Well, it’s a Monday. The alarm was blaring at 5:00 AM and I didn’t want to get up. I laid there for about five minutes and force myself to crawl out of bed. Half-asleep I managed to get ready and roll out the garage for my morning bicycle ride.

I could tell right away that it was going to be a long ride because of the way my legs felt. I was right too. For some reason my legs felt really tight. Especially in the hamstrings. I hoped it would work its way out but it never did.

The weather was another big factor in the ride too. It seemed to be out of the Northeast and the one or two flags I saw said it was pretty stiff. Because of the route I take in the mornings I felt it most of the ride except two legs near the end of the ride. I’m glad I didn’t have to face it in the homestretch or it would have been ugly when combined with how my legs felt.

I did get my 13 miles in but in only 56 minutes. Not as slow as I thought it would be but about 5 minutes slower than normal.

One bright spot of the ride was a family of raccoons I saw just past half-way. I’m riding through an area that is a little populated but there are some areas of trees where they haven’t been cleared for either apartments or homes. I’ve ridden through this area a lot and not seen any creatures of the night until this morning. I’m making a long sweeping left hand turn and I see a momma raccoon leading two kids across the street. The kids have got their noses down following moms lead straight across. They pass about 20 feet in front of me and head for the bushes/woods on my right. As they get on the curb I saw, “Good morning.” All three turn around, give me a look, and then head into the bushes. Very cool. I say very cool. They were probably just returning from a nightly raid of wreaking havoc on the trashcans at the apartment complex across the street. Ha, Ha!

Bike to Live.

Today was the first Saturday ride of my new bicycling fitness program so I was due to ride 30 miles. I set the alarm for 8, woke up at about 7:30, and headed out.

About 2 miles into my ride I saw a guy walking his bike down the sidewalk towards me. I asked if he needed help and he said yes. I pulled off the road to offer what assistance I could. Turns out his name is Kevin and started cycling about three weeks ago. Both he and his wife ride and they’ve already been on a group ride here in town and ridden the Jacksonville-Baldwin trail. I rode that trail back on Ride 8. He’s riding for the same reasons I am. His problem was a flat. I had a spare tube that I put in for him and put a little CO2 in it to make sure everything was ok. That’s when we noticed that CO2 was escaping from my inflator. My inflator uses non-threaded CO2 cartridges so it’s held in place with a plastic cover that, when you screw it on, pushes the cartridge into the valve and pierces the cartridge top. CO2 was leaking around the seam of the plastic piece holding the cartridge. I went to tighten it and the plastic broke allowing the CO2 to rapidly escape. It sure gave Kevin and I a start. How embarrassing. I tried to make it work somehow but couldn’t. It was broken beyond repair. I had to leave Kevin in the same condition I had met him in, with a flat, and go on about my ride. That just stinks. I did get his phone number and gave him the website address so we could perhaps get together for some rides in the future. Kevin, if you read this, I’m sorry it didn’t work out this morning.

(On a side note, I’m looking out the window of my study and am glad I rode early because it’s pouring right now.)

Well, I hopped back on my bike and continued riding. I knew about where I wanted to ride. I was planning on riding my 13-mile morning ride and inserting a 20-mile leg in the middle. Here’s what it looks like:

This route is pretty good and only has a couple spots where traffic can get bad and that’s along the St Johns Towncenter. Early in the morning, though, it wasn’t too bad. The loop around the University of North Florida is nice and there is virtually no traffic on AC Skinner Parkway. It made for a good ride.

Now that I’ve posted my route, let me explain what happened when I got home. I ride up to the driveway and my wife is in her car with the kids ready to back out. They see me and get out. I can tell she’s upset. I ask what’s wrong and she asks if I realize that I’ve been gone for over 3 hours (2:20 riding time, the time helping Kevin, and a short rest break). I told her I had a 30-mile ride scheduled this morning but that didn’t help. It turns out that after 1.5 hours or so she tried calling me (my phone was in the seat bag and I didn’t hear it), had been out twice along my weekday route looking for me, and was getting ready to head out again. She was worried sick that I was laying in a ditch somewhere hurt. I understand her feelings and apologized. Truth is, about half-way through my ride a I realized that I hadn’t left her a map of my route and/or hadn’t told her how far/long I was riding. Critical mistakes. With tools like Map My Ride, there’s no excuse for me to not print out my route and leave it for her in the event she needs to find me. I should also check my phone more often. So, let this be a lesson for those of you out there with significant others who are waiting for you at home.

Besides Kevin, I saw five or six other “serious” cyclists and four or five folks just out for a cruise on their comfort bikes. I also saw several runners out for their Saturday morning exercise.

