Sure in my Cycling Novicehood

  Yesterday my brother and I went for a ride and on this ride I was reassured that I am a beginner cyclist.  Luckily I'm able to laugh off these uncomfortable and pride crippling situations.  We had made it 20 miles or so through our ride when my brother noticed he had a flat tire.  I was behind him so I noticed he was slowing down.   I slowed down as well and as he got off his bike he said, "I've got a flat... and you're.... falling of your bike."  Yes it was true, I was falling off my bike.  What happened?  Well I almost always, no, always unclip my left foot and get off my bike to the left.  Here there was not and option for that since it meant going into the road and I'd pulled to the right of my brother.  I unclipped my right foot and took mental note that I had to get off my bike on the ride side but I think my body naturally leans left now and well I leaned left and timber.  Down I went.  My bro. broke my fall for the most part.  No blood or even torn skin on the road, just some pieces of my pride were left behind.  This hasn't happened to me in a very long time but it should definately keep me aware of how much of a begginer I really am.   Besides falling off my bike I was able to give my brother all that he needed to fix his flat since he wasn't with a saddle bag and I was.   We went on our way and as we went I got a few chuckles out of the way he said I was falling off my bike.   The moral of this story is to be prepared to stop getting off either side of your bike.  Here's a short video of some pro cyclist falls.  Most of which I'd never seen.  Even the pros fall just not like me.  But we do have the same attitude in common.  We get back up and spin on. 

Cycling Socialization: Ride your bike and save money!

You may be thinking that the idea of riding your bike to save money is all about saving your gas money.  I'm here to tell you otherwise.  There can be much more money saved from time to time and the way to save money is through socialization!  That's right, riding your bike with others and talking to them!  I went on a ride the other morning with my brother and we got to talking.  I asked him if he could take me to pick up my car from the dealership later in the day because I was going to take it in after our ride to have some maintenance done.  He said, "What are you going to have done?" I gave him short list of the things I knew needed done and he told me he could do all of that and to bring my car over after our ride.  After the ride I brought over my car, we checked out everything that needed to be done, made a list of the parts we needed, went to Autozone, bought what we needed for $140 (remember that number) and spent a couple of hours fixin' up my car.  I thanked my brother profusely becuase I knew I had saved at least $500 since that was a general number I had heard to change out my brake pads.  I was curious though as to exactly how much I saved so I made a call to the dealership where I was going to go.  I thought it was going to cost about $900 total for the work to be done and I was pretty close.  They told me $650 to check the parts and change out the fluids I needed and an extra $250 for the front brakes and $190 for the rear brakes to be changed out.  A total cost of $1090!(cough cough heart-attack). Savings made because I went for a ride that morning and I have an Awesome Brother who was nice enough to help me out was a grand total of $950! That's money in my pocket!

I just want to add that everything that we did was extremely easy (even changing out the brake pads, which required loosening 1 bolt!).  Luckily my brother knows cars well enough that he could inspect everything else.  The moral of this story is the title of the post: Ride your bike and save money! Get out there and talk to those you ride with. Socialize and have fun while spinning those wheels. Keep some money in your pocket.

Also, if your interested, the things we did to the car besides the inspection included: changing the oil, oil filter, dust and pollen filter, air cleaner element, front and rear brake pads. We also rotated the tires and topped of the coolant. 

The Best Ride is with the One You Love!

I did two rides today one was a joy ride and the other was a semi-joy ride.  The better of the two was the straight joy ride.  Why was it so nice?  Because my wife went with me!  It actually came as a bit of a shock.  She's a bit scared to ride her bike but today when I woke up she said she wanted to go with me!  So i picked out an easy route and encouraged her along the way.  She does great, it's just not habitual for her yet to get in and out of the clipless pedals.  We went down the bike path then did a few laps around a block and were able to chat a little and then we headed back towards our home.  We spotted Gaba (my wife's mom who's visiting from Russia - Gaba is actually a name my oldest son came up with. It's a mix of Galya which is her name and babooshka which is the Russian word for Grandma - hence Gaba) walking with our kids, so we rode on up to them.  I must admit I was all smiles the whole way.  I love riding, and the weather was great, but riding with my wife on a beautiful day just brings a new level of happiness to riding!  I figure it will be the same way to ride with my kids too.   6.7 miles of joy.  Luckily I get to be around my wife alot.  I'm pretty lucky. I love my wife!

Wind Chill While Cycling - How Cold Is It With That Wind Chill?

