It's Gonna Take Longer Than Anticipated

Well, it seems that when I ordered my Arabesque group last November (off of ebay), it came with shifters which may be the clamp on type and not the braze-on type, which is what i need. I've been searching a lot today to try and figure out if I can get some sort of adapters that will allow me to use what I have. The original shifters that came off of the bike could possibly go back on the bike, but some of the internal pieces are breaking, so I'm not too sure if they will still be usable.

Then, last night while searching on ebay, I found some Arabesque shifters, and not knowing that thre were different types (clamp-on and braze-on), I bought them. So, I will be getting a set of clamp-on shifters that won't work on this bike. Oh well, I'll just list them on craigslist/BF and/or back on ebay. I'm still in the search for shifters....

I'm going to take the frame by my LBS tomorrow and have them clean out the seat tube - the powdercoater painted some inside and I can't get the seatpost installed. I'll also have them check out the bottom bracket area as well to make sure my BB will install. Maybe I can get the BB, crankset, headset, and derailleurs installed this weekend. I hope so. And get the bars wrapped.

Ordered some stuff from ProBikeKit this week too. Should be getting some Vittoria Rubino Pro tires in white and a set of Look KeO Classic pedals in black. They didn't have any Ambrosio White bartape:(. I'm gonna order some whenever it's in stock again....

Half Of The New Parts Are Here

Wow! I got some of my parts that I ordered last Friday. Parts have arrived from BikeTools.com. Guess I should get busy cleaning the rear wheel, huh? I can't really do anything else till I get the stuff from LooseScrews, which includes some tools for installing the bottom bracket and taking off the existing freewheel.

I might have something ready to go by this weekend! That would be awesome! A new bike for my birthday:).

I Gots A New Toy!

A while back, like last October/November, I had been doing some research on dslr cameras. I had pretty much narrowed my choices down to the Canon Rebel XTi or the Nikon 40D (I think). Then, I up and purchased a PowerTap SL the first of November and thought I better wait a while before I made any more large purchases.

My husband asks me this past Saturday what I would like for my birthday, which is coming up this weekend. I haven't a clue. So, he tells me that he's thinking of getting me this camera because of the things he knows I really enjoy, cycling and photography are my favorites. Awesome!! We purchase the camera and kit, which includes a very large carrying case, UV filter, and an extra battery/charger, as well as a 2G compact flash card. Sweet deal - got about $120 off of normal retail price.

Since it did cost a bit, he tells me that it is a combination of birthday, Valentine's, Anniversary, Mother's Day gift! That's cool with me.

Without further ado - I am the proud new owner of a Canon Rebel XTi!! So much to learn now - I'll have to learn how to use this thing in manual mode cause it's not something to be using the Auto mode in...hell, I've got a P&S for that:).

My New "Old" Bike

I was gifted a bike by glenng (BikeForums member) back in November that was initially to be my "beater" bike. It is a Lotus Excelle and I don't really know any more about it. Serial number is Y6N 759. When I received it, it had rust on it, scraps/scratches, paint missing, etc. I was very grateful for the gift, but my personality is such that I just couldn't stand the "beater" look. I was probably never going to ride it like that.

Very soon after receiving the bike, I purchased a partial Arabesque group off of ebay because I had decided I wanted to make this a nice bike. I had initial thoughts of trying to clean it up and slap the group on there and riding it, but never did - just didn't have the time required to clean it and I still needed some parts. Instead, the bike sat around my house for almost 2.5 months before I decided that I would just find someone to do the stripping and painting.

I took it to a local powdercoater last week and got the frame/fork back on Wednesday. All I can say is Wow!! I had it painted a bright red and I have plans to use white cable housings, bartape, and saddle. I have cleaned up the front wheel using Mother's Mag & Aluminum Polish and need to work on the rear wheel this weekend. The brakes need cleaning as do some of the other parts that I will be keeping (seatpost, stem, handlebars). I also don't know whether to keep the headset or get something new. I have no idea if it's still good or not. Today, I ordered, hopefully, all the remaining parts I will need to build it up.