All told, I managed to ride 31.88 miles with a riding time of 2 hours and 19 minutes. After having ridden Wednesday and Thursday, I had to take Friday off to let my rear recover a little due to lack of time in the saddle. That day off, coupled with a better set of bibs, worked wonders for my sit bones and I didn’t have any trouble the entire ride. The highlight of the day though was meeting Kevin and at least trying to help him out.

Do you know where you’re going with your bicycle riding? Do you know what your current mileage is and how much you’re planning to ride this year? Do you have a target weight? How do you plan each bike ride you do? Do you roll out of the driveway knowing what the plan is for that ride or do you decide when your tires hit the pavement? Are you planning on riding in an upcoming charity event or race? If so, what’s your finish expectations? In short, do you have a goal, or goals, to accomplish what you want to do on your bicycle? If not, you dramatically increase your chances of failing or not performing as well as you wanted to.

Why do we have goals?

We set goals in order to achieve something important. Goals are our recognition of a problem, or opportunity, and serve as a target for us to focus on. Without goals we risk wandering aimlessly in our bicycle riding. Setting goals requires that we establish our baseline and determine where we want to be in the future. Setting goals puts the proverbial carrot out in front and keeps us moving towards the completion of that goal.

A goal properly set is halfway reached.
-Abraham Lincoln

Defining your goals

There are several factors that must be taken into account when you want to define your goals.

1. Where are you now? You have to have a starting point which means you need to make an assessment of your current situation. If you’re looking to lose weight you need your current weight. If you’re looking to improve your health see your doctor and get a complete checkup. If you’re looking to improve your riding record your most recent workout data to set as a baseline. Only by knowing where you are now can you plot a course to get where you want to be.
2. Where do you want to be? Do you know where you want to be with your bicycle riding, weight, or overall fitness? If you don’t, you need to figure it out. Do you want to ride a certain number of miles per week, month, or year? Do you want to drop a specific number of minutes off your weekday loop or commute time? Do you have a target weight you want to be at? Do you need to drop your cholesterol, blood pressure, or resting heart rate? Do you want to complete your first century ride or compete in a race next year? These are the types of questions you need to answer before you can figure out where you want to be.
3. How do you measure your progress? In order to determine if your bike rides are doing you any good you have to determine how you’re going to measure your progress towards your goals. Setting a goal and not measuring your progress leaves you wondering if you’ll ever achieve the results you wanted. So, how do you measure your progress? Some are:
   • Going to your doctor and getting your blood work checked periodically.
   • Measure and record your resting heart rate when you wake up each morning.
   • Use a bicycle computer to track your ride statistics (mileage, average speed, heart rate, etc.)
   • Weigh yourself periodically.
   • Are you able to keep pace on the group ride?

   These are just a few ideas and I’m sure you can think of others.

4. How do you get to your goal? This is where the rubber meets the road. Literally. If you want to improve your bike riding, fitness, or health, you have to define, specifically, the action required to get there. For example, if you want to put in 5000 training miles this year you need to determine the number of miles you need to ride per month and per week. In this example, you’ll need to put in approximately 417 miles per month or 104 miles per week to achieve that goal. You’ll need to measure your progress periodically to ensure your on track to meet that 2000 training miles goal. If you find yourself trailing behind you’ll need to re-adjust your plan (increase the daily/monthly mileage) to achieve your goal.

SMART Goals

SMART is a common method used to help in defining goals. SMART stands for:

• Specific
• Measureable
• Action-Oriented
• Realistic (yet challenging)
• Time-defined

1. Specific and Measureable. Your goals must be specific and you must have a way to measure them. If you simply say to yourself, “I’m going to ride my bike more this year” what do you think the chances of you actually following through on that are? How would you know if you were riding more than last year? It would be better to write your goal as, “Increase my training mileage this year by 30 miles per week.”
2. Action-Oriented. How are you going to increase your mileage by 30 miles per week? Expand your goal by defining exactly how your going to do it. How about, “I will increase my training mileage this year by 30 miles per week by commuting to work one more day per week”, or, “by increasing my Saturday training ride to 50 miles”, or, “by participating in the Monday night group ride at the local bike shop.” Writing your goal this way reminds you exactly how you were going to achieve it.
3. Realistic and Time Defined. You’ve got to look at your goal and make sure that it’s both realistic and can be achieved in the time you allot for yourself. If you’ve only been putting in 500 training miles per year how realistic do you think it is to set a goal to ride 5000 training miles the next year? Not very. You have to make an honest assessment of your abilities and use that to help set your goal. Additionally, you’ll need to propose a realistic time scale to accomplish the goal. If you’re looking to lose fifty pounds and give yourself twelve weeks to do it you’re setting yourself up to fail. Healthy weight-loss is 1 to 2 pounds per week which means a fifty pound loss should take, at a minimum, 25 weeks to accomplish.

