12/3/11

It's the winter blues again.  19 degrees outside this morning.  I road my new spinning bike in the garage for 47 minutes.  It was a great workout and much funner than running in the cold, but it's still not the same as being on the road.

11/20/11

I tried the spinning bike today.  I did a workout video and it almost killed me.  It was really a good workout.

11/19/11 Winter Blues

I bought this cool Gold's Gym Spinning Bike at Walmart.  Hopefully I'll be able to keep in riding shape this winter.

It's cold outside.

10/30/11

I rode to my parents house today for dinner.  Nice warm day, but WINDY.  The kids got quite a kick out of passing me in the van on the way to dinner.

10/29/11

Thank goodness.  Back on the bike.  I found a cool app for my phone called strava.  It uses my gps to track my ride.  Gives a map, average speed, elevation gain, maps climbs.  It's really cool.  I wish I would have found this earlier in the summer.

But it was great to ride.  In the high 40's/low 50's.  I've got to get some cold weather riding gear next payday.  Also topped the 1,500 mile mark today.

10/15/11

I had a great 50 mile ride today to Kuna.  I did it in under 3 hrs even with the wind.

10/13/11

The days are getting shorter.  I'm so going to hate winter.  Great 22 mile ride.  Some nice hills and good power.

10/10/11 Fall Time Riding

I just beat the rain today to get a 20 mile ride in.  I can tell that I haven't been riding as much.  My wind and legs aren't as strong as they were.  I have to get some cold weather riding gear and get riding.

10/2/11

Nice 20 mile ride.  Very windy.

10/1/11

I finally got a ride it.  Had a lousy week at work.  Just felt out of synch the whole week.  Had a great ride.  22 miles.  I raised my seat and could feel a total difference.  I had more power and was able to keep a higher pace.

9/25/11 Technical Difficulties

I was decending Red Top Trail this afternoon, when I bound up my front tire and went over the front of my bike.  When I got up, I notice my rear wheel looked crooked.  When I picked the bike up the wheel fell of in my hand.  Fortunately I was able to fix it, because I was about 4 miles from the road.

9/18/11 Red Top Trail

I tried a new mountain biking trail today.  Red Top Trail was a great ride.  About 4 miles out.  Steady climb.

The above images don't do the scenery credit.

9/17/11

I made it to Kuna this week.  48 miles and windy, but made good time considering the wind.

9/11/11

Great 27 mile ride today.  The wind felt good and didn't slow me down.

9/10/11

I started off with intentions of a 50 mile ride, but I just didn't have the energy to fight the wind today.  Only got 24 miles in.

9/5/11 Doubling Up

I went into a new bike shop this afternoon (Presision Bikes) and bought a pair of bibs.  I love em.  I wore them on a 20 mile loops this afternoon.

9/5 Mountain Biking

Up early on labor day.  I was the first on the trail.  You never know what you'll see.

9/3 Star to Kuna

Good 48 mile ride to Kuna and back.  2hrs 50 minutes.

8/31/11 Loon Lake

I went to McCall to ride Loon Lake today. 

This is a narrow rocky trail.  The rocks were rather rough on my pedals.

The lake was pretty and the day was nice and sunny.  Not too hot or too cold.

This wasn't as great a ride as I hoped.  It was pretty, but I spent a fair amount of time walking my bike because of all the rocks and tree roots in the trail.  But, my mountain bike is officially broken in.

8/29/11 I take it back

Ok.  I take it back.  I do want to do another century.  I had a great 20 mile ride today.  I felt fresh and fast in the saddle. 

Looking back on the riding season, I've had a great one.  This is the first year that I had riden seriously and put on real miles.  The first time I rode 35 miles I thought I was going to die.  When I rode the blue cruise and did the 50 mile route, I thought I was going to die.  Now 50 miles is nothing.  If I keep up my training next year 100 miles will be nothing. 

Maybe I'll get two centuries in next year.

