Saturday tandem Ride

Some of you readers who have been around a while may have noticed that there hasn’t been much mention of the tandem this spring.  Well, there are a couple of reasons for that. 

First, the weather has been so much nicer than normal, I’ve been getting a chance to ride and put on a lot more mileage early in the year than most years.  A lot of that mileage has been at temperatures that are marginal to where Pam enjoys riding.  She doesn’t like to be cold on the bike, and I don’t blame her.

Second, we don’t want to start her riding too early, because she doesn’t have the passion for it that I do.  She’s a pretty darn good sport, but there are other things she would like to be doing as well.  We compromise to ensure she doesn’t have an extremely long riding season.

Lastly, when it finally did get warm enough for her to enjoy it, she came down with a case of bursitis in the knees.  That’s some nasty stuff, and it takes discipline and diligence to get rid of it.  Pam normally has both, but it keeps creeping back.

 

On Saturday, however, we decided to give it a try for only the second time this year.  We got up early as usual, ran three miles, then changed and started some laundry and mounted up on the big bike for our 20 mile High School loop.

Talk about a gorgeous morning for riding.  Most of the time, the temperature was perfect, with only a few spots in the shade that were cold.  As you can see from the pictures above, there was some fog hanging in some of the low spots, and not much of a breeze to contend with.

Having not ridden the tandem in a while, I was reminded again why that bike is so much fun.  Descents are absolutely spectacular!  It’s like that bike senses the down hills and surges forward in excitement on it’s own.  The only real way I have of describing it is as “powerful”, much like giving a race horse it’s head and trusting it to run with all it’s might!

The other thing about the big bike is that it feels like you’re riding on roads as smooth as glass on all but the bumpiest pavement.  That big steel frame smooth’s  out the vast majority of road noise, and you might as well be riding on clouds.

Granted, it is a big, heavy bike, and it certainly feels so early in the season.  The thing will never be considered quick, but it sure is fun to ride.  We were home by 8:15, so we went to breakfast at Panera Bread!

We rode 20 miles Saturday morning with no seemingly ill effects on Pam’s knees, so I’m encouraged that we might be on that bike some more before long.

Here’s the GPS track for what it’s worth.

God bless…

TW

Redlined 4-26-2012

Back in the day, I used to work on being somewhat fast.  A few times a week, I would get out and time trial it either on the route pictured above or on the slightly shorter High School Out and Back route.   My records are kind of sketchy, but I think I remember the fastest I was ever able to do either of those was just under 20 mph, but that took the right conditions of rest, no wind, and the right motivation.

Yesterday afternoon, I had to visit a lawyer for some estate planning stuff.  Yeah, I can think of a better way to spend part of an afternoon, but sometimes you’ve gotta be responsible.  I commuted home from work by bike, took care of my business, and found myself back home by 3:30.

I decided I would take a quick ride to put myself over 40 for the day.  It was really warm, but not a perfect afternoon for riding because of the wind.  As I took off, I decided to give it my all and see what happened.  Frankly, I’ve not done that in a long time…and not at all on the Madone so I wasn’t sure what I would be able to do.  After all, I already had 20 miles under my legs, a decently hard workout in the morning, and a short night’s sleep because the baseball game the night before went into extra innings.  I figured that worst case, I would wear myself out and would be able to count it as a good workout.

As I pulled back into the driveway an hour and 12 minutes later, I knew I had left it all on the road.  I was shot – no doubt about it.  When I checked my average speed, I was quite pleased.  19.1 mph is consistent with those days back when I was trying to be fast.  But, boy….I was tired!

For the GPS details, you can click the map above.

God bless….

TW

People I See 4/23/2012

This is Kelly and Kristy.  I caught up with them on my way home the other day.  Kelly is a co-worker of mine, and they’re both rocking new bikes this spring.  I’ve been enjoying how much they’ve embraced them as a family.

Their daughter Khloe was with them, but she was moving too fast on her own bike to be bothered with a picture!

God bless…

TW

Forlorn

 

This sad and forlorn bicycle has been locked to a pole near MSU for the past several days.  I noticed it last Thursday, and at this point, it appears to be completely abandoned, although the Cannondale Trunk bag looked to be in decent shape.  It’s locked to a pole in the corner of the yard of a pretty nice house, so I’ll bet the homeowner would like to get rid of it.  With that big ole’ U-lock, however, it’s gonna take a hacksaw.

I presume a car was involved…..

Take it easy out there.  Stuff can happen!

God bless…

TW

Conversation with a co-worker

 

The signs of Earth Day are scattered around town in various forms.  I’ve seen a couple of these painted storm drains along my route, and there was a piece on the news about them last night.  You can check it out here.

When I got to work yesterday, I had this conversation with a co-worker.

Carol – Did you ride your bike today?

Tracy – Oh yeah!  Just like every other day.

Carol – Boy, it sure was a pretty morning for it.

Tracy – Well, I guess I’ve been spoiled.  It was kinda cool.

Carol – (laughing) I guess there is a difference between “pretty” and warm, isn’t there.

Tracy – Yes, and it’s hard to tell the difference when you’re sitting in a car.  On a bike, though, it’s readily apparent!

God bless….

TW