Write your goals down

Can you remember everything without writing it down? I know I can’t. That’s one reason to write your goals down. Another is that writing your biking goals down allows you to refer to them often as a motivational tool to keep moving towards that goal. Another is that being able to refer to your written goals allows you to make modifications if necessary. You can’t make modifications if you can’t remember what you were trying to achieve. Written goals help hold you accountable as well. Put your goals on the mirror so you see them every morning when you get up. Share your goals with your spouse, friend, or riding buddy. If you’re comfortable doing it, you can blog about your goals as well. Sharing your goals lets others know what’s important to you and perhaps they can help you achieve them. Who knows, maybe they have goals of their own that you can help them with.

After my open letter yesterday, today started my new beginning – I was going to start riding again today. It’s been about a month and a half since my crash back on Ride 23 and the effects of that debacle are long gone. I didn’t have high expectations today and just wanted to get the ride/mileage in. That said, I went to bed at 10…and didn’t fall to sleep until 12. Go figure.

The alarm went off at 5:00 AM and I hit the snooze. A couple minutes later I rolled out of bed and got ready. I was worried about it raining this morning because we had had a light rain most of the night. When I opened the garage door it wasn’t raining but it was overcast. The roads were wet and looked slick. All of this, combined with my recollection of the crash, didn’t give me a warm fuzzy but I was determined to ride. Throughout the ride I did get sprinkled on here and there but nothing major. I took all the turns slowly in fear of my bike coming out from under me. I wasn’t going to let the fact that I had new tires on get the best of me.

I got out of my neighborhood and onto my main straightaway without any problems. I could tell pretty quickly that I hadn’t ridden in 6 weeks. My hands, legs, and rear-end became uncomfortable way too fast. It was from non-use and I was paying for my laziness. Do you remember that great golf movie Tin Cup? Remember that scene where Tin Cup and Romeo are on the driving range at the U.S. Open and Tin Cup says, “My swing feels like an unfolded lawn chair!” Well, that’s I felt on the bike this morning. Not to mention I felt like I was sitting on top of a 2×4. I was paying for not riding and I knew it. All I wanted to do was get the mileage in to start creating a new baseline in my fitness. I’m hoping it won’t take me long to get back into the swing of things. Pardon the pun.

I saw a few folks this morning; a couple of runners and one cyclist who was out in front of me. All I could see was the flashing red tail light and I eventually lost that. He either dusted me completely or pulled off ahead of me. I’d like to think it was the later.

I think the one thing that bothered me the most was having to get through the intersection at the end of my ride. Up to this point I avoided this intersection by taking the sidewalk and using the cross walk but the crash back on Ride 23 has convinced me to stay off the sidewalk. I shouldn’t be there anyway. I pulled up to the intersection and it wasn’t too busy. There was one car ahead of me in the turn lane. The light turns green and the guy just sits there. I give him a second or two and he doesn’t budge. I start to go around him, he’s looking down at something, looks up, I slow down, and he takes off. I follow around behind him in the outside lane of a dual turn lane. I make it through just fine. What I don’t like about the intersection isn’t necessarily the traffic. It’s not being able to quickly clip-in to get going. I can’t do it every single time without fail and it slows me down and increases the amount of time I’m in the intersection as a target of opportunity. I guess it’ll come with time but if anybody knows some surefire strategies for clipping in easier/faster I’m all ears. Two minutes later I’m back home and have completed my ride. 13 miles in 50 minutes. Not spectacular but I was just trying to get the mileage in.

Fay Projected Path (courtesy of weather.com

I’m not sure how much more riding I’m going to get in this week. If you been watching the weather you’ve probably heard of Tropical Storm Fay that’s headed towards Florida. It’s expected to become a hurricane soon and run up the west side of Florida and move over Jacksonville (where I live) mid-week. Lots of rain expected. You can see the expected track in the pic to the right.

In light of the rain, numbness, and lack of fitness, it was good to be riding again.

New word: Road Slag – similar to welding slag, this is the asphalt droppings left on the side of the road (the exact place we ride) that forms a ridge, or mountain, of asphalt waiting to catch the inattentive bicyclist unaware and either throws them to the ground in a heap of flesh and metal or scaring them half-to-death by bouncing and jerking the handlebars around until you almost lose grip.

Well, it’s been about a week since I rode last. Not all my fault but some of it was. A business trip out of town and rain wasn’t my fault but laziness was. Because of that, I was planning on calling this post “No More Excuses.” You see, as I’m riding I’m concentrating on riding good but also letting my mind wander to different things. One of the things I think about is what to title the post for that day’s ride. Because it had been a week since I’d ridden, and because I felt bad about it, I was set to title this post No More Excuses. Before the end of the ride, though, events would cause me to change it.

My alarm went off at 5:00 AM as always for a weekday ride. I’d gotten a decent amount of sleep last night and felt ok. Maybe too much because I felt like I was in a fog for the first few minutes of the ride. After that, though, I began to come back to reality. The weather was good and there was actually a little chill in the air. That was nice considering the 90F days we’ve been having recently. It was chilly enough that I rode with my jersey zipped up. No moon in the sky so it was dark.

