Interesting Posts From Other Bloggers

Listed below are some interesting blog posts from fellow riders\randonneurs this week.

Chasing Mailboxes has a ride summary of a training ride near the Blue Ridge Highway. There are several awesome action photos of really pissed off dogs chasing the riders.

Rando Boy has a blog post series of a future apocalypse story where gasoline is no longer available. The story starts out a little slow, but give it time. Since the story is split across several blog posts, here are the links: part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5, part 6 and part 7.

Words of Wisdom From A Four Year Old

If you have kids, then you are more than familiar with those days where your kid(s) talk a million miles an hour and just don't stop. You know, those days where you would pay anything for some private time just to decompress in a silent chamber to make sure that you retain sanity. Monday was one of those days.

My head was completely split in two. I politely asked "Can you please, please, please be quiet for two minutes because I have a migraine?". Thirty seconds of complete silence pass at which time, she said "I have a  mouth, and it wants to talk!".

Couldn't help but bust down laughing hysterically, which of course, led to more talking.

How To Miss Training Days Tutorial

Just in-case you are wanting to miss some training days and need some ideas how, here's a couple for you:

• Check your sump pump before doing a night ride and hopefully find it broken which requires a several hour repair job before the basement floods.
• Take some form of martial arts and attempt to break your ankle while sparring against your fellow students.
• Get the most severe form of a stomach bug that causes to you to expel bodily fluids out of multiple orifices at the same time.

All combined, that's good for a solid five days!

New CycleOps Products

I'm a fan of Saris CycleOps and own several of their products. CycleOps product quality is superb and their customer service is second to none in my opinion. I have a couple Fluid2 trainers that have lasted a long time. The Fluid2 is also the only trainer that I can use on the Catrikes that will not cause the bike to rock forward and backwards while doing hard efforts. I also have a couple PowerTap wheels. Both hubs are on Mavic open rims and work very reliably.  When racing, the CPU+ computer is light, functional and stores a large amount of data.

Last year, I decided to get and try out the Joule 2. Overall, the Joule is a decent bike computer. It stores all the typical type of data watts, speed, distance, cadence, temp, etc but also allows the user to view up to 8 customizable stats at one time (the CPU+ only allows 3). The Joule also has built in reporting to view data from 2 weeks, 4 weeks, 8 weeks, 6 months and a year. There are numerous reports that display an awesome amount of data. For me, I found this to be great because I have a hard time downloading my workout files in a consistent manner so this would give me a great idea of how I was doing without needing to check WKO+ or trainingpeaks.com daily.

The Joule  was also flawed in a couple ways. First, I mistakenly tried to use a 16 GB micro SD card on it's first use. The card completely geeked the Joule out to the point it wouldn't even boot. CycleOps immediately sent me another unit and let me know that it could only support a 2 gig or smaller card - did I mention their customer service kicks ass! It's actually kind of hard to find cards that are 2 gig and smaller. In theory, it wasn't supposed to be possible to fill the card in under 1 calendar year, but I found that not to be the case. Second, the battery life is horrific. At most, the battery would last 10-12 hours while riding. Again, for normal riders this is probably fine but for ultra distance or randonneurs, it's easy to ride longer than the battery life. I also found that charging the Joule and letting it sit for a couple days (using a Garmin instead), the Joule would be drained and require being recharged again prior to use. Another design flaw is that the USB mini-B connection is underneath the Joule. For comparison, the Garmin Edge 800 has it's mini-B port located on the side of the case. This allows the Garmin to be charged with a AA USB charger while riding - this basically allows the ride time to be indefinite (simply replace AA batteries as needed). The Edge's battery life is easily 3-4x greater than the Joule. The other thing that the Joule lacked was GPS, so I find myself using the Garmin Edge 90+% of the time anymore.  Turn by turn routing is awesome for randonneurs who are riding in an area that they are not familiar with; this assumes the route has been provided ahead of time and hasn't changed the day of the start.

I recently noticed that CycleOps made some improvements to the PowerTap hub. I've been considering replacing one of my older units for a while. Perhaps if the stars align correctly this year, AKA wifey approves such a purchase, I might be able to snag one this year. Lighter weight, a 1 piece hub (no more water leaks),  better signal strength and the internal 'guts' are now field replaceable so it will no longer be necessary to send the entire wheel back to CycleOps for service. I checked Performance Bike's website to check their pricing and I noticed that they have a new version of the Joule listed with GPS functionality. I couldn't find anything stating that the battery has been improved nor any photos of the USB mini-B port location. Unless the battery problem has been fixed, the mini-B port is on the edge of the case somewhere and the GPS has turn by turn functionality, I think the Garmin Edge has a lock for best cycling computer (for long\ultra distance riders at least).