So, I will have something to work on for the next couple of weeks. Gonna be a real learning experience, as I have never built up a bike, but it should be lots of fun.

Here are some of the before/after & Arabesque pictures. I'll try to post more as it gets built.

Snow?? What Snow?? & Chilly Riding!

Yea, snow??? What damn snow?? Again, we are just teased by the white stuff here in Eastern NC. It didn't start snowing here till around 5pm Saturday and then it doesn't stick, but just melts because it's been raining all day and too warm lately. It did eventually cover the ground in a nice white blanket, but when I got up this morning, it was all gone! OK...how 'bout a really good snowfall for my birthday in 2 weeks?? I think that might make me the happiest.

It was pretty cold this morning, but the sun was out and there were no clouds in the sky. I finally felt good, after being sick Friday night and Saturday and not eating very much yesterday. I was hungry this morning, had a good breakfast (the usual) and thinking about riding....after some encouragement from a fellow BikeForums member, I got dressed and decided to go out for just a ride around town. I was a bit overdressed in the torso and underdressed in my legs. I wore a Craft ls baselayer, ss jersey, ls fleece top, PI Gavia jacket, polertec-type neck gaitor, PI beanie, Lands' End fleece lined, windproof gloves, PI shorts, Performance Triflex tights, 2 pr of wool socks, toasties and booties. Nothing was cold except my legs and toes. The toes eventually got warmed up after about 25-30 minutes. The wind was rough too - riding into 15mph winds for half of the ride.

I was going to go to the gym this afternoon, but will wait and go tomorrow. I told the SU (spousal unit) that I had joined the Rex Wellness Center on Friday. He, surprisingly, said he wanted to go as well. That's good. Peak Fitness is a hole in the wall here in Clayton. No classes, young people working there as "trainer" types, just not conducive for getting me to go there. Rex has trainers with 4 year college degrees and the atmosphere is just so much better. It's farther away from home, 12-13mi, but I could take half hour lunches and go after work and be home by 5:30pm. We'll see how it goes. I really want to get in there and work on the weights, hopefully, getting a bit stronger and also helping in my weightloss quest. 18 pounds to go.....

Picture from today's ride:

Eating Healthy, Losing Weight?

OK, I seriously have to start eating better! I am trying to do this, but it's hard to do when the rest of your family doesn't care to eat better. I'm the only one that's trying to lose weight and trying to train for the rides I want to do this year. Not sure how to go about getting the others to change the way they eat. Like right this very minute, just as I'm typing this post up, the kid and husband are noshing on Bojangle's Gravy Biscuit, Chicken Fillet sandwich and french fries. Am I eating any? Hell no. That's not part of my diet. Our supper is about the only good meal for the rest of the family.

I don't eat out at fast food places unless it's some place like Wendy's, where I'll have a Spicy Chicken sammich, baked tater or salad with it. No Hardee's, McDonald's, Burger King, etc. Lunches are usually brought from home or ocassionally I'll have something from the local Hibachi Japanese place (hibachi chicken/scallops with veggies and about .5 to .75c of rice with it). Other than that, I'm a brown bagger:)

This morning, I'll probably just continue to have some saltine crackers since I was sick last night. Even if I weren't sick, I wouldn't be eating that stuff. I think I either had a 24hr virus last night or got sick from the stuff I ate last night. I had fixed this Taco bake stuff (Kraft Mac 'n Cheese, hamburger w/taco seasoning, layered with together with cheese and topped with salsa & more cheese) Wednesday evening, didn't fix any supper (because I wasn't riding today), so I had leftovers. That mess is going in the trash.