Starting off my legs felt….weird. They didn’t feel bad and didn’t feel great. They just kind of felt there. It was a weird feeling. They began to warm up and for the first time in a long time, I started to feel it in my quads near the end of my ride. A little discomfort in my hamstrings wasn’t uncommon but for me to feel it in my quads was new. I spent many years lifting weights and have very muscular quads that usually have no trouble doing whatever I ask of them. Maybe this is a sign that I’m making progress. Or maybe it’s a result of not riding in a week. Or maybe I’m just getting old. Not sure.

For a Wenesday there seemed to be very little traffic and until I reached my halfway point I didn’t see another rider, runner, or walker. The rider I did see was the Christmas Tree dude. He was going the opposite direction on a divided highway so I didn’t get a chance to say “Hi.” I did see some roadkill (a dead racoon) laying in the road but he had seen better days. It’s funny-yesterday, my wife had picked me up a new t-shirt that was from a place called the Roadkill Cafe here in town. The shirt is awesome. Little did I realize that both the racoon and tshirt were trying to tell me something.

I power through No Man’s Land and begin the 3 mile straightaway back home. I cruise these last few miles and with about a half mile to go I take it to the sidewalk. I take to the sidewalk because near the end of my ride there’s a big intersection and when I hit it on my return leg it’s very busy this time of the morning. Rather than mess with the traffic light and cars I hit the sidewalk and use the crosswalk. So, this morning I did the same thing. I’m riding down the sidewalk with no problems. I get to about 100 feet from the crosswalk and stop pedaling so I can just coast to the intersection. That’s when it happens. I feel a big jolt and the next thing I know I’m flying to the left and my bike is leaving the ground. I hit the ground hard and before I know it, it’s over except for the pain.

The first thing I notice is that my mouth is full of dirt. That would turn out to be a good thing. Then I notice my left leg and shoulder are hurting. I had somehow managed to get my pedals unclipped and I’m laying on the ground next to my bike which is laying half in the grass and half on the sidewalk. I remove my helmet and begin to survery the damage. It takes several seconds to get all the dirt out of my mouth. Once that’s done I look at my leg. I’ve got a huge piece of roadrash below my left knee that is just starting to seep blood. In a few seconds the blood has run from the rash to my ankle where I have a small cherry just above my sock. That’s when I see the huge knot just below my knee. This thing is huge and has a big red cherry on it. It starts to bleed. My shoulder is sore from hitting the ground. I get up and nothing feels broken. Whew! I pick up my bike, put the chain back on, and set it against a small tree just off the sidewalk. Now I try to figure out what happened. I look back up the sidewalk and I immediately see it. About every fifty feet or so on this road there’s a drain at the curb that leads to a box culvert under the sidewalk which in turn leads to drainage pipes under the sidewalk/road. At each of these curb drains there’s a small access cover on the sidewalk. In order to integrate the access cover with the sidewalk there’s a seam that curves about halfway onto the sidwalk following the contour of the access plate. At the point where I crashed there’s one of these curb drains. The seam that curves into the sidewalk looks to have a gap in it just wide enough for a bike tire to fit into. My guess is that my tire slipped into this small gap and caused me to crash. I must have hit that gap perfectly because it doesn’t look much wider than my tire. Unbelievable. Looking at the distance between where my shoulder hit the ground and the gap and it’s about ten feet. No wonder my leg looks like it got run through a meat grinder. If my recollection is correct, my tire briefly become caught in the gap and it threw me and my bike to the left. My left shoulder hit the ground first followed by my left leg dragging down the sidewalk for several feet. Maybe as far as 6-8 feet. I look where my shoulder hit and I realize just how lucky I was. My shoulder hit square in the dirt next to the sidewalk and left a huge gouge. If my shoulder had hit the sidewalk I’d most likely be suffering from a broken collarbone right now. Man I was lucky.

I get back on the bike and make it across the intersection with no problems. As I head across the crosswalk I can only imagine what the drivers are thinking as the blood is running down my leg. As I’m pedaling the last quarter mile home my left leg is starting to ache pretty good. I get home and immediately head to the shower to get everything cleaned up. The shower hurts initially but I eventually get everything clean. It looks pretty bad. I think the knot below my knee has actually gone down some. I wake up my wife to help me bandage the carnage. She sprays on an antiobiotic for cuts and scrapes. According to the can it’s not supposed to hurt. Yeah right. It was excruciating! Once the pain subsided we bandaged everything up. I’m sore but able to move around ok. What a morning! I’ll post the numbers for the ride later.

How was that for a return to riding after a week off? These last few weeks have been unbelievable. I almost wonder if somebody is trying to tell me something. I will say one thing though…No More Excuses!