Resolutions

1. #1 for the 3rd year in a row and it seems like such a simple resolution - to not break any bones biking. 2010 brought me a broken collarbone and made me a full bird colonel. Last year, I was blessed with a shattered nose, a deviated septum and a pretty nice scar. Here's for believing a resolution might actually happen in 2012.
   
   
2. Athletic maturity. I know what you're thinking, WTF is that Jonny Rando talking about! Athletic maturity is basically gaining higher level skills and mental strength in the athlete's given sport. For rando riders, its knowledge gained through training, brevets, permanents  and riding with others. If you decide to do a 25 mile race, given you have any decent conditioning, chances are that you will finish and probably with a respective time. Let's say your goal is to ride a full brevet series - so that's a minimum distance of 124 miles up to 372 miles as one event (with varying distances in between). There are so many things that can go wrong. The rider's on the bike nutrition can be off, upset stomach, bike problems, the elements (this happens often), riding solo for very long periods of time, etc, etc, etc. I learned so much last year from other riders like Chris, Ted, Fred and Tim. Training tips, learning about different types of equipment, words of motivation and jokes to keep the group's morale up. It's nice to know there are other people like you (as Jabba the Hutt would say "You are my type of scum!") and it pays dividends when it's 45 degrees and raining. You are miserable and want nothing more to quit and find a warm place of refugee to rest, but instead look to your left or right and see your riding partners suffering equally; but more importantly, not a singe person is complaining and just sports a smile.
   
   
3. I am going to try and transition from a standard diamond frame road bike to a 3 wheel recumbent. I know what you're thinking, how is that hard? Basically, it's a relearning process. With a standard road bike, if you get tired on climbs or get leg cramps, you stand up and power through it utilizing different muscles. On a recumbent, all you can do is push through it. On a road bike, I was used to pedaling at a cadence 90-100 all day. On a tadpole, pedaling that high causes torque steer making the bike swerve all over the road. Riding a standard road bike includes it's share of pains, namely the sit bones and arms, and neck after a long day. The tadpole tends to cause more pain in the neck,  quads and my tail bone (because it was fractured many moons ago).  My goal is to aim doing a full rando series on the recumbent.
   
4. Spend more time with the family. I'm going to attempt to get by with 4-5 days of training vs. 6-7 every week. As an ultra distance athlete, it requires lots (understatement of the year) of training. Last year, I did many a ride starting at 8 and riding till after 11 PM so that the girls were already in bed to minimize lost family time. With the girls getting older now, they are wanting to stay up later and later. This would mean riding past midnight on weeknights, starting before day break to be done in time for work, or attempt to scale back training quantity. As an OCD type person, this change is quite hard for me, but I'm going to give it a try.
   
   
5. Help my support crew accomplish one of their personal goals. I have a very loyal and supportive group of people who year after year, race after race make sure that I achieve my goals. These are the unsung heroes of any long distance athlete. They are the ones standing in the rain and handing off water bottles and food so you don't have to stop. The ones who scream "don't you dare stop" over and over when your mental strength wanes in the rain and cold after many hours on the bike, often solo. The ones who are there to pick you up and you rebuild you when it seems everything has failed. They also have a great sense of humor and get those photos of the athlete at their best: puking, falling on the ground after the race grabbing their legs trying to stop cramping, etc. The people who say "SURE!" when you call and say, "hey I hate to bother you, but my bike is broke beyond repair and I'm 1.5 hours out". That's true love right there.
   
   This year is their year. We have goals set for each member. All of them are aiming for above century distance and attempting to place in their age group. I'll be pulling lead to break the wind to ensure they have as much energy as possible for the end and carrying the extra clothing and repair gear incase something goes wrong (aka rolling SAG). Each person has been verifying their weekly training and mileage.  Each of them have come so close in year's pass, so we're making it happen in 2012. One member of our group is a 15 year old looking to place first!
   
6. Increase my number of blog posts and perhaps include some photos. 'Nuff said.  The photo part will require a new and hopefully waterproof camera. The Cannon Elph camera failed me. Just after one month, the automatic lens cover fails to open.