So, back to the eating better part...to give you an idea of how I eat I'll list what I've eaten this week and this is similar to my usual eating habits:

Breakfast (6am):
Low-Cal Thomas whole grain English muffin, 2 slices turkey bacon, egg or
1c cooked oatmeal with .5tbsp Smart Balance butter, honey, cinnamon, raisins, chopped walnuts and .25c 1% milk
16oz water

Snack (9am):
Usually a banana or apple
24oz water

Lunch (12pm or 1pm on lunch-time ride days):
Nature's Own whole wheat bread with Boar's Head turkey, baby Swiss, 1 tbsp mayo, mustard
Piece of fruit.
Will alternate with large salad w/ tomatoes, bell pepper, broccoli, cukes, 1 tbsp cheddar cheese & chopped egg. Newman's Lite Balsamic Vinaigrette dressing
16oz diet sundrop

Snack (3-4pm):
Yoplait yogurt (digestive health kind) or
8 Wheat Thins with a triangle of low-cal/fat Laughing Cow cheese or
banana
16oz water

Supper (6pm):
Some sort of grilled/baked chicken, pork loin chop, or fish
2-3 veggies
decaf ice tea or water

Snack (8-9pm):
Yoplait yogurt or
banana

Sometimes, I don't have this last snack (or any of the snacks!) tho. Just not hungry sometimes. I don't know, I'm just frustrated with trying to eat well and not getting much support at home. "let's have Mexican tonight", "let's order Papa John's", etc. How do I get around this?

I guess I am eating pretty well, whatcha think?? But, I'm not losing the weight as fast as I want to. Maybe going to the gym and doing weights will help this along. I'm trying to ride the bike 3x during the week and the weekends, with longer (3+ hr) rides one of the weekend days. I've got 20# (at least, then re-evaluate) still to lose and would like to have this done by my planned WNC ride in May. I guess it's possible to do so in 4.5 months.

(not done, but will go ahead and post this...will add more later)

Snow??

Snow?? Hell no. :(. Wintry mix was forecast for today, but alas, all we get is rain. Not that we don't need some rain around here, but I really do want some snow!!! The last great snow we had in the Raleigh area was in January 2000. Seven farkin' years ago!!!! Sigh. Just give me 8-12" of snow on a Thursday morning and I'll be just as happy/ecstatic/giddy as a 7yo. Then I'll be ready for the faux Spring and hot Summer to arrive....maybe sometime before March we'll get some snow. If I see any snow on my trip to the foothills Saturday, I'll have to get some pics!!

So, I get no snow today, only rain, and I therefore, cannot ride. Guess that's OK. I'll ride on Friday. Yesterday, when I rode, I tried to scout out roads which would be good for doing my intervals on. I think I've found one or two, about a 15-18min ride from work. Means that I will have to take a longer lunch on interval days. The one I've found that I think will work well, is ride out Rock Quarry to Battle Bridge to Brown's Field (think that's the name) and start the interval on this road. I'll take this road to Old Baucom and ride till I get 8-10min worth of interval done. Good thing about this section of roadway is the pavement is way smooth, there's 2' of pavement beyond the white line, and it's somewhat up grade, and very low traffic. I can ride up for the interval and soft pedal back down for the rest period.

Snow?? There is now the possibility of snow on Saturday, supposedly starting as rain and turning to snow later in the morning. I was supposed to go visit with my Dad then, but I think I'm going to call him and reschedule. I don't want to have to drive there & back in that weather nor do I want to get stranded up there. I really don't want to go at all, for reasons I won't post here, but it's something that I am going to have to do.

Since I'm not riding Saturday (most likely) I might just see how the legs feel for doing an interval or two tomorrow on the new route. They may say "No!" but then again, it could be a "maybe". Just have to see.

This Week Is Frustrating

Well....what kind of week is this going to be?? Colder weather is upon us again with a chance of some sort of wintery mix on Thursday. Today and tomorrow are going to be rather chilly, in the low 40F's for highs. I wish we would get several inches (like 8-12") of snow out of this but we won't.

