More Biking

The first day of May seemed to be a good day for the first bike ride to work of the year. It really is tricky riding to work, because it was still fairly cool this morning at 8am (cool enough that I wished I had gloves) but it'll be plenty warm this afternoon. Before too long, it'll be way too hot in the afternoons to go home. The ride went well, and a co-worker rode in with me. He only lives a few blocks away, so we met about a half mile from our homes and rode the rest of the way in together.

On Saturday, I went biking with the scouts in Snow Canyon. I hadn't used my bike at all since last fall. The scouts are working on their cycling merit badge, so they went up to Snow Canyon on Friday afternoon and rode 25 miles and camped. I went up Saturday morning to do another 25 miles with them. I figured that anything that a 13-year-old can do, I can do. It turns out I was right, but just barely.

From the camp ground, we rode down the road to the park entrance, and then up a dirt road to the top of the canyon. Then down the dirt road to the park entrance. Then up the dirt road to the top of the canyon. Then down the dirt road to the park entrance. Then up the main road back to the campground. While we may have come up just short of the 25 miles, the dirt and rocks and sand more than makes up for that. It took us a bit over two hours, and in the last mile I pretty much bonked. Of course, the scout who was up with me (the rest were 15 minutes behind us) bonked, too. It was all we could do to make it back to the campground. Oh, and my poor little rear end didn't enjoy all those miles of bumping either.

Bike

My bike passed 300 miles today on the way to work, so now it's up to 309. The car is holding at 250 or something, I think. It's also getting colder every day. I've started wearing a long sleeve t-shirt, which is less ideal for the ride home, but still ok. Very soon I'm going to need gloves and then something to protect from the wind. My co-worker who lives just a few blocks away was going to ride in w/ me tomorrow, until his wife told him he can't w/o a helmet. (Those crazy wives.) He's been saying that he'd start riding his bike for a month or two now, and by the time he gets a helmet, it's going to be too cold do to it anymore. (I have no plans to go crazy and bike into work when it's only 40° in the mornings. 65° with a 20mph wind is plenty cold for me already!)

Biking vs Car Update

Last week I went to a doctors appointment with Shannon. That means I drove to work, drove back to the doctors, back to work and then back home. So that's 20+ miles of driving in one day. Enough to cancel out two and a half days of biking. Add in the Saturday errands and the car is catching up. As of this morning,

Car: 217 miles
Bike: 227 miles

I hope to get a good week in to build back the cushion.

Car vs. Bike

An update for you on my continuing goal to ride my bike more than I drive my car.

Car: 136
Bike: 208

I also went over 15 hours of total bike riding time this morning on the way in.

Mileage Plan

This morning as I was riding in to work, I had a marvelous plan for keep track of my biking vs. riding to work. My bike has about 160 miles on it. My car has about 60 miles on it. My new goal is to keep the bike mileage above the car mileage for as long as possible. Obviously, the first trip we make to SLC will shoot that idea out of the sky, so maybe once that becomes an issue I'll just account for that mileage separately. But, I figure it's a good little thing to track.

The return trip

Well, the masses have demanded an accounting of my return trip on my bike last week. So here it is.

It's hotter, but it's more down hill and I don't worry so much about getting sweaty. I made it home about 5 minutes quicker. I rode again today, and tried hard to not go too fast. Then you're gross all day at work. Yes, taking a shower is an option, but I'm not exactly excited to do that at work. As I was laboring up a hill this morning, I was thinking about riding my bike as a kid and the lengthy rides we'd go on. I seem to remember being able to stomp on the pedals for hours on end before my legs would get tired. Not so any more. Am I really that much wimpier than I used to be? Or do I remember my childhood biking days as being more glorious than they really were?