I’ve been trying to be less “sporty” looking and more wear more “everyday wear” when I am purely commuting. Sure, I’m still getting a workout, but I want to look like someone who’s just getting somewhere and happens to be riding my bike. In my mind this means I’ll be part of the solution, and help inspire more people to commute by bike…
But that means I’m wearing street clothes (albeit not slacks or jeans or anything) but still, I’m not wearing spandex… and so when I get to my destination and I’m soaked from head to toe, I’m not sure I’m actually going to convince anyone that was a good idea.
I guess I need to go buy some rain gear if I’m going to keep this particular style of riding up.
Workout:
- Type: Cycle
- Date: 12/28/2008
- Time: 20:29:34
- Total Time: 1:30:00.00
- Calories: 1408
- Distance: 25 miles
- Average Speed: 16.67 mph
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Slush Ride - Wow, that was tough!
The snow’s been melting, so I figured if I wanted to get another snow ride in this year, I’d need to jump on it. Plus, I was feeling a little off yesterday, and I’m sure it’s because I haven’t gotten much exercise the last week or so… so I headed out for a snow ride. What I got instead, was a slush ride.
So here’s the thing… it turns out, it’s a lot easier to ride on ice and hard packed snow than it is to ride on slush. Sure, ice is slippery, snow on top of ice can be even more slippery, but slush… that’s not really something you ride on, as much as ride in.
What we have out on the trails/roads right now in Seattle is about 3 inches of slush. On the trail, where there’s little or no traffic, it looks like snow… it looks a lot like what I rode in a couple days ago. But it’s not… it’s all melting and waiting to trap you. Imagine super slippery sand…. yep, even sand has more traction than this stuff.
By about .3 miles into the ride, I know I knew I was in for a serious workout.
My ride went something like this… pedal about 10 feet, spin out, fall off… get up… try to get started… spin out for about 30 seconds… try slow, try fast, try hard, try easy…. get going again… 10 more feet…. spin out.
I had a couple stretchers where I was able to get about 100 yards or so… But those were rare. I was really working it. I felt like I was doing squats or lunges with about 70% max single rep weight. I was having to balance as my bike skidded through the slush… this was a full body workout.
About 28 minutes in, I was just barely at the mile mark… I figured I’d stop there, take a photo and turn around… But as I got to the mile marker I was on one of my rare 100 yard plus stretches without stopping… so I kept going for another 10 seconds or so until I hit another skidding spot…
The thing that surprised me was that it was actually easier to ride in the deep snow, then it was on the slush. Maybe that’s because the deep snow was on the ground, and so I got better traction from the grass/gravel, but the slush was on the paved trail, and so there was no traction, just slush on asphalt.
There were several people walking along the trail, and aside from getting their boots wet, they had an effortless time. They walked by me as I spun out, and precariously balanced on my bike, or fell off in front of them (only once)… just shaking their heads… WHAT IS THIS IDIOT DOING!?!
One lady actually asked me “You did this on purpose right?” Yep… I could have walk home a lot faster… but that wasn’t the point! Was it!
Workout:
- Type: Cycle
- Date: 12/24/2008
- Time: 15:15:01
- Total Time: 1:08:26.00
- Average Heart rate: 135
- Max Heart rate: 167
- Calories: 758
- Distance: 2.1 miles
- Average Speed: 1.84 mph
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Snow Ride!
We’ve had so much snow in Seattle, it’s blowing my mind… I had to get out on a snow ride. I was pretty certain the Burke Gilman Trail would be hard packed snow, perfect for riding my hybrid… I was right!
Oh yeah, that’s a coffee cup! You betcha!
Yep, that’s me being all “artsy”… the shadow photo!
This is along the Burke Gilman Trail on the UW campus. I saw several people out for walks in the snow, a couple people out running, a couple other people like me on bikes… but the thing I didn’t expect to see…
…was cross country skiiers… But actually, I saw about a dozen people out doing this… easily 5x more than cyclists!
Here are a couple other shots I took along the way… the quality isn’t the best, but they capture the peacefulness of the experience pretty well.
Workout:
- Type: Cycle
- Date: 12/22/2008
- Time: 21:26:54
- Total Time: 1:00:00.00
- Calories: 313
- Distance: 10 miles
- Average Speed: 10 mph
Filed under: Cycle
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The One Mile Solution
I just voted for a new “Change Idea” on Change.org… The One Mile Solution
28% of all trips in the USA are within 1 mile of home. The vast majority of these trips are made by car. We should encourage people (who are able) to replace one car trip per week within a mile from home with walking or cycling. One trip becomes two, then three, then more. The benefits for the environment, the pocketbook, and our personal and community well being would be huge.
Of course, I totally agree with this idea… I’ve pretty much abandoned using my car for any travel unless I have to take passengers or I’m traveling more than 30 miles. As I said on change.org…
Great idea… so much work to be done in this area, but what a huge difference it would make. To health! To the Environment! To our dependence on foriegn oil (and the national security implications!)
I really do believe this is the kind of change that anyone can make, and if we all made this small change, we could make a huge dent in the biggest issues that are affecting us as a country (and a world).
So today, a normal day to me… I had some errands to run in the middle of the day. So I hopped on my bike. Despite the 29F temperature and threatening blizzard, ice on the road, etc. Look… really, I only had a couple miles to go… and I could choose to ride on a trail (off the road, away from cars) so, I don’t really need to worry about the ice or snow… right? Right!
I’ll log this as a workout, but really it wasn’t much… I probably didn’t even break a sweat… just like it should be for commuting right?
So, do your part, don’t drive those one mile trips… get a run/ride in… and please go vote for change at change.org!
Workout:
- Type: Cycle
- Date: 12/17/2008
- Time: 13:00:00
- Total Time: 00:30:00.00
- Calories: 313
- Distance: 6 miles
- Average Speed: 12 mph
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Various Fixie Commuting On The ICE
Riding your bike on the ice is crazy. Riding your fixie on the ice is even more crazy.
Actually, there wasn’t that much ice on the road except on the University Bridge… which is a draw bridge with a bike path and a sidewalk. The road was clear, but I don’t ride on the car lanes as they are grated surfaces and already a bit dicey… The bike path on the other hand was completely covered in ice, and the side walk was only 50% covered in ice.
I was able to ride across the bridge once on my way to my errands, but on the way back I just couldn’t safely manage the ice… so I walked.
I saw a guy with 3″ knobbies who gave up on the same stretch of ice… so I didn’t feel too whimpy.
Workout:
- Type: Cycle
- Date: 12/15/2008
- Time: 16:00:00
- Total Time: 1:00:00.00
- Calories: 313
- Distance: 10 miles
- Average Speed: 10 mph
Filed under: Cycle
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