I have to go visit with my Dad this weekend...he's not doing too well, mentally. For the past year or so, he has been getting forgetful and sometimes confused on things. And, he has awful mood swings...really angry & upset with everything/everyone to back to his "normal" self. Then, my step-mom calls me at work yesterday and tells me that it is getting worse, more confused/angry, gets lost driving but somehow ends up back home. So, I'm off this Saturday to visit and see if I can get any information on who his doctors are, what medications he's on, & so-forth. I really don't know what I'm going to do....I've got a good friend at work that I was talking to this morning...he's going to keep an eye/ear open for any kind of Hydraulics job in the NW part of the state (division 11 - Ashe, Alleghany, Surry, Watauga, Wilkes, Yadkin, Caldwell, and Avery Counties) so that should I have to move out that way for a while, I could. Sheesh. I never thought I would be thinking like this. :(

I guess on a brighter note - I get to do intervals today. Windchill around 37F at lunch when I'll be riding...yay! Gonna do either 8min X 3 or 10min X 2 intervals today or maybe some other variation. Just depends on how much roadway I have to work with, i.e. having to make turns or getting on a section of roadway that goes downhill too much. It's sorta hard to find good areas with long stretches of roadway to get in good intervals. Some long hill climbs would work great!

Well, those intervals didn't go as well as I thought they should. The first one was higher than it should have been, the 2nd was about right, and the last ones were in the upper end of Zone 3 instead of Z4. Oh well, guess the good thing about the ride, I was able to keep the cadence average above 95! Yay me!!

I Am Disciplined

Yay!!!! There was some question about whether I could ride with Jay and have a disciplined ride, i.e. not hammer the whole time. I was out to prove the nay-sayers wrong today.

I was to meet Jay around 10:30am at our local ride start and we would probably then ride about 40 miles or so. I had intervals to do prior to riding with J and I wanted to be able to ride with him and keep the ride in, preferably my Zone2, maybe Zone3. I got started a bit late and was not going to be able to get back to the start to meet him, so I called and we decided to meet along the route. That was fine, but I was much closer to this meeting place than he was, so I had to wait about 30-45 minutes for him to get there.

I started a new interval once he got there and we began our ride. I did this so that I could see the data for our ride in TrainingPeaks WKO and verify that I had accomplished a disciplined ride. We rode to Micro, out towards Fremont, and then back towards PineLevel. I really tried to not work really hard when pulling because if I did, it would just push my numbers higher and I wanted them to be lower for this part of the ride. For the 2:15hr that he and I rode, I had an NP of 141w and an AP of 118w. I guess it depends on which number you want to look at...the NP is right at the very bottom of my Zone3, so I maybe pushed a little more than I should have. But, the AP is really good, right in the lower to center of my Zone2. Overall, for the entire ride, my NP was 144w and AP was 119w.

The wind made the ride difficult as it seemed like it was always in our faces. Jay is really strong and did a lot of pulling, maybe more than me, but it had to be that way in order for me to accomplish this goal I had. Sorry Jay. :) At some point, the front derailleur on his bike slipped or messed up because he could not get it to go on the big ring. (just built bike). So, he had to ride the last 10-15 miles in only the small ring. It was a great ride, except for the wind and the sun disappearing a lot. I really like riding with Jay, but I just have to be careful and make sure I don't go out and ride hard when I'm not supposed to.

So, some data for you guys and don't laugh at my numbers:)
First Interval:
Duration=8:43min
NP=185w
AP=181w
TSS=14.5 (IF=1.0)
Second Interval:
Duration=7:00min
NP=174w
AP=170w
TSS=10.3 (IF=0.938)
Third Interval:
Duration=8:01min
NP=186w
AP=184w
TSS=13.5 (IF=1.004)
Jay Interval:
Duration=2:15:58.50
NP=141w
AP=119w
TSS=130.1 (IF=0.764)
Entire Ride:
Duration=3:35:03.66
NP=144w
AP=118w
TSS=215.5 (IF=0.781)
Work=1506kJ
Distance=54.166 miles

Registered for a few events now

Well, I am now registered for 3 biking events for February, April, and May. Frostbite Tour for 63mi, Burnsville Metric, and the Raven Rock Ramble (63mi). I'm still undecided on the distance for the Frostbite Tour (63 or 100mi) as the 100mi goes right by the starting point to complete 37 more miles. It's back over some roads we will have already ridden including Flower Hill (steep by our standards here in flatland) and Antioch Church Rd. Guess I'll just have to see how I feel and whether I can get with a good group and not expend too much energy during the 63mi.

