Thanks!

Tomorrow (Sunday) is my 62nd birthday, but today is the big-mile day. So I did 62.9 miles today with the club. There were myriad small storm cells migrating from NW to SE, and we finally caught one of them with 5 miles to go. We sheltered under an oak tree for about 10 minutes as we got a lot of rain and even a few small hail stones. No thunder, though. It was a cold front, and the rain was... 'refreshing.'

:bday:

My 55th. will be Tuesday the 15th.

I was caught in one of those last week, and got absolutely soaked. Lightning had me most concerned, to say the least. Under some heavy branches was all the shelter I had. About 75 minutes of standing still with my head down. Was fine with it until I rode 4 miles back up the greenway to discover the first half of the trail was completely dry! Boy, did I choose the wrong end. :twitchy:

Thanks. It was phenomenal for me! I think twice is all I've ever averaged that fast above 20 miles.

15 miles on a "new to me" dirt road. Have stayed away from this one due to expected heavy rutting. Guess what - smooth as glass. Found out they use rollers vs graders. Amazing ride.

This made me go back through years of records to come to the same conclusion ... two freak days .... and never even close for 30 miles. :( I guess i am not old enough yet. :)

47 Miles. It's been very hot the last few months, usually 90°+, but today was in the low 70s, I was cold, don't know what I'll do once it starts snowing.

:bday: yesterday to BP and :bday: tomorrow to o4s ...... a pair of young guns :D. Had my 67th last month so keep on going and you'll catch me. :lol:

Saturday I finally got back on the Propel after a week lay-off for prostate cancer blood work. 109 good-hard miles with some rain at the beginning then 101 miles yesterday on the Paramount with some rain in the middle. Hopefully tomorrow's 100+ will be rain free. :thumb: :thumb:

17 miles...

Just under 34.

Tuesday night C-Group-ride. 18 miles

I like this thread ... there is a limited number of superhumans riding too many miles, and more people who ride distances I could aspire to. Nothing against superhumans, but it can be sort of spirit-crushing when OldTriGuy gets out of chemo on Friday night and does 350 miles in that weekend.

I have been through a bad month ... very little riding, for a lot of reasons ... last thing I need to hear is 65-year-old guys riding 65 miles with ease.

I mean, great job and all ... wish I could too ... but .... :D

I pretty much always appreciate your insight on whatever topic it is around here. :thumb:

post of the year!

70.1 miles, 3126 total elevation gain. Both career highs for me. (Although I've gone barely over 3000 feet before in less miles).

Saturday -- Rowan and I travelled to the north of the state with the intention of starting ... and perhaps finishing ... a 400 km. We weren't sure if we'd complete the 400 because we haven't been well in recent weeks, and haven't done nearly enough cycling recently ... so we figured it might be a bit of a struggle.

Also, while this weekend presented us with sunshine during the day, it was not at all warm. Shortly after we started, Rowan's thermometer read -1.8C and the high reached 12C for a little while. Tonight it is supposed to drop below freezing again with frost.

So, we started the 400 km, and covered the part of the route I really wanted to ride ... a section we've driven but have never ridden. And it is beautiful! The route twists and turns and climbs a little and has some flat sections, and presents riders with a lovely view of the Great Western Tiers which are topped with snow at this time of year.

All up, we covered 183.8 km and I really enjoyed the ride. I was so pleased to be able to do that distance, and had fun out there! :)


Also ... when we reached 157 km, Rowan and I decided to go out for dinner to celebrate our anniversary (it's next week). Evil Rowan made the booking for 6 pm, which gave us an hour and a quarter to cover the last 27 km, a quarter hour to get ready and half an hour to get there. We made it! I can move briskly when there's Mexican food at stake.

To be fair to Rowan, he did try to get a booking for later, but this place is popular and busy and 6 pm was the only time we could get in.


Distance 183.8 km
Elevation: 1256 metres
Moving Time 9:02

My trip-planning expertise shined more brightly than ever tonight.

I waited until the worst of a line of thunderstorms passed over, and headed out for a carefully planned 46-mile ride. I know from experience that 45 miles is about my current maximum ride. Since I only get one day off each week, I like to spend part of the day doing my Big Ride of the week.

I memorized the map, wrote down all the turns ... I made sure I ate just enough, and hydrated all day. I was ready ... to get lost.

I only made one wrong turn. By the time I was sure I was going the wrong way, I decided I had gone so many miles, I might as well follow that road and take a turn at the next major intersection. After all, the area is cross-crossed with major roads ... eventually it would cross one of them.

Nope. This unprintable son of a censored something wove in between every major road and dead-ended at the entrance to a highway ten miles into the middle of Nothingsville. There were no cross routes whatsoever. Every road off either side of this road was either a loop through a neighborhood or dead-ended against a nature preserve or cow pond or anything but another road.

I had to ride all the way back to the intersection where I missed my turn. By that time I was so totally beat I could barely ride up a two-percent hill ... and there were a lot of hills from two- to five-and-a-half percent on the road home. They were all very short---a few hundred yards long or maybe a little longer--but even though my legs felt okay, every other part of my body was toast.

Then, when I finally got home, I had massive cramps for a couple hours and had to lie on the floor moaning like a sick infant---I couldn't even stand up.

Finally two-and-a-half hours later my body stopped trying to kill me for what I had done to it. I crawled to my desk and checked the downloaded data.

60.7 freaking miles. All that pain, all that suffering ... and I didn't even get my metric century. If I had just gotten lost for another eight-tenths of a mile and come back, I would have hit it.

That's not salt in the wound ... that is ripping a whole new set of wounds open--and then throwing salt in them.

So ... bicycling sucks rhinoceri.

How as your weekend?

er no comment:p

41 miles Saturday night, my second ride on a proper road bike ('80 Miyata 610). Enjoyed the speed a bit much, limping a bit today! Half daylight half dark, great view of the Milky way on the ride back in rural NW Indiana.

One benefit of rural living that few know ... lack of light pollution. Makes every night ride more awesome.

I love doing dusk-to-dark rides ... I have never seen an ugly sunset.

50.2 yesterday afternoon, solo, on a day with a 101 heat index. Stopped at 18, at 24 and at 32 to rest for a few before continuing on.

I'm 58 - started riding on Father's Day weekend in June. This is the 3rd Sunday in a row that I've gone 50+ solo! It feels good and makes the shorter 20-30 mile rides in the week seem like nothing in comparison!

Gary

You are a lot tougher than I when it comes to heat, then.

This is an extremely hostile statement. Why must you come here and demean your weaker fellow posters?

:D

Huge congratulations for you, sir. May the remainder of your cycling journey only get better.

I work in car sales. Whatever the outside temp is on any given day, it's 8 to 10 degrees warmer out there on the asphalt, in the parking lot where you meet customers. So yeah, it's hot but you do kinda sorta semi get used to it.


I didn't mean for my post above to sound like bragging, as I still feel like I'm getting stronger and have a long ways to go. Seems that endurance is easier for me than speed, at this point. Bottom line for me is, am I having fun? Certainly every mile isn't "fun", but the overall is and the only riding miles I have regretted are the ones I didn't get a chance to take!


Gary

Did 20 miles at 16.4 MPH on my Roam-2 today so improvements are still coming along since post #432. :thumb: It was kind of windy today too. :eek:

:thumb:

I haven't been able to ride since last week. :( Been under the weather with a summer flu. Gonna shoot for gettin' back in the saddle this coming Saturday.