We rides again!

It's been a tough few years and I'm hoping that this one will be a bit quieter. With that in mind I've been building up my mileage. Last week I did the CJBC Farmlands century ride. I was pretty sick at the start of the ride but fared better as the day went. Of course I was sucking wheel all day, I don't normally make a habit of doing that. We averaged only 15.4 mph (mea culpa) but I did finish with a bit of something left. Yea, first century in 2 years!

Jump ahead to this week, I led a ride yesterday (Saturday, 5/10) for a century from Cranbury, NJ to Tabernacle, NJ. We started out slow as pollen was causing asthma problems (not to mention I have some serious weight to lose). We made okay time on the first half. Temp's jumped into the 80's by the time we hit Pemberton (Pine Barrens). And it was a bit windy (normal for NJ and this time of year, steady 8 - 12 mph winds out of the SW). The stretch from Chatsworth to Tabernacle wasn't too bad despite the wind and that I hadn't been down here in 2 years (mentally challenging). We stopped off in Nixon's for lunch (at about mile 60), dead tired. Not unusual for early training rides. So we ate, got back on the bikes and started back. We now had a tail wind and that helped a bit (might have helped a lot more than a bit). We managed to get just east of Columbus when we ran into a downpour. We reached the general store in Chester and hid under the porch for a while. When it appeared to be letting up we took off again only to go about 500 ft and be driven under a bank's drive through by a surge of rain and wind. We had roughly 20 miles to go and the worse seemed to be over (though it didn't stop raining), so we headed out. With the cooler temperatures we seemed to be feeling better and we started booking it. We hit several more pockets of heavy rain but just kept going. We finished with an average of 15.9 mph, not bad for 2 rest stops (and a few hide from the rain stops).

Not quite a century

My rides are still a bit inconsistent (riding one weekend, not riding the next) but they are starting to get back to the century mark. During the week I'm squeezing in more miles, which is helping. It's been more than a year since I've done a century. I've been fighting health, weather and other problems just trying to get in any rides at all so I'm quite pleased that I managed to get in my 92 mile ride yesterday. Two weeks ago I got in an 80 mile ride with an avg. pace of 15.8 mph. No where near my usual 17 - 18 mph avg. This week it was hotter and we rode longer (92 miles) and faster (16.3 mph). I also just had the first step of a tooth implant put in so I'm on anti-biotics. That played havoc with my digestion yesterday but only small problems (I was queasy most of the ride). Despite this I was just happy to be doing any riding! Approaching the century mark and averaging 16.3 was icing on the cake.

I decided to head down to Whiting and ride Pasadena Rd from Village Park in Cranbury, NJ. The day started out warm, the way I like it. But I did worry it might be too warm (high expected was low 90's F). We had 3 stops planned, Whiting, Pemberton and Allentown. The first 25 went quietly, the busiest stretch from Plumstead to Whiting (New Egypt - Whiting Rd) was not bad. A quick stop at the WaWa for a break and we were on our way. Pasadena was nice except for the one guy who buzzed me. I was riding 2 wide (oops) but there was no one else on the road and no visibility problems. He could have gone a bit more wide and a beep before hand would have been a good idea too. After that it was quiet and we enjoyed the scenery. When we reached Chatsworth we turned North to Sooy Place. While I enjoyed the scenery I was surprised to find that there was much less shade than what I was expecting. I wonder if they widened the fire break along the road? On this ride I decided to check out a 'new' road called Avenue Rd (it's listed as just Avenue) if for no other reason than it's name. It appeared to be a nice back road and it was. Also it dropped us right into Ong's Hat (I love these names :-) ). Avenue is a nice road despite no controlled intersection on Rt 70 (we had no trouble crossing). After much sun, nice scenery and being entertained by a crop duster in the fields not more than 100 ft away from us, we made it to the WaWa in Pemberton. The next section is the return to Cranbury via Allentown, we've done this section hundreds of times and such familiarity at the end of a ride is a comforting thought. Unfortunately the bridge over the Turnpike was closed so we were diverted (added 1 mile, oh woe is me ;-)). I'm glad to see that we may have access to the new bridge soon. The older narrower one was uncomfortable with a large group. I decided to detour along a nice back route that avoided much of the traffic in Hightstown (and the nice down hill :( ). It felt good to be back but better that we had done the ride and that we had so many positives. I'll need to see what I can come up with for next week's ride.

Second ride of 2012

It's been almost a year since my last post. My new job has done a pretty good job of messing up my schedule. The hours are very long and I've had to endure way too many weekends working. This has severely cut into my mileage. I'm going to have to be very creative to get in my miles. But I made it out this weekend, the third ride of the year.

