August Rides

[emily_in_nc]

Ooops, I posted my first three rides of August in the July thread. In a nutshell, I rode 153 miles over three days on a couple different rail-trails here in Minnesota (Heartland and Paul Bunyan). Yesterday's was the longest at 68+ miles and my longest ride of the year. I'm spent!

[north woods gal]

Great ride, Emily. That's about my tops for the year, too, and I really have no wish to push for more. There was a day when I did purposely plan for a couple of century rides every summer, but that was time consuming because I was always careful to work up to those kinds of miles. I find that my usual 25 to 40 mile a day road work is MORE than enough to keep me in shape, now.

I'm at 70 plus miles for August, so far, but about 15 of that has been some nasty single track that leaves me panting and wheezing in a way that I don't get with my road biking. Another 15 has been on spooky gravel and sand roads. Loving it, though. Not too worried about the miles when I'm having so much fun.

Darn off the pavement biking is addictive. I now find myself going out of the way to ride gravel and sand roads, some really nasty ones, too. In fact, I've been practicing on how to work out of a bad fishtail and spin out in the deep soft stuff. The only way to do that is actually trying to ride through those spots, of course. Has boosted my confidence level, though, knowing I can handle it when it happens. Not a great way to add up a lot of miles, though.

[ny biker]

I enjoy the solitude of my post-work rides. Even though I ride in a well-populated area the roads are pretty quiet with most people at home eating dinner. I see dog walkers and a few cars but not much else, which is fine by me.

I rode last night, 19 miles, first time on the bike in 10 days. I was listening on my phone to the college baseball game that my nephew was broadcasting. It was a little hard to hear for a few minutes, because I had the wind in my ears going down hill and also there was a brief stretch with some car traffic. When I could hear it again, his broadcast partner was saying "I just can't imagine any situation where you'd need to see Twitter at the refrigerator." I have no idea how that came up during a baseball game. Anyway it was the last regular game of the season so I stopped and took a break during the bottom of the 9th so I could be sure to hear the end clearly. Their team will now go to the playoffs, but there won't be many more games to listen to on my post-work rides. I have enjoyed listening to them.

After the game ended I spent the last few miles thinking about the new gearing that I want for the bike.

The weather was great, around 80 degrees and not too humid. I'm trying to enjoy the warm weather as much as possible.

[Crankin]

I rode with my friend who is moving to Amherst today. Her husband is already out there, and they are going back and forth for the next 2 weeks. But, we already have 2 weekends planned, one in Oct. and one in September, when they will be here, since we still have our theatre subscription with them. Hopefully, we will get out there in between.
We rode to Bolton Farm today, a ride I did a lot in the beginning of the season. Woke up still sleepy, not usual for me, but I figured since my friend is a slower rider, I did not have to work too hard. Then, I forgot my GPS, so all pressure was off! I had no idea how fast I was going. I must say, everything feels easier since I came back from the Berkshires.
It was between 70 and 83 during the ride, but it's humid. Thankfully, after our early lunch, some clouds appeared, just as we started a slog of a mild climb that is unshaded. Since this part always occurs after lunch, I dread it, but it wasn't bad.
A weird thing happened after that. We were going up a short steep hill, just before entering Harvard Center and the General Store. This is a side street that no one drives on... at the top of the hill are like 10 skateboarders, rushing down, one at a time, falling off at times, and letting their boards fly. I yelled "heads up," but no one stopped, as they were being photographed. I was picturing one of them crashing into me. I was furious, and when I got to the general store to wait for my friend, there was a competition set up in the parking lot, with jumps and stuff. We told one of the policeman there, who went to investigate. It kind of felt like a bike race, but definitely, the people were not as nice!
After that, we were getting close to being in home territory. I was feeling drained, hot, and generally yucky. I went ahead of my friend and tried to speed up through Boxborough, more hills, through my old neighborhood, and finally into the home stretch in back to her house. As I was waiting at the light in west Acton, to turn left, 3-4 buses with "Team Lick Cancer," were bringing riders out to Sturbridge for the PMC, tomorrow. They were honking the horn and waving at me, which helped revive me, but the last 3 miles had me just bearing down. I actually lay prone on my friend's cool basement floor for a minute when I got inside!
39 miles, probably 2k ft. of climbing.

[emily_in_nc]

NWG, I've been meaning to mention that DH and I were recently in a Trek bike shop in Park Rapids, MN to get some chammy butter, and I was looking at the fat bikes, just for fun. I commented to the guy working in the shop that I guessed they were super heavy, and he had me pick up a carbon one. Despite the humongus tires and rims, it was amazingly light! Wow. No, I didn't even ask how much it was!

[north woods gal]

Emily, I think the secret is the rims not being solid. Those vents help to keep weight down. Carbon helps, too, but I'm a bit leery about carbon on mountain bikes. With all the rocks and smashing up against objects, a beautiful carbon frame is going to take a beating. Love carbon on road bikes, but if you're afraid of banging up your frame, you are definitely not riding your MTB the way you need to ride it. At my MAYBE intermediate skill level, frame material isn't an issue. I have a very long way to go to justify the expense of a carbon frame on an MTB. Just not in that class.

[Crankin]

I would not get a carbon mtb or fat bike, either.
Today I planned to go to tabata class at the gym, as I was exhausted from riding in the heat yesterday. But, I rode there, a different way. It's only a mile the normal way, today was 1.5 miles, by leaving my street and riding through the neighborhood behind us and then taking a fire road that connects to the gym's parking lot. The neighborhood was nice and I am pretty good now with riding my road bike slowly over dirt and roots. But, there's gates at both ends and I am just not confident enough to ride through the small space where you can get through. I had to get off my bike to get on the trail and put my foot down on the other end.
Wearing road shoes didn't help here, either.

[emily_in_nc]

Emily, I think the secret is the rims not being solid. Those vents help to keep weight down. Carbon helps, too, but I'm a bit leery about carbon on mountain bikes. With all the rocks and smashing up against objects, a beautiful carbon frame is going to take a beating. Love carbon on road bikes, but if you're afraid of banging up your frame, you are definitely not riding your MTB the way you need to ride it. At my MAYBE intermediate skill level, frame material isn't an issue. I have a very long way to go to justify the expense of a carbon frame on an MTB. Just not in that class.

Oh, I totally agree, I just thought it was interesting, since I expected to barely be able to lift the thing! And you are right about the rims not being solid; the bikeshop guy even pointed that out. A fat bike is not even in my future as it's just not needed for the type of riding I do 99% of the time (it would have been great in Belize, though!), and we don't have space to carry another bike, but I just think they are cool.