78 Mile Weekend

This past weekend my fiance was out of town, so I stayed with my brother. We went on a bike ride both Saturday and Sunday. Saturday we started with the Iron Tour 35 mile route. We were doing fine, starting to get tired, and running out of water, but fine. Towards the end, my brother's front shifter cable popped off, so we had to stop to fix that. I'm still not sure if it's functioning fully, but we got it back on and it works.

Today, we went down to the Schuylkill River Trail. We rode there from his house. About 6-7 miles into the ride, and while we were on the trail, we were passed by a guy going approximately our speed, so I asked if we could grab his tire. He pulled us for a few miles at a speed of 20-22mph. It was intense, but really fun. My brother dropped off, so I told the guy we were gonna slow down and he could enjoy the rest of his ride in peace (haha). I started feeling a little bit tired, so I pulled out my Clif bar and tried to eat it. I tore the package open, had two bites, and then I hit a bump. SHIT. There goes my only fuel source. We went 22 miles from the house and then turned around. The guy we tagged along with caught up to us on the way back and passed us.

My knee was bothering me a little bit so our speed suffered on the way home. We averaged 16.2mph on a 42 mile ride. Not too shabby for having just done a 35/36 mile hill ride the day before.

A New First

After nearly 600 miles of cycling, today was the first day I was caught out in the rain... and it happened at the worst possible time. I was planning on doing a 20 something mile ride on mostly flat roads, with the occasional roller. At about mile 7, I pulled over to put my sunglasses in my pocket because it was getting dark (at 2:30) and assess the weather situation. I checked a nearby flag and saw no wind. Figuring I'd have some time to finish the ride, I started off again. I got about a mil down the road when I felt the first raindrop hit my nose. Shit.

I turned it around right after going through the busiest intersection of my whole ride. Luckily the light was still green so I just pushed on through. Let me tell you, there is nothing like a little rain to get you motivated to go fast. I was hustling back home, hoping the rain wouldn't pick up too much. It didn't get too bad, but the roads were a little slick when I got home. The ride was fun because I had a lot of motivation to get home, but I still had some close calls. I was nearly hit three times, cut off 5 times, almost run off the road once, and some bitch pulled out in front of me while staring me down! At least I'm home safe and I got another 16 miles under my belt and broke the 600 mile mark for the season.

Ride Stats:
Time: 59mins 03secs
Distance: 16.42 miles
Average Speed: 16.7mph
Max Speed: 36.6mph

Iron Tour

Today was the French Creek Iron Tour. I went with my brother, friend, and fiance. We did the 50 mile loop. It was a lot of fun, but much more difficult than I had anticipated.

Last night we all stayed at my brother's place because he lives about a half mile from the start point. We woke up at 7am and rode over at around 7:45 to start. I volunteered to ride the free t-shirts back to the house before we started. We started out great, the ride was fun, but the roads were wet. There were A LOT of hills. Somebody at the end said they counted 22. ugh. I must have burned a lot of calories, though.

When we got our cue sheets in our e-mails, I laughed when I saw they had a rest stop every 10 miles. Apparently they knew what they were doing. Unfortunately, however, the rest stops SUCKED. There were lines for everything. Right as we left one of the water stops, they announced that they were out of water. ALL THEY HAD TO DO WAS POUR WATER!

Overall a good day, a good ride. We're gonna go get beer now. I know, I know, counterproductive...but we earned it.

Ride stats are on the right.

Iron Tour Approaching!

This past weekend was supposed to be a training weekend for me, but I didn't end up getting to ride as much as I wanted to. I had to dog-sit for my dad starting Saturday afternoon. Since his dog can't be alone for very long, my rides had to be short. I did 25ish miles on Saturday, and then I woke up at 5 on Sunday. I got my fiance up at 7:00 to start a ride at 7:30. We put in about 16 miles.

Unfortunately, because of Graduate School, I can't ride on Monday or Wednesday. Tuesday nights are also hard to ride because I play ultimate fribee on Tuesday's. That leaves Thursday through Sunday to ride. Fortunately, however, the Iron Tour is on Sunday this coming weekend. I will be riding as many miles as I can on Thursday and Friday, then do a short ride on Saturday before the ride... about 10 miles.

Sunday is ride day. 50 miles. I'm really excited to be doing this with my fiance, my friend, and my brother. All four of us are taking on the 50 mile ride on new(ish) bikes. I spent an hour or so yesterday cleaning my fiance's bike. Hopefully it stays clean enough for the ride!

Also, we may be getting sponsored for the City to Shore ride. I'll keep you updated as things progress...