I went out again in the bitter cold.  Today I checked the weather.  42F where I was starting out and 34F where I was going to be.  I wore my winter (not cycling) gloves ontop of my cycling gloves and I'm happy to report that I had nice warm hands for almost the entire time.  There was a point where I felt a slight chill but it didn't last long.  I wore an extra pair of socks and well my feet did better than they would have with one pair socks but still got pretty dang cold when I was going fast (15-35mph).  So as I was screaming down the bottom part of a hill I was thinking to myslef, "I wonder how cold it really feels with the wind chill?"  Thus I decided to seek out how cold it is.  I found this nice chart online.

Click on the chart to see it better!

Wind speed (or how fast you're going on you're bike in this case) is on the left and the thermometer temperature is on the top.  All of the other numbers are what the temperature feels like.  I saw on one chart stated that wind at 40mph or faster has little effect on the way temperature feels so if you go really fast on your bike it won't get colder and colder.  There is a stopping point to the cold.   So today the coldest point for me was about 21F (-6C) as I was going 35mph down in the valley where it was 34F (1C).  Cold.  Here's a Conversions chart for anyone who needs to figure the chart in Celcius. Happy and Warm Riding to Everyone.

Very Cold Cycling

I was once again cold while riding today.  This is definately a learning process.  I honestly don't know how cold it was (didn't check the weather. oops.). I don't think it would have changed anything becuase the things that I thought of that would have helped I don't have.  Once again - going 30mph in the cold = SUPER Cold! My jacket is nice, thank goodness, because my chest was warm and that's what matters.  Besides that I was pretty cold.  Especially my extremeties were cold.  The more I thought about how to keep my feet warm the more I liked the idea of having booties for cycling.  The biggest advantages that I can see in having booties over just a pair of warm socks are these: 1- They are removable, so if it gets warm you can take them off easier than taking of your shoes and socks then changing socks and putting your shoes back on (NO one's going to do that).  They won't let in any air meaning no cold air = no cold feet.  Warm socks will still let the air in though they will be breathable, but once again you can take off your booties if you really have too.  I doubt the breathability factor plays a role if you're not riding that far.  Wearing thicker socks might have the strangling effect on your feet and actually restrict blood flow to your feet so that was another negative towards warm warm socks.  So if you're going to ride in the cold wear some nice socks and booties or just have cold feet like I will for the rest of winter becuase a pair of booties are not in the cards for this season.   The next thing I thought of was to wear super warm gloves.  I have a feeling it was below zero and with the wind chill it was definately below zero.  I bought some long fingered gloves for riding in the winter but they are not super warm and I didn't want them to be.  The point is if they are not made for cold weather they won't do much to fight the freezing cold air whipping at your hands.   I do have some cold weather gloves (not made for cycling) and I think I'm going to try them out tomorrow.  Something else on the cold weather cycling list is a ski mask or maybe a scarf.  I can see a scarf just getting in the way but it will be alot easier to remove than a ski mask.  I would say that something to cover your ears will do the trick but I would be lying because your entire face gets cold.  I could feel the hairs on the top of my head freezing as I rode downhill.  Once again you have to know your ride because really I felt great on the way back up the hill, but it should would have been nice to be warm going in both directions by having the proper apparel which can be removed for slightly less freezing temperatures.   If anyone out there has experience riding in the really cold feel free to let us know what you do to fight the freeze. 

The ideas are these and I guess you can decide what's best for you.

Ski mask

or scarf

warm gloves

or not so warm gloves

Booties

or warm socks.

Hopefully you'll have some warm riding!

Bike Ride: Depressing or Motivating

This morning I came home from work and asked my wife if I could go for a ride.  She rolled over in bed and said to keep it short.  So I decided I'd do part of a ride that I hadn't done for a few months.  The ride is only about 7 miles total 3.5 miles down and 3.5 miles back up about 1,500 ft.  I think it's a cat. three climb having a 6% grade avg. so it's a pretty good ride and I've used it alot for training since it's close to home.  I new it was cold so I dressed the part taking note of my advice to self from my previous post. The ride down I take pretty slow because there are switchbacks and you cannot tell if cars are coming or not.  I also take the trip back up pretty slow but there's not much I can do about going any faster, it's just steep.  Today the ride seemed especially difficult.  I think part of why it seemed difficult is because the road was a bit different in that the road has changed.  It is rather dirty and new graffiti has been added to the road so calculating where I was was more difficult.  The road seemed more steep that I remember and longer!  More steep because I had to get out of my seat more often to keep from stopping and tipping over.  Longer becuase it was longer that is it took me longer to complete than the last time I did it by about four or five minutes.  So as I was riding I had a flow of emotions.  It started with being depressed becuase I figured the reason that the ride seemed so difficult and long was because I was in worse shape that I was previously but rather than dwell on that fact which might have kept me from riding for a while after my attitude changed to well I better do this more often and get back into good form.  I think this attitude is so essential in most of our activities and I'm glad this time it came to me.  There is always more to do and a way to get better.  For cycling the way is to spin those wheels.   