8/27/11 I'm Never Gonna Do That Again

Today I rode my first (and last) century.  I was out in Payette and Washington Counties.  The first 50 some miles were great, but then I started cramping.

I must have taken a wrong turn and ended up in Africa, because I saw a Zebra and an Emu.  I had to walk my bike across this crazy bridge, because there were only two strips on the bridge for car tires to fit on.

I proud that I finished it, but it was extremely painful.  My right leg kept craming and I had to repeatedly get off my bike to stretch it.  I had to do this every mile or so towards the end.

08/25/11 Rabbit Run Trail and D's Chaos Trail

I used my new Ridge to Rivers map to try out some new trails by Eagle.  These two trails were great.  It was narrow single track, with lots of curves and switchbacks.  I was almost thrown from my bike a couple of times.

08/21/11 Breaking in the new mountain bike

Yesterday, when I dropped off my road bike to get tuned up, I bought a new Fuji 29" Nevadan mountain bike.  I decided to break it in today.  Unfortunately after church, it was 98 degrees out.  The trail was really hot.  The upside was that I only had to share the trail with some cows and grasshoppers.

Mountain biking is so different than road biking.  It's all anarobic.  You pedal really hard to go uphill, then you fly downhill.  I think mountain biking is probably the closest thing I can do to flying.  It is amazing how you fly over all the bumps on the trail, with your body sitting lightly on the saddle.  It is an amazing feeling.

8/20/11 1,000 mile mark broken

Today I broke the 1,000 mile mark with a 40 mile ride.  I felt great in the saddle and am feeling ready for my century next weekend.  My ride was shortened by a flat tire.  I wasn't prepared for that.  Fortunately Stephanie and the kids came to my rescue with a ride home.

8/11/11 Corrals Trail 31 & Hardguys Trail

I took off on a 1 & 1/2hr mountain bike ride.  I started off on corrals trail 31, but chose to branch off on hardguys trail.  There should be a sign that reads studs only, because that trail is straight up.  Much of it I had to walk my bike.  It was a lot of narrow and rocky single track.  The climbs were steep and I could taste the sweat on my lips.  Some of the decents were so steep I had to walk my bike down those as well.  I'm going to half to get my breaks worked on after this ride though.

The high desert is beautiful.  It reminds me of my childhood.  The sage brush, cattle, thistles, and the flowers are all so beautiful.

8/9/11

I tried a different route today.  I left my house, rode through Meridian and Boise and South of Kuna.  Nice climb up Kuna Cave Road and came home on Robinson Road.  59 miles in all and it took 3hrs 38 minutes.

I'm starting to come to the realization that the century ride and the end of the month may be a bit out of my grasp at this time.  It may take another year of riding to get to a point that my body can handle that many miles and that amount of time in the saddle.

8/7/11

20 miles of interval training in the heat.  Feeling a little soreness in my left knee.

8/6/11 a new loop

I tried a new loop today.  I left my house and headed to Middleton, then took the old Emmett Highway to Emmett.  I took a short break in the Emmett Park (one of the places that Stephanie and I fell in love).  After my stretching break and rode up Freeze Out Hill and took Hwy 16 home.  The trip home was super windy.  In total 46 miles in 2 hrs 56 minutes.

My Century in a couple of weeks seems daunting after this.

8/5 Communting to work

Storing my gear in my office after communiting to work.

8/3 100 degrees

Hot 20 mile ride.  Just working on getting my pace up for the upcoming century ride on 8/27.

7/30/11

Todays ride was 27 miles.  It was beautiful out.  The sky was overcast, with the sun peeking through the clouds.  I even was caught in a small rain shower.  I was really happy with my climb up marble front.  My speed gets better every time I take it.  I climbed it at around 15 mph.  It was such a relating ride, but I still knocked it out in 97 minutes.

