Jacob's Ladder

While there are several versions of the song "Jacob's Ladder", I've been humming the Huey Lewis & the News version all day long. The problem is that the chorus is so stinking short that you can sing it about 10 times every minute. Talk about repetitive.

Anyway, I got my second round trip commute in today, since 9 August! That's quite a drought for me. I can't complain about the entire thing however, since I did go on a trip for a week. I traded in the wheels for waterskis and tried out a different sport at Lake Powell. I learned that bicycling is only marginal cross-training for waterskiing. The legs have the strength, but the upper-body gives out way too quickly for serious waterskiing action. I figure that if I can lose the extra weight I'm toting around and get my upper-body toned a little better, the I'll be better prepared for waterskiing next season.

Not much to mention about the commute, aside from the mornings cooling off enough to almost require the arm warmers again. I'll work on that over the coming weeks. Since I have the goal to keep bike commuting until the snow flies, I guess I'd better figure out the layering as the weather cools. Maybe I'll even be smart enough to write down what works for me at different temperatures so that I can reverse it next spring. Maybe.

Well, back to getting caught up at work. I'm looking forward to a good ride tonight and another tomorrow morning.

Burnin' Ring of Fire

For some reason "Burnin' Ring of Fire" is the theme son for the ULCER (Utah Lake Century Epic Ride) sponsored by the Bonneville Cycling Club. It's a 111 mile ride around Utah Lake that occurred last Saturday, 9 August 2008.  I was one of the 1,500 riders. I rode with David Flores, Nicole's Uncle; Phillip Harrison, a riding buddy for several years; and Mike Pope, a friend of David's who is training for the Lotoja Classic next month.

Last week I had people ask me if I'd actually enjoy the ride. I responded then that I figured I would enjoy the first 80 miles and survive the last 30. It turns out that I was about right. I felt good for most of the day. Now, to be fair, it really helped that Mike wanted to pull the line for the majority of the ride. I'll freely admit that he was a big reason that I was able to enjoy so much of the ride. I did at times feel guilty and pull up to take a turn in the front and try to pull my own weight, but I didn't come close to matching Mike's effort. So, what was there to enjoy?

Well, there was the band at the starting line playing "Tequila"; that song stuck in my mind for 10-20 miles or so. There was the well marked course. Okay, a story about that. Even with good course markings on the road, the leader of the line has to look at the road to see them. Twice I had to call from the back of the line that we had just missed a right turn. (They weren't both Mike. I don't know who was leading then.)  There were well stocked rest stops every 10 miles, including water, sports drinks, ice, fruit, and licorice. Good stuff. There was one rest stop toward the end of the ride that ran out of water and ice, but I'm told that's because the volunteer just bailed on the stop. I heard another rider say that was the only glitch they'd seen on the ULCER in about five years. There was the pleasant company. Obviously I've enjoyed riding with Phillip and David, but I also discovered that I have a lot in common with Mike, and we hooked up with Adam, an employee at Zion's Bank. He and Phillip ended up talking shop for several miles. Who knew that a credit union guy and a bank guy could get along so well?

I actually felt pretty good during the entire ride and after. I stuck to my game plan to keep a sports drink or electrolyte supplement in my bottles at all times. That really helped me to stay hydrated. In fact I felt better toward the end of this ride that I did on the last training ride leading up to it. I also made up my mind to not try to lose weight on this ride, but to eat as much as I needed at each stop. It worked. It was good that we kept the line together for most of the ride. Now, Mike and I did pull ahead of the group on a small climb out of Lincoln Beach heading to Genola. But, hey, if you can climb sometimes you just have to.

I did also notice how increasing just a couple of km/h can drastically increase the amount of effort required. To get from 25 km/h to 28 km/h took a fair amount of work, and then to get up to 30 km/h spiked my heartrate and really increased the effort required to keep going.

Oh, and it's really fun to look back and see a group of 20 riders falling in line behind the little group you're a part of. Good stuff there.

Anyway, I'm amazed at how much I really did enjoy the ride, despite the headwinds and other challenges. To have no mechanical failures was really a bonus!

Now it's time to return to my original goal of commuting by bike as much as possible until the snow falls here in Utah.

