i need to ride more

After waking up today, i rode on my rollers for a half hour. (I think my last ride was two weeks ago.) Since it had been awhile since my last ride, I didn't ride particularly hard, but when i got off my bike i felt like i was going to throw up and pass out.

My body said "stop" at about 20 minutes, but I forced myself to go for a full 30, pushing up my speed somewhat toward the last couple of minutes. Perhaps that was dumb. Apparently my body wasn't very happy with me directly after.

I feel fine now.

Average Speed: 19 mph
Max Speed: 34 mph
Ride Time: ~30 minutes
Distance: 9.7 miles

It's a beautiful thing

As you can tell from this picture, my bike arrived on Monday as planned. What drove me crazy was that it was "OUT FOR DELIVERY" from 7 AM and wasn't delivered until 4:40 PM! Talk about anticipation. Oh well, when it finally arrived it was like Christmas.

I had it shipped to work because that's just how things go in NY. I mean, nobody would have been home to sign for it or anything and it's not like that's something I want sitting on my porch outside all day. In anticipation of its arrival I had brought a sharp pocket knife and some tools to work in order to unpack and put it back together (thanks Sean for packing it all so well and for keeping the putting-it-back-together process simple). I just had to put the handlebars, front brake calipers, pedals, seat, and front tire on and she was ready to go. Oh, and I had to walk the bike over to a bike shop to air up the tires.

(NOTE: always let pressure out of bike tires when shipping. You never know what kind of air pressure differences the tires might go through while in transit on planes and...trains and...zeppelins. You should also loosen the strings of your guitar and other such instrument before shipping or extensive travel. Sean knows this. He's smart. Thus the reason I needed to run to a bike shop to use a pump before my bike was truly ride-worthy once again.)

Anyways, due to the lateness of the bike's delivery I wasn't able to put it together Monday night. I got it all unpacked and left it locked up in a room at work where we keep the servers and extra computer equipment. After leaving work I met up with a friend and headed into Queens to Shea Stadium to watch the Mets vs Nationals game with a bunch of other Mormons. It was a good activity. There was plenty of socializing and I was able to see some of my friends from other wards that I don't get to see too often.

Tuesday after work. I put it together, got some air in the tires and rode it home---from 4th Street and 2nd Ave all the way up to 128th and Lenox. It wasn't too bad, but it wasn't all that great either. Traffic was horrible. I'm really unfamiliar with which streets are best for biking so just headed north up 3rd Ave. There was a lot of stop and go up to 60-something where I turned left and into Central Park. From then on, the rest of the ride was great. I rode the loop in Central Park up to 110th Street and then went straight up Lenox.

Once I got home I couldn't not try out my new rollers, so I set them up in the living room and hopped on for a couple minutes.

I rode them again tonight for a short little ride. I didn't want to go crazy, but I did want to get a little riding in so i can ease myself back into shape and get use to the rollers. In case anyone is interested, here's what I rode tonight on the rollers:

Ride Time: 21:45
Distance: 8.6
Average Speed: 23.7 mph
Max Speed: 33.7

PS - both times I've ridden on the rollers nobody else has been around to go downstairs and tell me how loud they are (I've been riding in the living room directly above my room rather than in my room above the neighbors downstairs.) They seem pretty quiet to me, but I'm wondering what they sound like when you're directly below them.

Now all I need is my bike

I've been going through withdrawals. It's been over 3 months since I've gone riding.

Can you blame me for buying these rollers when I saw them online for a decent price? I knew I'd be wanting a set of my own after leaving Provo and no longer having access to Sean's set, so in my mind it was inevitable. Honestly, it was only a matter of time.

Well, they came in the mail about a week ago. I put them together and now they've sat folded up under my bed unused since. (Oh yeah, they fold up---for easy storage)

Let's hope that once my road bike gets here on Monday I'll use them regularly.

Did I mention that my road bike arrives on Monday. :)

Payson Canyon: proving grounds for the new saddle

Saturday Sean and I went for a ride. It had been awhile, and was well needed. Plus, I needed to break in my new saddle. It ended up being the longest (time-wise) ride that I've done (and maybe the longest mileage as well). All and all, the seat worked great. Pretty comfy. My pelvic bone on either side of my butt was a tad bit sore the next day, but I think that's to be expected when you combine the fact it was my longest ride yet and the first time that saddle has been riden.

We rode out to the base of west mountain and then down to Payson. After filling up our water bottles at a gas station there, we headed up Payson Canyon for about an hour of climbing. That climb just keeps on going and going. It's gorgeous.

Here's some stats from my computer:

Ride Time: 3:55 (just shy of 4 hours)
Distance: 62.8 miles
Average Speed: 16 mph
Max Speed: 37

And Here's a cool map that I put together of our ride. We started in Provo, went out to West Mountain, then down to Payson, then up Payson Canyon. The green line shows that path.

