We will ride again!

After a long hiatus it's time to return. Hammers need to be dropped, roads will need repaving, and my son will get a glimpse of the superman he will become!

I had a long post written about what happened in 2007, then I decided fuck it. It's time to build a bridge and get over it.

Short version: I crashed some bikes, killed a dog, sued some people, and won.

Onward!

2010 Cycling Season comes to a close.

LOL.

2008 & 2009 Seasons comes to a close...

Actually, they never even started. I rode not one mile the entire 2008 and maybe 10 miles around my neighborhood in 2009.

The 2007 season ends....

The 2007 season is over for me, I was in really great shape with my weight down to 181 (14 pounds lighter than 2004, and much much more sustained power). I would have had a good ride at the Highlander but things happened and I'll blog about it later when I'm ready.

2008 is still up in the air. As of yet, no decisions have been made.

...."All change is not progress, as all movement is not forward."

Rain or no rain ?

Well the radar was all green with medium to heavy rains for this morning. So I did a spinerval. Now the sun is shining. :)

Gotta love Ohio weather!

Ride Updates

Thursday 7/12 - 36.4 miles @ 18.6 average (Secret Location #1)

Sunday - 7/15 - 28.3 miles @ 16.4 average (Secret Location #2)

Interesting huh? :)

Coach Troy Returns!

Wednesday morning was a repeat of Tuesday with rain just sideways and blowing like crazy. I hooked up the trainer and did 45 minutes of suffering with Coach Troy. Those workouts do perfect on mornings when I get off of work, I may change my routine a little to include more of those. I'm also looking at ordering a few more.

My Giant is still ticking and driving me nuts, I've got to get that back into the shop. I don't know what the heck is wrong with it!

Highlander Recon!

Well today's ride was canceled after mother nature decided it was going to rain at 9am rather than wait until noon like all the weather websites said.

I have a vacation coming up soon and I'm heading to NY for some good ole Highlander recon! I should get a good 8 days of riding in, so hopefully before I leave I'll have memorized all the climbs so I won't be in for any suprises this September!

7/9/07

Grabbed the new bike and headed out this morning before the heat set in.

2 hours, 28 miles, few hill repeats. Glad I got a triple!

The Loveland -> Lebanon -> Loveland time was 59 minutes.

1,947 calories in 2 hours (28 miles at 14 mph)

7/3/07

51 minutes - Loveland -> Lebanon -> Loveland. Blew up on the last climb, had 8 minutes with 2 miles to go to tie my record of 50 minutes and couldn't do it. Cardio just wasn't all there. It will be back soon.

Coming off of 10 days rest that isn't bad.

1,713 calories in 1 hr 37 min (26 miles at 16.1 mph)

Lots of rest...

Rode Thursday on my new bike. I have to get a shorter stem and a seat that matches my current road bike. I'll order that stuff this upcoming week, I'm not in a hurry. Hopefully I can ride it this coming weekend. I couldn't get the 4th off of work as I was wanting to do the Vandalia Freedom Tour ride. Oh well.

I took this whole weekend off, it's the first weekend I haven't been out pounding the pedals since April so it was time. The weight is coming down as I am down to 211. Pants that used to almost make me choke to wear, are now becoming baggy and I have to wear a belt. That's a good feeling there! I've gotten a few compliments from people @ work that they can tell I've lost some weight. They balk when I tell them how much. My large frame hides it rather well.

Super Sunday!

Met Kyle @ 8am at the secret location - he's training for a triathlon so we rode the bike course twice. Engine room faded with about 10 to go but we still had a good ride.

3423 calories burned (56.6 miles @ 18.1mph in 3 hr 7 min)

Rest day Monday!

Solo Saturday

With Tom being out of town this weekend, I set off around 7. It was cold, wet, and a lot of debris from the rain. The sun never poked through and at the 10.5 mile mark I turned around. I stayed on the flats and just kept a good tempo going. When I got back to my car I was kind of surprised to see a time of 1 hour and 6 minutes especially when I wasn't really pushing. I didn't want to push too much though there were leaves and it felt slippery.

Big ride Sunday at new secret location!!

1241 calories burned in 1 hour 6 minutes (21 miles @ 19.1 avg)

Lots of rest - followed by a great afternoon!

I was wore out after last Sunday's ride. I took Monday/Tuesday/Wednesday off and rode the Thursday afternoon with Kyle in Bellbrook. I had the engine room on all cylinder's today and I knew it after the first climb! I did manage to blow myself up while pulling on a flat stretch of road into a good crosswind around 28mph. It took a while for the lights to come back but they did.

Kyle didn't quite have the firepower today but you can't be good everyday. I pulled as fast as I could for as long as I could without dropping him and we made it back with our highest average yet. The wind was crazy but it's always like that in Bellbrook for some reason. I like it!

I'm not sure what I'm doing Friday, I may rest & go shopping, or I may ride. I'll know that when I wake up and see how I feel. I think I'm going to have my best year yet, the weight is dropping and the power output is really increasing.

2,469 calories in 2 hr 6 min (36.6 miles at 17.4 mph)

Sunday.................