Feelin' Stronger Every Day

I'd like to think that this title and it's lyric describes my riding, but I'm not sure of that. Anyway, that was the earworm for Saturday's ride: the 80  miler that shrank to about 70 after 6 mechanical issues delayed the whole procession by an hour.

First, I figured that an 80 mile ride would properly prepare us for the 111 mile ULCER this coming Saturday. That's about 75% of the total distance. Seemed reasonable. It also seemed reasonable to figure that a 25 km/h average speed would let us finish that 125 km ride in, well, 5 hours. So much for reasonable.

I will take credit for the first mechanical. I, cunningly, found a section of loose, sharp rocks hidden in a patch of shade on the shoulder of the road. At first I thought I snuck through it, until I got to the top of the hill and coasted for a second, feeling a strange cyclical breeze against my calf. Oops.

From there, however, it became the Phillip show. There was a flat back tire first. During that repair he noticed that his tire was getting thin, as in down to the threads. We rode further on faith and cotton thread,  until about 2 km past Taylor's Bikes. Then, Phillp flatted again; this time it was violent. The threads had given out. So I shared the rest of a Clif bar and we booted his tire for the ride back (uphill) to Taylor's. There he bought a new tire and tube (on borrowed credit -- always bring a credit or debit card on a ride). After putting his own new tire on, the shop inflated it for him. About a half hour later we were off again. That finished up mechanical 4.

At about km 80, we crested another small, steep climb and pulled over for a breather. Phillip cleverly noticed that his front wheel was out of true and was rubbing against his fork. After realizing that none of us had an adjustable wrench, we just put his wheel in off-center so it would stop the rub. Off we went for about 100 meters when we got the call of another flat from Phillip. Mechanical 6 had struck.

After that last delay, we had only a strong headwind to contend with for the next 20 km before we turned around for the final, truncated leg of the last lap.

Hopefully having that many problems on the last training ride portends having a safe, uneventful ride on the real event!

Here's to well-oiled machines and tailwinds!

Heavy Things

"Things kee falling down on me; heavy things that I can't see… when I tried to step aside, I moved just where they hoped I'd be."

Heavy things can take many forms. If you're me, the heavy things could be an upset stomach or a Honda Civic. If you're my scale, the heavy thing is me. After yesterday, I'm taking it a little easier on the scale, tipping in a just a few strands of hair over 200 lbs. (My wife likes to keep the scales on pounds, rather than going metric.) That's pretty good for me, considering that I started this biking season at around 210 lbs.

Anyway, I think the heavy things for me are going to be more interesting that the heavy thing for my scale. Wednesday  evening my family finished up the day by going with some friends to Rile's for a milk shake. My banana-hot fudge shake was delicious. It was just the fact that it was 1500 - 2000 calories of fat, right before bedtime that had me worried. And worried I was for good reason. As I scooped out the last couple bites of the cup full of deliciousness, I thought, "Oops." Well, Thursday morning I woke up with a tender tummy and didn't want to really eat anything until THursday night. There was one challenge with this not eating: I had to bike to work. Yup, no car at home. So I took an easy, short commute to the office and went through the day on a pice of bread and some a pudding cup. Now, I was glad to see that this helped drop my weight to within 20 pounds of where I want to be, but it was a hard way to do it. Heavy thing falling down on me.

Then this morning I was at the top of Winchester at 1300 West when a, dare I say it -- yes, stupid Civic driver decided that he could get the left turn in front of the bike coming straight at him. Fortunately for me I was planning on turning at that intersection anyway so he didn't smack me broadside. Well, I discovered that I can get -- and effectively act upon -- road rage on a bike. I was seriously ticked at this idiot. So, I shifted all the way up and sprinted down the 10% grade. I was finally able to catch up to him and thought about slapping his trunk, but then realized that there was a gap between him and the car ahead of him, so I kept sprinting and put myself squarely in the middle of the lane, directly in front of him, repaying the courtesy of cutting me off by cutting him off. Eventually I did slide back to the right and watched him burn a half gallon of gas speeding up ahead of the bike as he raced to the next red light. Just after this I thought back to the stories recently of card pulling in front of packs of bikes and slamming on their brakes. At least I didn't slam my brakes. Anyway, that's one heavy thing I'd rather not see on the road again.