Today I did a nice ride out of Village Park, in Cranbury NJ (Central part of the state), rode to Hightstown, Allentown, Chester (Mansfield), out to Columbus, Springfield and stopped in Wrightstown for a break, 55 miles in total. We started out at 9 AM near the freezing mark but oh what a gorgeous day it was, not withstanding. I used several, low traveled back roads. Roads we usually don't use. One of the problems with rides under X miles (you fill in the X) is that you tend to travel the same roads over and over). It's hard to find something you haven't visited lately. Worse yet is that I need to try and ride routes that my friend, Larry, won't use the next day. Oddly enough we tend to think alike which may be due the the time of the year and weather patterns. Hopefully the NJ Turnpike will have a bunch of the bridges reopened soon so it will open up more of the area to our old routes that have been closed to us for the last two years (Turnpike widening, South of 8A).

On the wild life side we did manage to see a bunch of basically well behaved dogs, A nice Red Hawk glided along side of us on our way out to Columbus and a Turkey Vulture more interested in someone's lost lunch that us riding a few feet from it.

Farmland 2011

Okay so I haven't blogged in a while (sorry). Well, so far this winter and spring have not been good for getting in miles, but spring is getting better. I just did my first century (May 7^th) on the CJBC Farmlands ride. The club laid out new routes and, with few exceptions, they were a very nice change (don't worry I'll get those roads fixed). It was a gorgeous day, starting out cool (~55F) and ending up mild (~70F, I like it hot). My average time was in the high 16's and considering my lack of riding that's okay. I did manage to get in one of my 'long pulls' way above pace. Afterwards I felt terrific and my leg problems of the last few years doesn't seemed to have surfaced. Additionally the stress of getting and learning a new job and the lack of miles have allowed me to put on too much weight. All things considered the average speed and the day-after feeling says I'm well on track for the longest day. My friend Mark and I rode well together and it looked really good for us on the Longest Day. Unfortunately Mark had a bike accident on a Sunday ride. He and another friend collided. Ken went down with a concussion and cuts above and below his eye. Mark ended up with lots of road rash and a broken clavicle. I'm wishing them both a speedy recovery and not to go nuts during their time off the bike.

Weekend updates

Last weekend I kind of put off the work I need to get done outside because I was busy playing. :-) That Saturday I led a bicycle ride and we tested out a new route. It was nice to have Bikely.com to help plan out the route (I did that on Friday night). I really like the satellite feature as it helps me envision what the area generally looks like as I ride the roads. Since my 3D perception is pretty good I understand what the area should look like from the ground as well as above it. I now have a nice smart phone that I hope will be useful when we're out riding (for short cuts or alternate routes). We'll see how that goes. Sunday I spent a lot of time trying to organize my various information sources so I could reach them using the smart phone (I'm still working on that).

Now, I really wished I had drank more as Sunday I was slightly dehydrated. It would have also been nice to have had the GPS working on my Android based Samsung Captivate (bug in the firmware) to test out and get use to using the feature. I was able to use the phone to check the radar for the area though it really doesn't give you a good idea of the way the headwinds are blowing in the various areas (yes it comes from various directions). On Saturday, my friend was able to text me that she was running a few minutes late and to not leave without her. I've since added Facebook and Twitter to my phone so I'll be able to post inane information for all to see! ;-) Despite the fact there is a lot of junk posted, both Facebook and Twitter have their uses. It allows me to keep up with friends, family and acquaintances. What I'd really like to do is to figure out how to post pictures and information from my rides like my friend Lane does. I often see interesting things along the way and wouldn't mind sharing them (most of NJ doesn't look like the start of the Sorprano's). I'm glad I've met people who have given me these ideas. Now I just need to figure out how to implement these ideas.

This past weekend I did the Princeton Free Wheelers - Princeton Event. It's one of the area's big rides. We managed to get a break in the weather as it only reached 85F but starte out at 65F @ 7AM. The previous weeks before were very humid and the temperature started out at 84F and rose quickly to as much as 103F. This break in the weather was a nice relief. This year the event took a different series of roads, as it always does. They took us out to Columbus NJ, down to New Lisbon, over to Turkey Swamp and back to Mercer County Park. It was a gorgeous route. I'll have to take advantage of some of those roads now that I know them. On the hydration front I decided to learn from my previous mistakes and drink a lot more. I still went out and stayed on the front too much so at the end of the ride I was very tired. We finished with a 17.3 mph avg. Not bad considering the previous weekends air quality alerts (I'm asthmatic) and that heat & humidy limited both our speed and distances. I'm hoping that we'll continue to get a break for the rest of the summer and I'll be able to get down to Chatsworth (107 mi.) and Tuckerton (131 mi.).