The campaign to revoke Gust, Gail and Windy's bike club membership!

I hereby put forth, before the board, a request to revoke Gust's, Gail's and Windy's club membership for abuse of rider members on club rides!

Wow, I thought last week's ride was windy. It was supposedly a stronger wind with higher gusts but this week's ride felt worse. I guess it really does have to do with ride selection. I was forced to start heading south into the open prairies of the NJ flat lands. This was the only way I could really get my mileage up to the 65 mile ride we did and ride to where I wanted to ride. Yes, I like to site-see while I ride, it's important. The hard part in selecting a ride is not only figuring out where you want to go but also figure out how to get there. My ride is called "Which every way the wind blows" because I tend to get head winds at some point. I try to adjust the ride as we go (hence cue sheets are useless on my rides). Yesterday's ride required I toss in a few extra miles and zig-zag through some tree lined and hilly roads (Province Line Rd outside Allentown NJ). One other part of ride selection is that I have hundreds of rides in my head and thousands of variations. This led to one funny incidence where a rider congratulated me on never getting lost to which I replied: "Oh $#!7 we took a wrong turn 3 miles back. We're doing the wrong ride.". I still get chided about that.

So other than the wind was there anything special about yesterday's ride? Well there were 3 other riders on my ride. Because of the mileage I tend to get only 1 or two riders. And the second, which was really exciting (okay, not really) was Hockamik Rd was being ground up. Never heard of it? Not surprised it's a bit off the beaten path near the Ft Dix Artillery range. We decided to ride down the road only to find it was extremely soft. Our tires sank to a depth of about two inches. Not what we expected from ground up road. We had expect a gravel like material. Boy were we disappointed. Another special thing about the ride was the gorgeous weather. It was in the mid 60's and I would gladly take the wind and that temperature vs the winter we had. The coldest ride I did was 26F which was only slightly better than being stuck indoors. Well next week I have a 78 - 82 mile ride down to the edge of the Barrens (Mt. Misery Rd and New Lisbon). Hopefully there will be less wind and my avg. speed can get to a respectable level. Besides putting on too much weight and asthma and wind and getting older and not getting in as much base miles as I usually do I can't understand why I'm so slow.

Who invited Gust, Gail and Windy?

Yup, Saturday, Sunday and Monday's rides were very windy and the usual trio decided to ride with us (Gust, Gail, and Windy). Of course now it's going to rain for the next few days (wish I could ride with Gust, Gail and Windy instead). Despite the 20+ mph NW winds it was nice to have warm day to ride. Saturday started out like any other ride, I wore out the rear tire and needed to replace it before we could leave Cranbury. I created a 50 mile loop that would first take us East, then turn North and allow us to zig-zag north and west to the Griggstown Canal. The 50 miles was important since I suffered a nasty asthma attack a few weeks ago and I haven't been able to build up my miles as much as I'd like. So how strong were the winds? Well I managed to get pushed up the hill at the quarry in Kingston (no pedaling required). Made this flatlander feel like quite the climber. ;-)

Our first rest stop was 36 miles into the ride at the Main Street Kingston Eatery on Rt 27 in Kingston. We met up with Wendell and his friends (they were riding fixed gears, ouch). It was nice to meet up with a bunch of cyclists who don't look at you funny when you says your only doing 50 miles. ;-)

Next month I have the CJBC's Farmlands Century. After that I start training like I'm doing the CJBC's Longest Day ride (210 miles). I won't actually be able to do the ride but I do love to do the training. So all these base miles should help smooth out that first Century. I'm also expecting that it will have an effect on my weight which I've allowed to get too far from healthy.

Riding with my peeps

The last few days have been some of the nicest to get in some mileage. But the signs of spring are there. Various birds have arrived (boy does it get noisy, I love it) but most of all, the tree frogs having begun their mating calls (some folks call them peepers because that's what it sounds like). They're wonderful frogs (unless you're trying to sleep), I found one climbing on my house last year.

2 weeks ago I started what has to be the worst asthma attack I've had in years. I had to work to breath (extra push on the exhale). I would walk around the block gasping. Now I'm up to 30 minute walks with my dogs and almost 30 miles on the bike today. Hills still cause me to gasp but that's because I'm a flat lander not my asthma. I've learned an important lesson that I must continue to exercise on a regular basis. I can't let everything else get in the way or I'll have to spend weeks working out to get back to where I can breath again.