April 29 Ride Reports

[Mr. Bloom]

Silver and I did 40 miles in beautiful weather at 16.4mph.

http://www.routeslip.com/routes/35649

We pushed each other as much as the wind allowed us.

[BleeckerSt_Girl]

I just did my usual loop of 20 miles. Very pleasant despite some light drizzle. :)

[Velobambina]

The sun is rising earlier. Left the house around 5:30 and I could adjust the headlight from "see" to "be seen" after about a half hour. Did my usual Sunday ride--43 miles. It was a chilly 49 degrees at the start, but the humidity kept the edge off. Cool mornings keep the fair weather crowd inside, waitng for it to warm up. :) Memorable moment of this ride: A bird pooped on my face. Actually, on my lower lip. That was my most disgusting bike moment I've had to date (thank goodness I wiped it off, even though I initially thought it was just a drop of water).

[deedolce]

Did 36 miles with a nasty crosswind almost the entire way. Not as many riders out, mostly the orange and blue jerseys of the race team. I kept ahead of a pace line of 4 for a couple of miles before they they reeled me in and spit me out. :) Blue jersey had the best calves. White jersey had the best view from behind. But Red jersey beat them all for my #1 Eyecandy of the day, because he smiled and said 'hello' .:p

[makbike]

I decided to take it easy today and not push myself after yesterday's century. I decided I would ride a new route I put together on RouteSlip to make sure it worked before using it on a club ride in the future. Good thing I rode it for I discovered the side road I was to take at one point does not exist. I turned around and head home on this note - my legs did not have a lot in them (they were frequently asking me if I had lost my mind). I got in 31miles at a moderate pace (15.1 mph). It was a pretty ride - lots of emerald green pastures dotted with dairy cows. The skies were blue and temps in the mid-70's. I could have done without the wind today but I'm starting to think what is a ride without a headwind these days? I have a feeling I'll be in bed early tonight.

[HillSlugger]

I did the Bicycle place Sunday group ride with Regina and her DH. He did the A ride, we did the C ride. I think I was more a C-, just able to hang onto the back of the pack.

33.6 miles, 16.2 mph average.

[7rider]

You did awesome, Nicole (I apologize for calling you Erica so many times! I just get so used to having her as my only female riding partner on that ride, that I get all confused -- especially when chasing the group up some hill and the blood exits the brain to fuel the legs.) - A+ in my book!

[BleeckerSt_Girl]

I did the Bicycle place Sunday group ride with Regina and her DH. He did the A ride, we did the C ride. I think I was more a C-, just able to hang onto the back of the pack.

33.6 miles, 16.2 mph average.


33 miles at 16mph is a C- ???????? Geez....I need a bigger alphabet for me!!!! :eek: :eek: :eek: :( :(

[HillSlugger]

33 miles at 16mph is a C- ???????? Geez....I need a bigger alphabet for me!!!! :eek: :eek: :eek: :( :(

I was working so hard to hang on to the group that I have almost no clue what route we took or what the scenery was like. :eek: :rolleyes:

[BabyBlueNTulsa]

After yesterday's 68 mile hill fest, I decided to only do a quick 22 today. (a few hills)

No notable items..except I'm looking forward to my recovery day (Tuesday!)..woohoo!

[Kano]

I need more letters too, Lisa!

My ride today -- According to DH's computer, almost 22 miles. Mine had a spontaneous reset, I think when we stopped to fiddle with is bike for a while. I'd sure like to know why that happened!

We started from home and headed out to the quarries this morning. I lucked into waiting at the first stop light. DH just kept right on going, and at first I thought about catching up to him, but then I decided to just ride my own ride, and eventually he'd be going up that nasty invisible hill, and I'd catch up with him. (HAH! my legs had other ideas) In the mean time, a group got between us, and they were kinda road hogs, with no intention of moving when cars came by and all (I was thinking "share the road" goes both ways, doesn't it?)

We got to that invisible hill, and I realized that I was hurting today when I wound up using my granniest granny gear to get to the top of it. This thing isn't all that big, and we just rode it on Friday afternoon, and I didn't need to go out of the middle ring to do it at like 12 mph, and here this morning I was struggling up at 6.... Like I said before, legs had other ideas today!

