Labor Day Rides

[Jiffer]

Today I rode 65 miles down Santa Ana Canyon to the beach, including 10 miles along PCH and back. I went with DH, my friend who is training for Amtrak with me and her husband, who is also doing Amtrak. My husband is the strongest, so he pretty much pulled us the entire way. But, even so ... I KICKED MY BUTT!!! We averaged 18 miles per hour, which is just completely insane for me. Even with the drafting, I was working my butt off and can't believe I sustained it for that long. I was really hurting the last 10 miles or so, but I did it.

Funny thing is, I saw Zulu! Fujichants new beautiful Trek with pink handlebars and white seat. I saw it at the beach during a bathroom break. I stared at hit wondering if it was that bike, but decided that Zulu had pink bottle cages. When I got home I found a post from Fujichant asking if I had ridden the Santa Ana River Trail today cause she thought she saw my bike at that rest stop. So, it turns out it WAS her and I'm cracking up that I saw her bike and she saw my bike. It's all about the bikes. We recognize them but not each other. How funny is that! I didn't even know she was in California.

[Crankin]

My ride was exactly 10.75 miles, squeezed in between gardening, shopping, going for coffee, and taking my bike to the LBS to start the process of installing the components on the new frame. While we were there, we talked with a racer guy we know who used to take our son to races before he could drive; he also taught spin classes at my gym. As we were waiting for the owner, one of the employees, who I know fairly well, told me the new shallow drop, short reach bar I was holding in my hand for them to use on my new frame, was not good and they had better ones ! She saw I was pissed, so her next comment was "Well, you should talk to the owner." I can't wait for this process to be over. While I'm thrilled he is doing this for no cost, I am sick of the attitude toward anything like components for small women. He also is anti American bikes, in general. Now I am worried the new bike won't be done for the ride I have next Sunday.
I will be putting around on my Jamis this week, I guess, but I got my 2,000 miles.

[kie_fujo]

hubby and i did 28mi yesterday. but it was split into two 14mi stretches. rode to my mil's for a cookout then rode home. good way to work off some of that food!!

[MrsB]

DH and I set out to do the 30 mile loop but when we went to take the bikes out of the garage my bikes back tire was locking up. Quickly figured out the noise I heard the other night. I have a broken spoke. So anyways no biggie I rode my neglected Giant rainier. Well as soon as we got out on the road the wind picked up and it never left our faces. UGhhh.. Especially with my big 4 wheel drive tires. Big nobby tires! We ended up doing 22 miles so all in all it wasnt that bad. I can say that now but let me tell ya at about 10 miles into it and the wind just holding me back I came close to calling the kids to come get me and the bike but DH promised me an ice cream at mile 15. LOL. So anyways hope its not going to be to expensive to get the rear wheel fixed. I think Im going to start looking at some new bikes so this will be a good way to get me into the LBS.

[Aggie_Ama]

I did about 6 miles in a tube! We went to float the river yesterday and take some time off the bikes. Good thing for me since my little debacle on the mountain bike Saturday has me with a slightly bum ankle. I am hoping to run tonight and bike commute home later this week. Maybe I should wrap it.

[mayanorange]

I'm so jealous you got to tube! DH and I went out for a long ride- probably too long for me! 24.8 miles with way too much wind and the usual rolling hills of Dover and Sherborn. Now I have a bruised bum- still working on finding the right shorts apparently- and a couple twitchy muscles in my hand that are repairing themselves. Tubing would have been better although it was probably too cool up here for it.

[Aggie_Ama]

Tubing would have been better although it was probably too cool up here for it.

This has been one hot summer, I am jealous of cool temperatures.

[kfergos]

I went for an amazingly nice (if lonely; I have no biking buddies here ) 62-mile loop around the Wachusett Reservoir, to Holden, down to Shrewsbury, and back to Malrborough through Westborough. Left at 6:30 am, and it was a mere 56 degrees outside -- I was positively cold without my arm warmers for the first hour or so! Fall's a-comin'. New England has been beautiful the last few weeks; trees are changing colors, the temperature's remained moderate, we've finally ditched those thunderstorms. If only it was like this all the time!