We didn't backtrack exactly the way we came. You can see the blue line is our way back once we got back out of the canyon, and it eventually merges back to our starting path as you near Provo. (Click on the map to see a bigger version.)


I'm not positive how far up the canyon we actually went so this map isn't accurate with that info. All I can say is that once we reached the canyon, we climbed for an hour and we had a decent pace set. As for everything else, the route on the map is pretty darn close to the exact route we took.

Victoria's Secret: new biking line???

OK, so the original title of this post was "New Saddle" but after hearing a roommate's comment about the look of these pics, I opted to rename it. :) I think Larry the Cable Guy would be proud of the new title considering the second picture (if you don't know what I'm talking about, click here and once the video loads watch from about 2:40 to 3:40). Anyways, enough with the explanation of the new title for the post.

Look what finally came in the mail today!
Isn't it pretty?
I must say, I was really impressed with the packaging. I mean, I open up the cardboard shipping box and remove some packaging paper to see this:
The clear plastic "guitar case" for the saddle even has these two little clips inside for the rails (the two bars along the bottom of the seat that connect to the seatpost) to clip into and keep the seat from moving around in the package.

Let this all be a lesson to us in branding. I mean, how differently would I feel about this brand if I opened up the cardboard shipping box and the saddle was just in a thin clear plastic bag, rolling around the box? The packaging of this product provided me with a very different and powerful brand experience. The people working with Selle San Marco know what they're doing.

Sean said I had cool hair

Biking on Monday we stopped to fill our water bottles at Sundance Resort before continuing up Alpine Loop Rd.

Sean thought my hair was cool so he took this picture:


I guess that's what happens to your hair after a hard climb, a quick downhill, and another hard climb all with a helmet on when you have product in it from the day before.

Change of Plans

Sean, Tyler (dude from the ward) and I took off on our ride this morning around 9 am. but we didn't end up riding Squaw Peak and Hobble Creek Canyon as planned. Instead, we rode up Squaw Peak, back down...and then went and rode to the top of Alpine Loop Rd again (up past Sundance Resort where Sean, Jason, and I rode on Saturday).

It was a great ride. LOTS of climbing. On the way back home through Provo Canyon there was a crazy headwind that totally sucked. But as soon as we hit University Ave. it became an AMAZING tailwind. We were pedaling along in our top gear as if we were taking an easy cruise along the beach...and we were going 28 mph! That fast, and it didn't feel like we were working at all!

Sean and I decided to kick it into gear once we got stopped at the light at Bulldog and University to see how fast we could get going with this kind of tailwind. I got up to 36 mph on University as we cruised past 800 North. Pretty sure that's a new max speed for me on the flats. It's funny because I think that was my top speed going down Squaw Peak the first time.

Speaking of max speeds, I have a new one! I hit 48 mph coming down Sundance today! The computer on my bike says that my top speed was 47.3 but I looked down and saw 48. I wasn't going that fast long enough for my computer to register it as the top speed, but I hit it! Here's the stats of the ride from my computer:

ride time - 3:43
distance - 52.1
average speed - 14 mph
max speed - 47.3

Stay Tuned:

We're planning on riding up to the top of Squaw Peak and then Hobble Creek tomorrow. I'll let you know how it goes.

Alpine Loop

Ride Summary:
We rode up Provo Canyon and up past Sundance to the top of Alpine Loop. It was awesome!

Ride Time: 3:26
Distance: 48.5 miles
Average Speed: 14.1 mph

New Max Speed: 44 mph
also, it's about a 3500 ft altitude change from the base to the top of Alpine Loop.

Extended Version:
Not having school or work certainly has its perks. Lately I've been doing a lot of biking and I'm loving it.

On Thursday Sean and I rode the West Mountain Loop (you all read about that here). Then on Friday Jason, Sean, and I went mountain biking up at Sundance and South Fork. Yesterday, the three of us rode the Alpine Loop. (Please see map below for a rough visual or click here). Let me tell you about Saturday's ride:

Basically we rode up University (notice all the "up's"), up Provo Canyon, then turned left and rode up to Sundance Resort (where we had mountain biked the day before). We filled up (ok, so that up doesn'st really count) our water bottles there and then kept going up Alpine Loop to the top. I think Jason said it's a 3500 ft elevation change from the base to the top. Honestly it was one of my favorite rides yet! It just felt so good and I felt like I was climbing really well. Sean even made a few comments about how well I was riding.

Here's a pic of me during part of the climb.
At the top of Alpine Loop you can either drop down into American Fork Canyon or go to Canyon Springs. Seeing as how none of us had ever been to Canyon Springs we thought we'd head that way. It was 7 miles so it would tack on another 14 miles to our journey.

