Machka 

Tell us about your cycling this weekend and in the week to come. Are you getting out there regularly these days? Where are you riding? Who are you cycling with?

Machka 

Saturday

Distance: 56.1 km
Elevation: 362 m
Moving Time: 3:13:50
Elapsed Time: 3:47:21
Speed: Avg:17.4 km/h | Max: 42.5 km/h


On our ride today ... a casual recovery ride with our touring bicycles ...

It's autumn here and today was a heavily overcast day with a hint of fog and smoke in the air. But because there was no wind and the temp was in the high teens, it was actually quite nice out there.

We kept it pretty relaxed including a lunch stop in the middle.

jamesdak 

Well yesterday was the beginning of my weekend. Headed out for what I planned to be a 40 miler. Forecast was temps around 50, 8 mph winds and 0% precipitation. Right away I was cold and the winds were twice as strong. Once I got over to the other side of the valley I looked back and saw the area around my house being totally obliterated by a wall of...ummm..... "0% precipitation". WTH???

So I aborted the ride and headed home, arriving totally white from all the sleet coating me. Not fun in just shorts and a jersey. If I ever meet a weatherman I'm punching him in the face.

Anyway 20.8 miles total Friday. Hopefully the rest of the weekend is better.

kbarch

Finally got around to repairing the flat on the TXC, which was super easy - almost could have removed the tire with just my fingers, and it popped right back on. However, filling that mega 40mm thing took twice as much pumping for only 70% as much pressure as regular road tires!

And today was the day to take it out - damp and drizzly, and I wanted to ride some trails - a change of pace without having to go far. It was a short ride, distance-wise (29 miles, 1,464') but a LONG one, time wise - about three and a half hours moving time and the better part of five hours, start to finish. There were two coffee stops, but that wasn't what made the ride so long. It was long because it turned out to include a good bit of hiking, too.

Seems what I thought was going to be a nice dirt trail through the woods (like another couple of trails I'd taken earlier in the ride) was actually part of a fairly challenging set of mountain bike trails - exposed roots the size of your arms, rocks like baseballs and bowling balls embedded in the path, and streams all over the place. A CX bike is not a mountain bike, so I wound up walking the bike and carrying it a lot. The map made it look like there was just one direct trail from one end of the park to another, but I wound up going around and retracing some loop up and down the hillside. It was disappointing going back out the way I came in, but it was pretty cool to be in that area - it felt like some secret playground.

Earlier in the ride, on a long, smooth, flat trail, I made a little discovery. Seems I have been in the habit of grasping the handle bars. Not with some death grip or anything, but in a certain way that leads me to ride fairly upright. I made this discovery when I made it a point to just rest my hands with the thumbs hooked over the hoods - trying to get as relaxed and easy as possible. The more relaxed I made my hands - loosening the fingers so they sort of just laid flatly against the sides of the brakes and bars rather than wrapping around anything, the more I wanted to drop my forearms. Normally I would shift with my forefingers, even from the hoods, but as I relaxed more and more, I found myself shifting with my pinkie. I got so droopy that when I went to the drops, I found my body position didn't change at all, just my hands. I got to thinking, this seems quite right, maybe this is the way others ride all the time? It was new to me, though.

At the end of the ride, I stopped at the shop to say hello and also to have them check out a strange noise. Turns out the front rotor had gotten slightly warped. They had the prettiest bike hanging up there today. Blue and gray, lovely shape, and inspection revealed all top-notch components. It was an Argonaut. Never heard of it before, but looked it up. Wow$ - it better be pretty! Funny thing, though. Their standard build kits are Dura Ace or eTap with Enve bars, stem, etc., but this one had Super Record and Deda to go with the custom lay-up, hand-made in Oregon frame.

Jakedatc

Sat morning shop ride. Forecast was for 50s into low 60 with fog clearing. Turned out to be mid 50s with varying amounts of rain. 5 of us did 35mi with a few fun climbs. Got home and went to the local ramen restaurant to warm up

Lrdchaos

41 mile ride, 48 degrees with mist and 18 mph north wind/30 mph gusts. Toughest ride to date, the wind took its toll, I was down to 12 mph during some of the gusts. 18 miles of the trip was straight north.

jamesdak 

Sat - Took the Paramount back out for it's longest ride. Temps closed in on 60 but the winds kept getting stronger during the ride. Basically just didn't worry about pace and took what the conditions and bike gave me. Nice ride and an ok time. A tad over 51 miles. First time doing this many miles on this bike and it felt great. Even the saddle which is nothing like my usual saddles did OK.

HTupolev

The size of my arms? What are you complaining about, then?

It's pretty normal for drops and hoods to not be all that different, even with arms outstretched in both positions. If you've got some elbow bend on the hoods, it's not surprising that the drops would be no more aggressive.

Extreme elbow bend on the hoods is a common way to get quite aero. It's usually more aero than arms outstretched with hands in the bottom of the drops, since you have less non-aero forearm profile. Sometimes people do it even when they don't actually have any hoods. See at 12 minutes into here:


If the drops and hoods with arms outstretched have a huge difference in aggressiveness, it sometimes means that you should either use a bar with less drop, or have the bar farther forward and higher up.

kbarch

This is what I'd always figured. Meanwhile, I'd never noticed a big difference in body position between riding in the drops vs on the hoods, except on my fixed gear bike (which has track bars that I'm not supposed to have hoods on or ride any way except the drops... ) I was just surprised that I noticed no difference at all in body position in drops vs hoods when the only thing I purposefully changed was the openness of my hands and uncurling of the fingers when on the hoods.
By the way, I notice the guy you pointed out had his hands sort of draped over the tops; his fingers weren't really gripping. That's key, I think. When you grip the bars and don't completely relax your arms, they want to straighten.