Met Kyle @ 8am in Bellbrook - hit some hills today. Took a variation of the course which added about 6 miles and a few good rollers. I pretty much felt bad the whole ride, definitely felt yesterday. My bike has a tick in the bottom bracket area, long story short the mechanic doesn't know what is wrong with it and he has to call Shimano and he will call me tomorrow. More than likely they'll recommend a different seating compound for the threads or something. We'll see!

2,431 calories in 2 hr 7 min (36.6 miles at 17.3 mph)

Hilly Saturday

Met Tom @ 7:30am this morning for a long ride on his new bike. He bought a 2006 OCR2 full Ultegra. An epic day, he managed to get rocks in the rear brake about an hour in, and then again in the front brake an hour later. An hour after that, his seat came loose so it was scooting forward and backward like he was on a boat. Special thanks to the mystery rider who loaned us a alan wrench to tighten it up. It won't be coming loose anytime soon! Also at some point his water bottle came out and ended up in a ditch full of dense weeds. It's still there.

Today was climbs everywhere. We rode from Loveland up climbs #1 and #2 at the 4 and 6 mile marks. We then ventured to Lebanon and Tom beat his old record of 61 minutes by a full minute. We then rode back to the interconnect, and then north for some real hills. We rode past Morrow and hit the Strout hill which Tom almost made it all the way up. After a break he was able to finish it. Back down Strout and onto Ft. Ancient. I made it to the top, first time since 2004 for me, Tom didn't make it far at all. Not sure what happened there. Back to the path and north again for a hill we call MF. I forget the name of the road but hill just keeps going. Tom made this one without stopping! Awesome.

That was our turn-around point and we began heading south. Back to Morrow for a stop at the infamous ice cream shop for some lunch and legendary potato salad!

We got to the interconnect again and turned for Lebanon. Up all those climbs and then we turned for home. I elected to go up the climbs again at the 6 and 4 mile mark and even tried to talk some other rider into doing it but he didn't want anything to do with hills. Wimp!

All in all, a nice long ride. Our average was in the toilet but we did a lot of climbing. Hills again on Sunday, rest day Monday. My new shoes are awesome.

4,229 calories in 4 hr 34 min (66.2 miles at 14.5 mph)

The Big Ring

Rode Thursday in Bellbrook with Kyle. Hopefully this will be a weekly thing as the hills and open roads with lots of wind are good training. I felt okay on the hills but not great. I was finally able to sustain the big ring on the flats for quite a long time. Most of the ride I was over 20mph on the flats which is great progress from 6 weeks ago. In other milestone's my weight is back to 215.

2,040 calories in 1 hr 47 min (30.6 miles at 17.2 mph)

Variation of the route is on tap for Sunday.

Picked up my bike Thursday evening from the shop. New Ultegra crankset, rear cluster, cables, headset cleaned and greased and the hubs were cleaned and greased. Feels like a totally new bike with responsive shifting! I haven't done really any work on it since it was new in 2003 and everything was original. It was time.

Tom went out and bought a brand new bike! We'll ride Saturday morning. Can't wait. We plan on doing the River Route next week. Call it Tom's Revenge! I talked to him last night about doing some trips in August. We'll talk more about that in the upcoming weeks. Road trips are great!

Windy Tuesday!

Set out today for an attempt on my record, but that just didn't happen. I knew on the 2nd climb I didn't have all the cylinder's but I said the heck with it and went for it anyway. Once I turned west to Lebanon it seemed to be a headwind or a strong cross. I didn't have the power to go through it. I made it at the end in 54 minutes. I turned around and flew back to the hill and then turned around and rode it all again. Uphill and into the wind!

A good effort today, Tomorrow I get my bike basically overhauled.....lots of new stuff. Will it make me faster? No.

2,185 calories in 2 hr (33 miles at 16.5 mph)

The CCC

The Cincinnati Cycling Club put on a heck of a ride today with the River Rendezvous. Tom and I rode the 50 mile route (Which ended up being 55.4). The routes were painted great, and the rest stops were stocked with all kinds of stuff. Couldn't have asked for a better day today, it was warm but not too hot. The wind didn't pick up until later.

Northern Kentucky is great roads for training. Very rolling, a few long climbs. It seemed it was one roller after another and I really only remember a flat section of just a few miles. I think I'll be doing that route again sometime soon.

At the 35 mile mark or so Tom had one hill too many and really started to slow. I let him suffer for a few more miles and then I dropped back and pushed him along on the rises. It didn't help that his bike was jumping gears really bad and no matter which way we tried to adjust it, it just didn't work. I think he may need a new dérailleur, a new Shift indexer, a new cable, or all.

3,534 calories in 3 hr 54 min (55.4 miles at 14.2 mph)

50 Minutes

New personal best record today of 50 minutes from Loveland -> Lebanon -> Loveland. That beats the last record by a full 3 minutes.

Once I turned around the rain set in and I got drenched, I basically just soft pedaled back to the car for a total time of 1 hour 39 minutes.

Rest day Saturday - big ride on Sunday!!

1,723 calories in 1 hr 39 min (26 miles at 15.8 mph)