Next was the rolling road, on the way to the quarries. Things got better, but my poor thighs were hollering the whole way. And that road has two of those cow stopper things, you know, the metal grates in the road. I hadn't ridden over any of those on the new bike yet, so was a little nervous approaching the first one (on a downhill run) Needn't have worried, just extra vibration, bigger than chipseal!

When I finally caught up to DH, he'd stopped at the corner just before the hill to wait for me, and taunt me about needing to go home. Perhaps he wanted to, but was hoping I would be his excuse. I made him wait -- I really needed to stretch after our three mile warm up before tackling the next hill.

That pause to stretch those screaming muscles made a WORLD of difference! Nothing better than a good stretch!

I did it!!! It's a mile and a quarter long, and only about a 250 foot rise, so from what it sounds like, for many of you that's barely a blip on the radar, but I haven't ever climbed the whole thing at once before! Now, I was in my granny granny for the whole hill, but maybe that helped? Usually I try to go in as big a gear as I can as long as I can, then keep shifting down til I run out, and when that happens, my lungs are screaming, my legs are complaining, and my heart rate is through the roof. I also went faster than I've ever been able to go in that gear, a whopping 6mph up hill. I was sure proud of me when I got to the top!!!!

Then there was the lovely long straight shot down hill, another up, and then one more down. We turned a corner and had a really long mostly down stretch, where it was easy to run at 20 or more -- what fun!!!

DH was a bit ahead of me again, and when I caught up to him, I noticed that his rear wheel was wobbly. Told him he needed to stop at the next corner -- he always AARGHS! at me when I say that, but when we stopped, I told him about his wheel. He fiddled some, then rode off, and at the next corner (about a mile) stopped to fiddle more. Cussing a bit, he decided we should head for home.

A few miles later, I noticed that suddenly, I'd only ridden three and a half miles -- no, that was somewhere around the corner where we headed up the real hill. I don't think I did the reset button -- you have to do it for each function on the computer I've got on this bike, and ride time was reset too, so it seemed really odd to me.

Once home -- I discovered his seat rail is bent (I wondered why he seemed to be leaning to the left all the time) -- told him he has to at least change to my old seat for my old bike like his, if not my newest seat (that I don't like) -- and then when he started playing around with that wobbly wheel, he discovered the broken spoke. Very sad DH.

This necessitated a trip to the bike shop cuz we don't know from changing out spokes, much less have any spares around, or the right tools. Hey, wait, we got a printed from the web site coupon, we can get some stuff while we're there! So, as he puts it, tomorrow DH will have a lovely new $200 spoke on his bike -- two pair of gloves, one jersey, one pair of shorts, and a saddle later, we were out of there!

And now Tater's recommending the new Sierra Trading Post as a fun place to shop....

It was a good ride, in spite of the need for repairs, and fun shopping -- makes for a pretty good day!

Karen in Boise

[Kalidurga]

I drove up to Pennsylvania today to ride a new loop (http://www.bikely.com/maps/bike-path/Gettysburg-3-Best) I put together around the battlefield at Gettysburg National Military Park (http://www.nps.gov/gett/). This was the first time I've dared to go off the park roads (aside from a short stretch through side streets of the town), so the route's still pretty short. The great thing about riding through the battlefield, though, is that there are so many roads that it's easy to loop back around through various sections to increase the mileage or get more hill practice, or just to take a look at a particular monument that I sped by the first time ;) I ended up doing a total of 18.5 miles. One of my goals for this summer is to get to know the roads around the battlefield so I can create longer routes.

The other thing that's great about riding through Gettysburg battlefield is that it's a pretty little town smack-dab in the middle of some gorgeous countryside (if you ignore all the tacky little tourist shops, of course). It's also good for practicing dealing with un-observant drivers and pedestrians (i.e. tourists), and has a handful of killer hills. And on top of all that, there's the incredible history (http://americanhistory.about.com/library/weekly/aa101601a.htm) of the place. Definitely one of my favorite places to ride.