Machka 

Sunday -- Another casual recovery-type ride on a heavily overcast, chilly day. It was so overcast, Mount Wellington disappeared!

However ... some nice autumn colours out there.

Distance: 40.2 km
Elevation: 309 m
Moving Time: 2:29:48
Elapsed Time: 2:50
Speed: Avg: 16.1 km/h | Max: 28.4 km/h

MarioT

72 kms on a nice if somewhat chilly morning ride.

OldTryGuy

My "Weekend" ride began at 7:23PM Friday and ended 11 hours 2 minutes later at 6:25AM Saturday. My participation in this year's "Relay For Life" was on the bike riding area roads instead of walking the oval at Venice Airport. Goal was just to cruise my refitted 1983 Paramount Road bike but instead completed 152 miles. Have to up the challenge for next year to 175 miles.


YEAR???

jamesdak 

LOL, this one is a 1987 I recently got. Still sorting it out.

jamesdak 

Sunday - I got in a 30.91 mile ride as the next storm front moved in. Gonna rain all week. Today I jumped on the Giordana XL Super. I'm always pleased at how perfect this bike feels under me each time I get on it.

It's the bottom one in this shot.

Wileyrat

Getting my endurance back after having a nasty cold/cough last month. I rode 57.4 mup miles yesterday.

Today was bike maintenance day.

ZIPP2001

Had to babysit the little grandbuddies Saturday, and it decide to rain when babysitting duties were done. But Sunday after service I took the TT bike out for a quick 41 miles, the sun felt so nice. The legs were eager to push so it made for a great way to finish the weekend.

JamesB722

12.2 mile ride through Pennypack Park in Philadelphia.

Sojodave

Nothing like riding 53 miles into the wind only to discover your rear brake is rubbing against your back rim. I also got my first bout of sadddle soars..whoohooo

Jadesfire 

10 miles yesterday (after taking care of an emergency plumbing situation ).
~41 miles today. Th is a new build I just finished last week and is still in the shake-down process. But for some reason I just kept going and going. It wasn't until I was on my way back home that I realized- Hey! Your fitness really sucks, you probably won't be able to make it home . Tried calling the family member that was home to get a ride. It's really not helpful when the person that knows you are out on a long ride (and are already overdue anyway) doesn't answer the phone. So, I HTFU and kept going...until I turned onto the North-bound highway and directly into a headwind and the plummeting temperatures of our (probably) last cold front of the year. Gave it one more go at the phone call and luckily they answered. Kind of sucks because that last bit would have put me over 50 miles, but my legs just didn't have it. I'll give this route another go in a month or so .

[IMG][/IMG]
Pardon the NDS view.

wipekitty

Great weather and great riding the past few days - daytime temperatures in the mid 60s to low 70s, sunshine, and it's light until nearly 8PM!

On Friday, I got in 43.4 miles and a few hills, including one that's known for being a bit tough. Great view from the ridge along the top, though! Saturday, I took a short ride (17.5) miles with one tough climb, made even tougher by the fact that parts of the road were missing (washed out) and/or covered in potholes!

Today was a ride to the Mindoro Cut put on by the Wisconsin Bike Fed. The weather was absolutely perfect - except for what seemed to be headwinds for the whole ride. The official ride was 54.3 miles, but I rode to and from the ride, bringing the total to 76.9.

I realized on the way home that, oddly enough, this was my highest mileage day ever on a geared bike; I've done slightly over 100 on a fixed gear and non-fixed single speed, but my max on a proper road bike was 67 miles. Everything feels pretty good, other than a mild sunburn. I usually do OK but sunscreen might have been a smart choice today...oops.

Jean3n16

I did a 2mi ride to test my new saddle but i plan to hit up the trail this week! 20+ mi ride that will be!

Rowan

This isn't Hot or Not, so NDS view is A-OK.

But tell us about the build. What's the frame?

British Racing Green also is nice.

dirtydozen

Around 40km on saturday and on sunday at around 30km/h average, the weather is beautiful, first rides with summer equipment is always a pleasure


On sunday I was chilling with my brother on some small downhill, a guy wanted to impress us going super fast, i kept a 20m distance with him for 30sec and attacked him in the uphill that was comming and he was far from catching me. Snap back to reality boy

Zurichman2

So they had National Parks Day on the Skyline Drive on Sunday no cars allowed. The kicker is even though the event was free you had to register for the ride because they had limited parking at the Skyline HS at Front Royal were the ride started. I wasn't lucky enough to get a parking pass so I just showed up early.

50.54 miles
1st 21 miles was uphill on an out and back.
avg. going out 6.40 mph
avg. coming back 26.57 mph sweet

Friday arrived at the motel in Luray before check in so why not go out for a bike ride. Again an out and back and the 21 mile loop out was uphill. lol

42 miles
avg. going out 7.19 mph
coming back 23.94 mph

Zman

Machka 

Welcome here ... do I know you from a couple other forums?