The Burnsville Metric is my "A" event for this spring. My goal is to train right, do what I'm supposed to do in training and this will show on the ride. Ride Smart. And then there's the Raven Rock Ramble....this will be my 3rd year for registering for this event. It has rained every year on ride day and I have yet to ride this event! This year will be different. Unless it's just absolutely pouring cats & dogs on the ride day, I'm going to ride. Wet roads will be ok. Just do it.

So, that's all I'm registered for as of now. I will be registering for Assault on Marion, maybe the 3 Mountain Madness (it may be too close to Marion tho), Blood, Sweat, & Gears is a big maybe, then Ride for the Land, and of course I want to get a few TT's done this year too.

Discipline & Patience

Discipline and Patience must prevail.

Discipline is:

1. Training expected to produce a specific type or pattern of behavior
2. Controlled behavior resulting from disciplinary training
3. To train by instruction and control.

So, discipline, is something that I am gradually learning, due to the training I've been doing. I've never had a "set" training plan so it's new, but with my personality, it suits me just fine to have a "training" plan. I can't stand unstructured, unorganized stuff so this is good. It also means that I have to choose my rides very carefully. I can't just go out and ride with the fast guys with no restraint. It's just not part of my plan right now. Eventually, I should get to do some of this, but right now, I'm on a plan and a mission to ride some rides and ride them well. Tho, "well" is a relative term depending on how one wishes to define it.

But, patience is not something that comes very easily to me and I must remind myself to look at the end goals.

Patience is:

1. The quality of being patient; capacity of calm endurance

Patient is:

1. Capable of bearing affliction calmly
2. Understanding; tolerant
3. Perservering; constant

Both, discipline and patience are something that I have to learn and have them as an integral part of "me" if I'm going to accomplish all that I've set out to accomplish this year. I hear it all the time from my mentor. "Are you riding today", Yes, I answer. "Zone X?", Yes I answer. Are you doing this or that? Yes or no, depending on the question. And, I usually know what the correct answer should be. Are you riding with the fast group this weekend? **Sigh** No Obi-wan, I'm doing my intervals, which one should never skip doing. I'm becoming disciplined and learning to have a little patience. In doing so, maybe I'll become a better cyclist and person. But, how does one ride with a person who has no discipline? Is this possible at all? I hope that these questions an be answered as I do enjoy the rides, but know they are wrong for me and are detrimental to my goals.

Ride with discipline and patience and all my hard work will pay off in the end.

Just...I don't know....

Well, "that" time of the month now. I hate this time. I'm bitchy, bloated, and just "ill" in general. Just don't talk to me. I can't even ride tomorrow because I won't feel like it. But maybe Friday will be a little better. If it is, I'm gonna do some farkin' 8min x 3 intervals in my zone 4.

There's no actual group ride scheduled for Saturday. I've been trying to find people to ride with, to no avail. May just end up doing the Frostbite Tour 63mi route by myself or maybe JayC will ride with me.

I did register for the Frostbite Tour and Raven Rock Ramble today. Also printed out the registration for the Burnsville Metric.

Well, after looking at the projected forecast, it appears that I will not be riding on Friday (intervals) as it's supposed to be raining. I haven't heard anything about group riding yet for Saturday, so I may just do the intervals Saturday morning and get in about another hour's worth of riding and call it good. I guess I won't ride with the "hammers" Saturday either as BWNC says it's just not part of my plan right now and I know he's right. But, dammit I want to. Hold on girl!!! Look at the big picture and what you want to do this year. Remember Assault on Marion is the priority here!!!!!!!

Mid-day Ride

Wow! It was a beautiful day here in NC. One of my riding partners asked me over the weekend whether I might want to ride today. Of course, the answer was yes!

