Such a great day for a ride compared to the last post! This time I put in two laps around Boeing Field. 13.4 miles (stretched the usual lap to the south a little), 19.4 mph average (calm winds helped this) and completed the circuits in a little over 41 minutes (didn’t have to stop for a single red light either so a constant 41 plus minutes of spinning!) Here’s a link to the ride map.
On another note, Team Bear is growing! We have one new member added so far and may have 4 or 5 more here soon. Welcome to Marc Fendel, a friend of Beth and mine, and another West Seattle neighbor. Thanks Marc for joining us and I look forward to getting in a ride soon!
For anyone who would like, a few of us are going to gather up at the Beveridge Place Pub for a Sunday evening out, just a short one as I will have been up since 4:15am… I am planning on being there around 7:00. Hope you can join us.
OKAY, that was going to be a much longer ride but I was SO wet after lap one that I couldn’t make myself turn the corner for another one! Feels kind of lame, boy from SE Alaska and all, I have gotten a little soft!
Well at least I got one lap in… 5.9 miles, 17.5 mph average.
Finally headed out for a ride today. Wasn’t really feeling it but new that I needed to get out on the bike. Without realizing it I was doing a lap around West Seattle, tackling some big hills. Metaphors are becoming more common in my life, or I am just aware of them more often.
As some know, we have been tackling a couple of hills in Beth’s treatment regimen as of late. It was determined that her previous treatment wasn’t working as required to continue using that protocol (Avastin and Carboplatin- see post on Feb 14). After a lot of research and a false start on a possible clinical trial, we have decided on a chemotherapy called BCNU or Carmustine. We will be in at the hospital once every 6 weeks to the infusion clinic for a couple of hours for the administration. That part of it doesn’t seem so bad, specially as our two choices were. The part that we don’t know much about yet are the fatigue and blood count side effects. So for that we will just have to wait and see.
So for the ride I found myself climbing Highland Park Dr down near the Duwamish, going almost 3/4 of the way up and being overwhelmed by the climb and the cars powering up past me. I turned around, coasted down hill and once at the bottom decided to try again. If you take a look at the map and view the elevation you will notice that the last 1/4 looks to be around an 8% grade. I pushed myself over that piece, looking down at one point to see that my speed was right around 4.5 mph! My legs screaming, but my mind looking ahead.
Arriving home. 12.7 miles, 56 minutes, 13.6mph average
Kevin and I got in a good ride on Mercer island today. About 45 miles averaging 15 mph and around 2400 ft of climbing. The map below is for my ride, Kevin’s is about the same but he heads south from Safeco where I head north. I did not have my cadence sensor on but I normally average 95-105 rpm, which at 2:58 means the cranks went around a little under 17,000 times.
View Larger Map
I got a good look at Kevin riding away a few times, I’ll need to reel that in on the next group ride.
What a great ride! Was a little on the windy side going over the I-90 Bridge as the wind was from the north and the bike lane is on the northside, but otherwise a fun ride. Original plan for the day was to go around the south end of Lake Washington but really thought that a preview of the Mercer Island loop was in order. I will do this ride again and would really like to try it out as a group ride soon. The Mercer loop is a great road with lots of turns and a few little climbs in there to make it a good workout. I would also consider lapping it twice, maybe head down and around one way then switch it up for a lap the opposite direction to keep in interesting. Overall: 31.8 miles, 14.5 mph average and just in under the 2 hour mark.
Well kids, here’s the course layout for the 70 miler. I used the course notes from the LiveSTRONG site, and it looks like we have a challenge in front of us! Its interesting to me that the climb over Cougar Mt is after going through Newcastle and Issaquah. This is going to be a fun challenge for sure!
A little morning break gave me a chance to lap Boeing Field a couple of times. Great spin and a nice head wind on each southbound leg. Still working on crossing the 300 mile mark for the month… will have to put in a couple of long rides. Maybe tomorrow after work. Anyone else interested, or can anyone play hooky for the late morning?
I spent about an hour Saturday on hills – a fun but slow ride. Average speed was 11mph on a 12 mile route with 1380ft of climbing. The reward for climbing is a white-knuckle descent – up to 38mph. All stats for this ride are from My Tracks using the GPS in my phone which was very close to what my cyclometer read.
I got in a ride around town on Sunday with a little sun, some snow and lots of cold. According to the computer it was 29 miles at 14.5mph with a max speed of 33.5 and an average cadence of 97. I’m trying to learn to spin faster so I was happy to see the 97 cadence, but the average speed is still too low – though there is a lot of stop and go in the city.
I tried out Cardio Trainer with some success, though it claims I only went 22 miles and and rode through some fences in interbay.
Trying this out… used mapmyride for the first time on a ride around West Seattle. Legs not that into it and my back is a little tight today too. According to the bike computer 13.7 miles and 50 minutes of spinning. According to the iPhone; 16 miles. Need to make sure the bike computer is calibrated correctly, or won’t trust the iPhone app.