It looks like a bike path but it's a single lane road.



Note to self about Cycling in the Cold

I woke up at about 3 am, which tends to happen fairly often due to my crazy work schedule, and felt pretty good.  I decided to go for a ride and test my new headlight out a bit more.  I ate a little and drank some water. Got ready and started to ride.  I new where I wanted to go since I had driven down the rode the day before.  Driving in certain places makes me want to ride.  I tend to get ideas while driving.  So, as I wrote already, I started to ride.  I road down, down, and down and as I went down I thought about writing this post, and I thought about how cold I was.  This is general advice that I need to remember and maybe is some no brainer stuff but, when you're excited to get out and ride you don't think about anything but getting out and riding.  First - Check the weather - Know what you're getting into.  For all I know there could have been a tidal wave covering the west coast and headed in our direction and ofcourse I was going to head right down to it.   Knowing how cold it is or vice versa will determine your attire.  Going outside is one way to check the temp but checking online is ideal since like in my instance I was covering a decent amount of ground and changing 1,500 ft of altitude - pretty much going from one city to another where the temp is going to be different.  The temperature difference from one city to the next may not be enough to change what you're going to wear but atleast you can be mentaly prepared for a stronger wind chill or a chance of rain.  
 So you know the weather - It's COLD.  I checked the temperature when I got home and it was 36F which is about 2C so pretty cold.  I was riding about 30mph going down hill, not pushing the pace though I was trying to keep warm by atleast pedaling which I think a good idea. If it's cold keep moving.  In general I believe this is good cycling practice to keep pedaling and coast as little as possible while training (that's just my opinion) Ok, back to the advice - 1. keep moving 2. slowing down might help. I noticed when i stopped to turn around I imediately started to warm up.  3. wear warm socks! atleast some mid to high socks that will cover the gap from your shoes to your pants.  I've noticed my feet get colder than any other part of my body (it used to be my hands but I now have gloves - thanks to my wife).  Maybe invest in some booties.  I don't own any but they seem like they'd be a really good idea for blocking out the cold air.  4. Know where you're going to ride.  If I were to have ridden someplace flat I think I might have been found in the morning on the side of the road frozen.  Going downhill is really really cold, going flat is pretty cold but... going up hill is warm (for the most part - besides your nose and maybe ears if they're not covered).   I knew I was going to be going up hill and I had had the experience of being way too hot while riding uphill so I dressed fairly light when I went out the door which ended up being alright. I needed to wear better socks and another layer on top under my jacket.  5. Remember to hydrate even when it's cold out - water will keep you going.  Eating a light breakfast before you ride won't hurt either i.e. cereal. Eating and drinking go hand in hand with knowing where you're going to ride.  How long you will ride will determine how much water or food you need to take along.  Why take an extra water bottle if you know you won't need it or what if you're 25 miles from food and drink and you bonk because you didn't eat! 6. Bring something like paper towels for your nose.  My nose tends to run when it's cold and i'm panting like a dog and having snot running down my face is not a sensation that is desirable.  Why must the paper be thick.  So you can feel it with your gloves on.  One day I went out riding two regular kleenex wodded up and placed on either side of my back pocket and the next i went with a paper towel torn in half also placed on either side of my back pocket.  The day I went with the paper towel I was able to find the paper and dispose of the "waterfall" properly while on the day with the kleenex I was forced to use my glove which is really what I wanted to avoid doing in the first place. For know this list is what I've got in mind maybe it will be added to in the future.  Some of these things are decent advice for any ride really not just while in the cold.  Here they are again.
- Keep your body moving. 
- Keep the pace slower if you're getting cold and or going downhill.
- Wear warm socks or invest in some booties.
- Know where you're going to ride which will determin proper attire.
- Drink water no matter what/have some food.
- Bring paper towels if your nose is an runner.
- And check the weather which will aslo determin proper attire.   
Happy riding!

Update: Went for a ride this morning and was reminded of something of a necessity while riding in the cold or well most of the time. Glasses! I like clear lenses even if it's sunny outside because I don't like my vision hampered even though most "clear" lenses have some sort of UV protection and are not totally clear.  Wearing glasses in normal weather keeps the dust out and in cold weather it means no more cold tears streaming back towards your ears.