I say "amazingly nice" because I had the horrific experience of riding over freshly-scraped, pre-repaving road. The road crew must've gotten it ready to repave on Friday, and just left it over the weekend. OUCH!! My hands, wrists, butt, knees...everything hurt. Felt like my skin was going to jitter right off. A couple miles of that (I think; I kept my eyes on the road, trying not to fall or get a tire stuck in one of those grooves) made me practically weep with gratitude when I got back to normal paving. Guess I'm not cut out to operate a jackhammer!

[Misandal]

Labor Day for me was a short recovery ride after the 50-mile, 5,000' ride from the day before.

Stay tuned...next week is the Blue Ridge Epic Tour, beginning on Monday the 8th at Mile Marker 0 and ending Friday at Mile Marker 470. I'm told there's an average elevation gain of 10,000' every day. Woohoo!

I just pray that Hurricane Hanna stays away!!!

[mimitabby]

Got up early and rode downtown with Raleighdon. We found Mr & Mrs Shootingstar, bade our farewells and headed out to Alki point of west seattle. From there we headed back towards Beacon hill. We rode 41 miles, fairly flat.

[bikerHen]

We camped out in Idaho's Silver Valley, and nearly froze overnight. The temp was in the mid 30's. Next morning we rode to the top of Lookout Pass on the Idaho Montana border. Froze again at the top of the pass and on the way back down. Clouds moved in and there was talk of snow flurries! We didn't see any, but it was certainly cold enough. It was a very pretty ride through cedar forests, with lots of little creeks flowing over moss covered rocks and logs. Next time we'll dress a bit warmer. bikerHen

[LBTC]

We took our newbie friend and her borrowed bikasaurus rex on our 50km pretty flat loop. She was doing very well considering the ancient 6 gear cassette and friction shifters! And I was doing very well on the hill that usually saps me completely, possibly since I wasn't trying to catch anyone! We stopped in the next town for a bathrrom break and a bit of fuel. About a block from there, her rear flatted. Well, I thought I had three unused inflater cartridges, but I only had one cartridge in my inflater, and it was *used*!! since I have never used the thing, I don't know whne that happened! DH came back and he had enough, so we (mostly he) swapped it out and filled it. But we put a presta tube in an old shrader rim and it promptly flatted. Between us we had one more tube and one more cartridge, so DH rode home to get the car and my friend and I hung out in the park a block away and chatted....
I am so grateful that it didn't happen further up the road which is way far away from anywhere nice to hang out and wait! And I'm wondering if the flat and poor preparation happened so I wouldn't crash when I had the next ice pick headace. Yup, my brain has decided to give me a new type of headache - the first one woke me up in the middle of the night! Before the ride I only had one more, but while we waited in the park (when we would have been riding) I had another. These are super sudden, very intense, and very short. I have no idea what I would do if one hit while I was riding on a highway at speed!!

It cetainly was a not-quite-what-we-had-planned kind of ride, but a good time, nonetheless.

Hugs and butterflies,
~T~

[chicagogal]

My labor day ride was with my parents who were in town for the weekend riding horrible rented "comfort" bikes. We did a VERY SLOW (I'm not exaggerating, we averaged less then 7mi/hr) 20mi ride (10mi out, 10 back). After the fist 10mi we stopped for a swim and lunch and sightseeing, and when we got back on the bikes, they both claimed to be unable to move! I traded my bike for my mom's b/c mine is easier to ride and we are about the same size. This helped her a bit, but she still had to walk up a "hill". I had to hear for the next 24hrs about how I tortured them! Other than the complaining on the return trip, however, I think they enjoyed the ride. The weather was great and so was the sightseeing for out-of-town guests.

[chicago]

I did the Wright Stuff Century out of Mt. Horeb, WI. It was amazing and so fun. Very hilly and very hard... but I loved every minute of it. I so love my bike