7/29/11

I haven't been able to ride for awhile due to a recent accident which resulted in stitches in both hands and a concussion.  I got the stitches out today and got a great 18 mile ride in.  I was 95 degrees out and I hit some nice rolling hills on Foothill Drive.  I pumped those 18 miles out in 57 minutes.  It's hard to believe how much I've missed riding.

my map for getting around DC

My beach cruiser for the ride to Mount Vernon

Shale Pathway to the Woodroe Wilson Bridge

July 17, 2011 Bicycling in Washington DC

I'm at the National Drug Court Conference for a couple days.  Today after the conference finished up I decided to do something a little different.  I rented a beach cruiser bicylce to do some site seeing.  The beach cruiser they rented me was old, only had 1 gear, no hand breaks (its been a long time since I've had to pettle backwards to start, like little boy long time ago), and may have been a woman's bike.  But never the less, I was determined to do something different.

I left National Harbor and headed out on a white shale pathway, which eventually turned into a paved greenbelt.  I rode over the Woodrow Wilson Bridge and entered Old Town Alexandria Virginia.  Old Town was very nice.  The buildings were historic and was exacted what I expected this area to look like.  Then, I decided that I would follow the greenbelt along the Potomic River towards Mount Vernon.  The Potomic River is beautiful.  I rode along through trees and through a wildlife preserve.  Wooden foot bridges weaved through marshes with lilly pads and willows.  Mount Vernon was nice.  It was neat to see where George Washington was born.

I will make a commen on beach cruisers.  Other than the seat being comfortable, I don't know why anyone would want to own one.  They are big and bulky.  The one gear thing doesn't make going up hills very enjoyable either.

But overall all it was a great excursion.

"Hell of the West"



top of Freeze Out Hill (Emmett)




Top of Horseshoe Bend Hill




Top of Horseshoe Bend Hill



7/15/11 "The Hell of the West"

I took my inspiration for the title from the movie "American Flyers."  Juan and I rode 71 miles today.  We left my house, went up Beacon Light Rd to Hwy 55.  From there we did the crazy climb up Horseshoe Bend Hill.  What a climb.  It's a 7% grade.  On the way down the hill you follow a 7% grade down for 5 miles.  I was hitting 40 mph on the desent.  I felt great on the climb.  From Horseshoe Bend we followed Hwy 52 to Emmett.  Then we had another great climb out of Emmett by going up Freeze Out Hill.

In general this was a great day and a great ride.  Surprisingly I feel very good.

7/13/11 Getting back in the saddle

I just completed a nice 29 mile ride.  I haven't ridden for a couple of weeks so I'm a little sore.  I rode out Hwy 44 to old hwy 30 and back purplesage rd.  I have to get ready for my 65 mile ride in 2 days.

Mountain Biking

June 30, 2011

Just got off a 33 mile ride.  I took the foothill drive loop into Caldwell.  Fun ride.  Did it in 1hr 48 minutes.

June 28, 2011

It was a very hot training ride to Eagle and back this afternoon.  It was winding out, but it was a hot wind.  94 degrees.  The wind and heat brought my mile per hour average to about 17.  I rode 20 miles in 68 minutes.  The new sleeveless jersey helped some (but it is mostly to get rid of the farmer's tan.

16 miles, 4,000 feet up

Pictures from Pearl Road Ride

June 26, 2011 the start of the blog

Well, this is the beginning of my bicycling blog. It's been an exciting riding season so far.  I've got 592 miles under my wheels so far.  This is by far the most miles that I've riden in a year.  I rode in the Bob Lebow Classic.  That was a 35 mile ride that I did in 1hr 45 minutes. 

I also climbed Bogus Basin Road.  This climb is a 16 mile 4,000 foot climb.  I was able to do it in 2hrs and 10 minutes.

I've even done some mountain biking.  So far my favorite mountain bike route has been riding from Horseshoe Bend Hill to Firebird Raceway on the old Pearl Road.

This week I rode a half a century at the blue cruise.  This ride took me 3 1/2 hrs.

This year is also the first time that I've had a bike that the bike snob would consider nice.  I have a Giant with clip in peddles.

It's been a great summer so far and only getting better in the saddle.