[mimitabby]

Well, X and Kit got to my house last night and before we were all tucked into bed for the night, I found out that my stepfather had fallen and got a concussion and a broken jaw. We're not sure why he fell. He's 80 something and it could be his diabetes, his BP, or perhaps the newly discovered heart valve problem. I found this out at 9pm and DH went down to the hospital to take my mother home; they'd been there since about 4pm and she was without car (they went in an ambulance)
So, i didn't sleep well last night.
In the morning, Teigyr called me sounding just llike the people you see in Nyquil commercials, she couldn't ride.
So the three of us went to the park in X's cool jeep and started the ride.
It was nippy out, and tried to rain on the way over, but as the day progressed, so did the weather, it was absolutely gorgeous. We rode 26 miles on the burke-gilman trail with a side tour of the University of Washington campus.
Kit tried to teach me how to jump my bike but I couldn't do it, and a squirrel tried to race with me. We turned around at Logboom park, and went back to Lake Forest Park (not a park) and ate subways for lunch.
I cut the ride way back because i had to go to the hospital. My mother drove down there but was too tired and stressed to drive herself home. We went down there and visited my stepfather too, who is feeling a little better. It looks like his jaw isn't so bad, they wont' have to wire it or anything.

[Shiraz]

DH and I rode to the next little town and back approximately 33 miles. We had a nice ride out stopped for a bathroom break and fluid refill then started back home. The wind pick up and made for a slower trip home but still very nice weather and time with DH. We realy are fortunate to have very little traffic and lots of farm ground. Can't beat it!!

[yellow]

What a superfun mountain bike ride I had today!

I've been overanxious about the Wine Country Century coming up next weekend, because, well, I've been running a lot and not riding much at all. So I thought I'd cram for the test this weekend. Stupid, I know. I'm mostly trying to get my butt used to sitting on the saddle again.

So yesterday I did a moderate 40+ mile road ride, flatted, and got sunburned in that space that only gets exposed when you are wearing a sleeveless jersey and are leaning forward. I had planned to do another long road ride today, but when I called my riding buddy in the am, I declared it a mountain biking day. I just really didn't want to ride on the pavement. I mumbled something about a "long easy-ish ride".

Well, it wasn't technical, but it qualifies as "epic" in my book (I'm not a very talented mountain biker). 20.13 miles, 4,136' of climbing, average grade of 11% (which explains why I feel so tired this evening). And it was hot (for Park City at this time of year), though I only almost melted down once. We started out on one of the standard trails and ran into a guy that was high on life and very chatty. He told us about a new trail, just opened this year, unmarked but open to ride. So we found it and went for it. The climbs were long but not really tough, so we chugged along. And the descents were a blast. What a great ride! But for meeting this guy, we would have ridden right by it and had to battle with the gagillion other people out on the more familiar trails.

:D

[KnottedYet]

Trek and I didn't do the ride with Mimi, RaleighDon,Kit, X. Other things to do. But we ran into them at our beloved LBS: Recycled Cycles.

[Triskeliongirl]

Hey Guys, I arrived in Wellesley yesterday, assembled Feronia, my new S/S coupled bike, and met up with DebW and Newsfsmith for a great ride this morning. After Deb trued my wheel from TSA damage, we set off down route 16. Soon we came upon a racer boy on his black carbon trek, with a flat and no more C02, so Team Estrogen came to the rescue. The forst pic is of Newsfsmith, loaning racer boy her pump. The next two are more shots I took of DebW and Newfsmith along the way. Thanks for a great ride guys!!!
(I took them on my camera phone, so I apologize the resolution isn't great.)

[salsabike]

Yellow, I'm impressed!

We had a beautiful tandem ride today (Mercer Island), 48 miles, several major hills for the first time since probably November, and they went better than we feared they might. It was gorgeous out and we were pleased with ourselves for doing a demanding ride. Hurray! Sorry I missed the TE ride and sorry about your stepdad, Mimi!