We turned right at the top of Alpine Loop and cruised down what I think was about a 14% grade. It was amazing. I reached a new max speed: 44 mph.

After a couple of miles of fast, smooth, long curved downhill the road turns uphill. We zoomed up that and stopped to discuss. What we just road down we'd have to ride back UP and seeing as how we just climbed 3500 ft and weren't sure if we'd be able to fill our water bottles at Canyon Springs, we opted to turn around. It was a steep climb, but so good. We soon reached the top and then turned to head down to Sundance Resort, Provo Canyon, and back home.
By the time we got home we were pretty hungry, but we wanted to make sure we ate something healthy. After stretching out and showering up, we headed to the grocery store to pick up some supplies to make this:
The picture doesn't even do it justice. It was SO good. Thanks Dad for teaching me how to season a great steak.

I'm tired

Sean and I did the West Mountain Loop today. Basically we rode from the house in Provo down to Provo Bay, around the big mountain down there following the edge of the lake down to Genola, then back up through West Mountain, Payson, and Spanish Fork back up to Provo.

Here is a rough map of what we did. It's not really accurate (seeing as how we started in Provo and we took a couple different roads once we got to Genola), but you get the idea. That's pretty much the route.

This is what the computer on my bike says:

distance: 58.7 miles
ride time: 3:29
average speed: 16.8 mph

Stats

When I got home from working on 489 tonight I decided I'd ride the bike for a half hour. Here's how I did.

Speed (mph)
Average: 25.6
Max: 38.5 (I wasn't there for too long.)

Distance: 12.8 miles
Time: 30 min

It was PERFECT riding weather all week

but I was too busy...so Sean and I decided we'd take to the road this Saturday after I got home from a short game of disk golf with some friends and before we had to go to our show.

Here's some stats.

Distance: 43.8 miles
Average Speed: 17.5 mph
Ride Time: ~ 2.5 hours

It was such a nice ride.

It's like riding a bike.

Well, last night I had Sean tell me how to ride his trainer/rollers. I really felt like doing something physically active and riding my bike in the fridgedness that was Provo last night was not an option. I had been meaning to learn how to ride on roller so I figured it was a good time to start.

When Sean rides, he usually sets up in front of the TV and puts on a dvd of the Tour de France or something like that. I decided I'd put in my roommates Incubus Alive at Red Rocks dvd. I figured the music would pump me up and I'd be less likely to lean over and crash from following some weird camera angle or something. I could just imagine riding on those rollers while watching a video of the Tour...as the bikers come whizzing around a corner a camera angle from the biker's POV is seen and I naturally and instinctively lean into the turn as well only to find that I'm not going around a turn...I'm carefully balanced on a stationary trainer with rollers roughly 15 inches wide and so natural laws insue...I topple off the trainer and run straight into the wall. Yeah, that really didn't sound like the kind of experience I was hoping for so I opted on Incubus.

For the first...hmmm...say 2 miles or so of riding I rode one handed (that is, one hand was on the handlebars while the other was on the back of the couch helping me keep my balance.) I'm sure it was slightly commical to watch me as I started. I would slowly lift my right hand from off the couch and feel it out for a moment or two before steadying myself again. I think my first real stretch of time not holding onto the couch lasted for about....well, atleast 10 seconds before my balance wavered ever so slightly and I reached out for the couch again.

After awhile I got the hang of it and rode just fine. In fact, by the end I even felt comfortable enough to take one hand off the handlebars to wipe some sweat off my face before it reached my eyes. I didn't however have the confidence to attempt to retrieve my bottle of water from the cage mounted on the bottom tube of my bike in order to get a drink while maintaining to ride. When it came time for me to get a quick drink I opted to stop just long enough to take a sip before jumping back on and getting back to business.

Squaw Peak

Now, now...I know what some of you are thinking reading the title of this blog post, but don't jump to conclusions.

This Saturday, between General Conference sessions, my roomate Sean and I road our bikes up University, into Provo Canyon, and up Squaw Peak. Holy crap was that difficult! Four and a half miles of constant incline. I had to tell myself several times to just keep pedaling. The last half mile gets a little steeper and thinking that the peak was right around the corner, I pedaled through the first steep section giving it all I could...I rounded the switchback only to find that there was another quarter mile of the same before I would be in the parking area...let's just say that last 1/4 mile killed me. When I reached the top and hopped off my bike, my legs were like jello. It was amazing.

Well, I did it. And I'll do it again.

PS - you'd be amazed how well you can corner going downhill on a roadbike. It was fun getting to pass a car on the way down. :)

My New Bike

Isn't she pretty? :)