I left work around 10:30am and arrived at Jay's house around 11:15am. The wind was blowing steadily at about 12mph, but the sun was out and the temps around 75F! We head out down Hwy 50 towards Benson and usually I have trouble holding his wheel on the climb up 50. Not today. Not on any grade we hit today. Yay!

Anyways, we go down Old Fairground to some other road to the right that is nothing but climbing until Johnson CoLine road. Cross this heading into Harnett county. This road we are on is terrible...bumpity, bumpity, bump. Finally end up at a little store that's just off of the normal route we take. We never new about it! It will be added to our Benson/Coates route as a 3rd stop. Sorely needed at times.

By this time, we're close to an hour into the ride and I'm finally starting to feel better. Didn't feel bad, but it takes me a while to get warme up. Jay did most of the pulling up till now. I did a lot after the store stop. With him riding behind me, I always feel the need to go as hard as I can for as long as I can. Not necessaryily the best way to train, but that's just the way it is with us. HTFU.

We had one more short stop just off of Hwy 1010 before heading back to his house. Great ride today! Our overall stats were 34mi/2hr ride time. I unfortunately, went home, took a shower and went back to work!

***off topic***
My son had exams today - Spanish & English. He thinks he passed both, especially Spanish, since he was not doing well in there lately.
************

Sunday Afternoon on the Clayton Bypass

Well, it was a beautiful day today and I asked the SU if he had much planned for today or wanted to do anything...not really was the answer, so I said that if it was ok, I was gonna ride some this afternoon....didn't say no, so...

I emailed my riding friend Jay, and asked him if he was interested in riding today? He said yea and suggested that we try out the Clayton Bypass. 2 lanes in each direction, unopened, no traffic. This route is simply all rolling terrain and didn't seem to have any flat sections. But, I did fine. It was really nice to ride with Jay again as we haven't ridden together in quite a while. Last year this time, we seemed to ride every weekend and even some during the week.

He's encouraging me to play hooky from work on Tuesday....it's supposed to be around 74F! I most likely will and we'll probably do the Benson/Coates route, about 50-55mi. It is a rolling to hilly route and is the route on which I got hurt last year.....Anyways..

Ramblings...

Just a bit of rambling....SU got the complete Led Zeppelin cd set today. It was like half price from Amazon the other week. We listened to some of that while fixing supper tonight. It is pretty good. I have XM, so for the past 2 days, in my car and at work, I have been listening to XM59, which is nothing but LZ, Page/Plant music along with some commentary.

Now, we're watching the Carolina Hurricanes play St. Louis Blues. They're losing at the moment. We have had half season tickets for 3 years now. Not sure what we'll do this year. I know we'll probably get them again, but I could use my longevity check to pay for part of the trip to Colorado in July.

May add more later this evening or tomorrow...........

Well, not much going on the next day (Sunday, Jan 6). Reading the newspaper in the AM, to BJ's for some chicken breast & thighs, stuffed pork chops. I had an afternoon ride and the SU was home playing on the xbox & reading. Kid home being lazy & studying for exams next week...

Metric Century Today

Well, I planned on doing a group ride this morning, which started in Wendell and would be 51miles. I wanted to get at least a 100k of riding in today, so I thought that I would park about half ways between my home & Wendell and ride there, do the ride, and then ride back. That would have given me around 68miles. Well, when I get to the ride, most have bailed on the 51mi ride to the 39mi ride. That was ok with me - just meant that I would have to ride a little extra at the end.

The route is really nice, not a lot of traffic with rolling terrain. I think the Ring of Fire ride really helped me, if not physically, mentally. The last time I did this ride, I was dropped on every hill, then struggled to get back with the group. This time, tho, I attacked just about every one of the hills, standing out of the saddle to climb them. I was amazed at how much easier they seemed to be.

Arriving at the rest stop, the 5 that I was riding with had an average of around 17.1mph. But, upon leaving, we had the wind in our face and it proved to be a strong one. All went well on the return trip and once back to Wendell, I said bye and headed back towards my car. This return trip was a bit harder due to being solo and the wind. My hamstrings also started to tighten up and feel really uncomfortable. I had eaten about 6 gels during the ride, but stopped at a store for a Baby Ruth bar & a Coke since I was feeling slightly worn out. I took a little longer route back because I really wanted to get the metric in and I still had to ride on past my car....I had 60mi at the car, so rode 1.5mi past and then returned. I'm pretty proud of myself....the longest I have ridden in quite some time.