[Crankin]

Great pics, Trisk, Deb, and Jean. Hope you didn't get rained on too much.
We were set to ride our Groton-Lost Lake loop, a 40 mile ride we lead every year and ride about 4-5 times a season. Big climbs near the end. At 9:30 the weather didn't look so great and it was still 48 out, so we called our friends and decided to ride closer to home. We set out from Acton and it began drizzling immediately. It stopped, so we headed to Harvard, via Littleton. Immediately I knew my lungs would be funky. That little wheeze started, but I kept going. All 4 of us had sort of bad attitudes, so we planned the easiest of the hill climbs into Harvard and back to our friend's house. I was sweating after the first climb into Harvard center, so I took off my arm warmers and put my rain jacket back on. Of course, then we went downhill, so I froze and that didn't add to my already cranky disposition, so I put them back on.. Then we climbed up part of West Bare Hill Rd. and Scott Rd., which I did not remember as being so LOOOONG. I was in full granny, all the way down, going about 7.5 mph. But as we waited at the top for my friend, my husband said, "UH that was really hard,it's not you." The rest of the trip was basically downhill into Bolton and then back to Boxborough and Acton. Rode past my old house on very familiar roads that I miss. About 2 miles from my friend's house you have to go over a highway and there's a little hill on the street. My legs were dead. By this time we were all separated, since Brant had to go to the bathroom really bad, so he raced home and my husband tried to catch him (we just though he had gone nuts with speed) and Janine was way behind me. After that little hill, I put it in the big ring and pushed it up to about 20, to make it back to their street.
We recovered with tea and Clif bars. I'm glad I did it, but I am dead today.

[cosc]

I rode a 25 mile loop from my house.The wind was more than my fitness level allows. I so enjoyed the sun, and smell that newness of spring offers. Seems I had mostly a crosswind that I had to fight to keep the bike upright. When I got home I felt like I'd done a century -sore all over especially my weakling arms.

[SheFly]

DH got on the bike yesterday for a 30 min spin in the EASY gears trying to get his knee actually moving after his surgery on Weds.

What that means is that I RODE THE FRICKIN TRAINER AGAIN! :mad: I'll be back outside this week...

SheFly

[Crankin]

The upcoming weather looks good SheFly (except for Wed. AM). To answer your question about NH, we are staying at Applebrook B and B. I cannot remember what town it is in, but it's not far from Mt. Washington. We do 2 loops on this trip. The first day has like a 6 mile climb in the middle and then a shorter climb near the end. I can't remember how long the ride was, but I think 35-45 miles. Day 2 we drive to the Vermont border, park and ride up to the Canadian border, about 25 miles one way. It's very flat, along the river. Last year it was gray and drizzly on day 1 and about 55 out. The second day was like 85 and sunny and that got to me, almost like going from winter to summer in a day.
Getting my stuff together to do my first full commute from Concord to Hudson tomorrow. I decided that I can't ride my commuter bike (it's an old mtb), it would take me forever, it's so heavy, so I brought all my clothes in yesterday and just took the bladder out of my Camelbak, which makes a very ergonomic backpack! I still haven't decided on my route, but I have to decide if I will scoot down Barrett's Mill to the rotary over to 2A and then up Concord Rd in Acton, cutting across Rt. 2 on Piper Rd to School St., which gets me to where i usually go by car, into Stow, then Hudson. Or, I could ride to Concord Center and cross 62 into West Concord and catch School St. there. That involves a climb and I don't know how I will feel at 5:45 AM...

[SheFly]

Robyn - looking forward to some good riding this week - OUTSIDE!

I would avoid the rotary on your bicycle in the morning... Can you go up Strawberry Hill Rd to Pope, down to 2A and continue on your route that way? I think it would be safer for you than going through the rotary - especially during commute time! Be careful, and let us know how it goes.

SheFly

p.s.
Since you're commuting tomorrow this won't work, but you should try to come out to one of the NEBC women's rides that we are starting this week in Lexington Center. We'll meet each week on the green at 6:00 pm to head out for a 20 or 28 mile loop at all different ability levels. Should be a fun time, and I think I heard Deb W rumbling about coming ;)

[alpinerabbit]

50 miles on Saturday, to my parents house, and 50 miles back on Sunday....

with overall negative elevation, and without getting lost, on the way back, we were 2 hours faster...(we didn't detour on the way there, just wasted time at intersections guessing what the map was telling us)