Lions, Tigers and Monkeys

Something really awful happened shortly after Saturday’s brevet.

A man who owned a wildlife preservation in Zanesville with a variety of exotic animals including tigers, lions, monkeys, cheetahs and a bear let the animals loose on Tuesday. Sadly the owner killed himself afterwards. Even more depressing is that the police officers were forced to kill a large majority of the exotic animals to prevent any accidental attacks or deaths of the local residents. Many of the 911 calls of where the animals were located happened to be on the roads we were riding on.

Kind of freaky, really. Considering we got our ass kicked being chased by a wild dog, I can’t imagine being chased by a wild tiger.

Attack of the Woolly Bears!

Thornville-Caldwell-Thornville 200k Brevet

Saturday, Oct. 15th was the last brevet of the year in Ohio, with a start temp of a comfy 46 degrees. I woke up at 4 AM feeling a little ill with a sinus and chest cold. I strongly debated staying home, but I managed to force myself out the door at 4:20. On the way to the highway, I saw the “old man”. The old man is in his mid 60s and rides regardless of weather or time. So when I saw the old man, I felt more motivated and told myself to stop being a cry ass.

The route was an out and back from Thornville to Caldwell with a forecasted high of 65, sunny and a severe wind advisory. The advisory called for sustained winds of 15-20 MPH and gusts up to 40 MPH from the South\South West. Given the forecast, the amount of riders that showed up was on the slim side. Bob, the RBA, was unable to ride because he was stricken with bronchitis, but wished us well on what he promised would probably be a miserable day. Bob sent us off at 7:32 AM.

Let’s just say, things got started off on the wrong pedal . You know how some rides go - a group of riders are just riding assuming everyone is still on course – when in reality everyone was cold and not checking their queue sheets. Within the first two miles, we realize, “hey, we should have turned right 1.8 miles ago”. Whoops.

For the most part, the ride out to Caldwell was ok. The wind was either to the side of us or to the back. The first couple hours were a little boring, just pedaling to stay warm. I ended up talking to a guy named Joe. Joe was telling me this was his first brevet of the year since he had been taken out in March by a squirrel. Apparently this rabid squirrel had attempted to jump through Joe’s front wheel, which caused the front fork to snap, 14 spokes broke and Joe did a face plant while traveling 21 MPH. Joe then had an extensive recovery period of three months that included having numerous facial and ear canal surgeries. Based on how he was performing on our ride, it was hard to tell he had missed any training time. He looked ready to take on the route.

Later in the morning, Joe, Tim and I were slightly separated when this wild dog charged out of a corn field at me. I sprinted hard for 20 seconds and looked back expecting to see the dog a ways back; instead, he was still on my ankle and even more pissed. “Oh shit!”, I said to myself. I sprint this time for a minute standing. Again I look back and again the dog is right there on my ankle. I also noticed that there were 2 cars driving behind the dog because it was running dead center in the lane. Great, so this time I’m doing a standing hard sprint for another minute up hill, when the dog finally broke its chase on me and started chasing Tim. Tim managed to break through unscathed and we finally ditched the wild beast on a long downhill.

It was probably about 10:45 that I realized there were a lot of Woolly Bears on the road, entirely too many to count. There was a Woolly Bear at least every 10 yards on the road. I was constantly attempting to steer slightly out of the way to spare my Woolly friends from a quick death by Vittoria tire. We passed through Zanesville and a couple other small towns.

We arrived in Caldwell at 11:15. Unlike past 200ks, we actually stopped for a quick lunch at Subway. After about 20 minutes off the bike, we started on our journey back. After about 6 miles, it became very apparent that it was about to become a very long day. The force of the wind was insane. I was riding near threshold and barely averaging 10-12 MPH. Joe and Tim pulled away. Every randonneur must ride their own ride, and I didn’t want to blow up on the way back.

Long story short, it was a very long ride back for me. I stayed mostly in an aerobic heart rate zone and was feeling a little under the weather. To kill the boredom of a long ride, I reverted to attempting to count Wooly bears, on which I later gave up. I finished the day with a 200k in 9:32, which for me seemed excessively slow regardless of temp and weather.

Sunday and Monday I got progressively more congested in my sinuses and chest. Tuesday I decide to go to the doctor and found out that I have bronchitis now. Sigh.