Once home, a long, nice hot shower and a shave and I felt a lot better. Did my stretches for the legs...those felt great. Had a beer and discussed supper with the SU. We wound up going to Lowe's Food for steaks, tuna & a couple of beer. Supper was great!!

Now, I've been searching for flights to Denver, CO so that I can ride the TBP in July. Haven't found anything yet, well, I have, but have to discuss with SU before I purchase either 1 or 3 tickets. If I go, I'm planning on going out the 9th and returning the 15th or 16th. I really think I can do this ride. And, I'm really looking forward to the ride!!! I hope I get to do it.

Tomorrow will have to do a short easy ride:)

1st Week of the New Year

Well, this has seemed like a really long week for me. I sure wish that I could have taken this week off as well and just started the New Year on a complete week. It wasn't really that bad, just seemed long for some reason.

I didn't ride any after the New Year Day's ride because the temps did not get out of the 30's(F) for Wednesday and Thursday and included very strong winds. This made the windchill probably around high 20's to low 30's. No ride today either, tho one was planned. I stayed up too late last night and overslept this morning, so nothing was ready to ride. And, I am out of Chocolate Gu. I had to find some from somewhere, so I did this during lunch. Performance is still out of stock in the store:(. The Spin Cycle had an opened box with 10. I bought all of them! Will probably use 3/4 of them on tomorrow's ride.

So, I would write more about general life, but it seems pretty boring to me. And, you never know who will be reading the blog, so I wouldn't want to write something that might, ummm, be read by the wrong people and taken the wrong way.

I'd like to do some traveling, maybe this year or next year, to other parts of the US to meet and ride with other BF members. VegaVixen is talking of going to Cali when BWNC does so that we can have a Suth'un Invasion! That sounds good, but I'm not all that sure I can do it this year. I had thought about doing the Triple Bypass out in Colorado, but BWNC thinks I should wait till next year and get more mountain training "under my belt" so to speak. But, I think I could do the ride if I trained for it - the only thing is, you can't train for that elevation around here. We max out at 6500'+ and I think that ride starts at that elevation and goes past 10,000'.

Tonight, I'm going to attempt to make the pasta puttanesca that BWNC fixed me & Jason last week. I hope the family likes it. It has olives in it and the SU and son don't like them. Why is it that they (SU) are not very willing to try new foods??? Basalmic vinegar? Forget it. I say the hell with it. I'm gonna start fixing things that I like to eat and they can either eat it or fix something else. This should be good for carbs for my long ride tomorrow.

Looking to ride around 60-65miles. Gonna ride 8mi to the start of the ride, do the 51mi ride, then ride 8mi back to my car and drive home. We're starting a little later (10am) due to the chillier temps forecasted at 9am. I have to get to the point where I can ride for at least 75mi and produce 2400kJ of work in order to be able to do the Assault on Marion ride. Plus, this will help me ride my first century on February 23 at the Frostbite Tour. Anyways, I'm tired of typing now:)

Starting Off 2008 With A Ride

Beautiful day here in NC, tho, just a bit windy. I started the year off with a 39 mile ride from teh local shop, The Spin Cycle, around Lake Jordan. There were a lot of fast riders there, but I was not there to "hang" with the fast riders. I was there to just ride and stay in Zone 2.

Wind was a little difficult at times, pretty much in my face until we turned onto Martha's Chapel Rd. Then some tailwind, then cross winds, head winds, etc...It was a really good ride - all the "hills" I encountered were nothing compared to my Ring of Fire ride. Anytime I thought it was hard, I just remembered Cullowhee Mtn Rd, and those thoughts were gone.

So, unlike last year or the year before where I didn't do anything on New Year's Day, this year, I rode my bike!!!