Tuesday, November 3

This morning’s ride: 50:09 Distance: 10.43 miles Average cadence: 94 RPM

I woke up fifteen minutes before my alarm went off, wondering why we have sporks but no foons.

No, not really. But I did wake up fifteen minutes early. I spent about five of those minutes pretending I was still asleep, but I didn’t fool anyone, so I got up and checked Eyewitness Weather* for current conditions. It didn’t suck enough to not ride, which, for this time of the year, is about the most you can hope for, so I got dressed and hit the road.

Truth be told, sporks were on my mind this morning. According to answers.com, a spork is: A trademark used for a plastic eating utensil having a spoonlike bowl and tines. It’s part spoon, part fork–and as anyone who’s ever had to use one, not really well-suited for either purpose. However, its ineffectiveness doesn’t prevent it from showing up on company picnics.

As I pedaled, I thought about my personal sporkyness. I’m a single parent with a full-time and a couple of part-time jobs. And now I’m also an athlete in training. At least, that’s what I’m attempting. Will this be possible? Will I be able to give any of these parts of my life the attention they deserve? And if not, which elements will I relinquish?

I already knew the answer is ‘no.’ I’m not training nearly hard enough for the race. At least, not yet. And since I don’t plan on giving up the parenting stuff, that means I’m going to have to cut back on the work. At some point in the future, I’m going to need to give up the part-time jobs in order to spend more time on this goal.

This is going to take some major reworking of my life. Either that, or I’ll need an angel. I’m not worrying about it, though. The phrase an acquaintance of mine likes to use is “remain open to the possibilities.” That means figuring out what it is that I want, finding out who might be able to help me attain it, and asking for their help. I have all the tools I need to do this, with the possible exception of fearlessness, but I’m working on that.

Winter’s not the best time to ride. However, it is a good time to recruit. Hopefully, come spring, I’ll be able to separate my spoons and my forks.

I’ve said it more than once: there’s not much to do when you’re on a bicycle other than thinking and pedaling.

*I open the door, and I witness the weather.

Sunday, November 1

This morning’s ride: 1:12:43 Distance 15.03 miles Average cadence: 92 RPM

Whose idea was it to call those little miniature candy bars we give out at Halloween ‘Fun-Sized?’ What’s so fun about unwrapping a piece of chocolate smaller than your thumb? “Ooooh—it’s a tiny candy. Whee!” And if you have kids, the fun lessens even more when you have to go around the living room, dining room and kitchen picking up four or five times as many wrappers than usual. Yippee.

This was my first Halloween in two years. Last year, the kids were at their mothers, and I had a job that evening, so I just gave the whole event a big miss. No decorations, no candy. This year we had both. Two years ago I had a lot of kids, so I purchased candy accordingly, and waited by the door while the parents of my kids best friends took the kids out.

So, there were six or seven or thirty ‘fun-sized’ lumps of chocolate working their way through my intestines as I did my ride this morning. Plus, three slices of meatball marinara pizza.

And three carrot sticks. Because, you know, I’m a healthy eater.

It was a startlingly beautiful day this morning. The air was crisp and the skies were blue. My ride took me past a high-school regatta, several dog walkers, half a dozen runners, and three cyclists, all out for at least one more day on the canal path. If this is the last day this year that I’ll be able to ride outside, at least it will end well. Of course, knowing me, I’ll try to squeeze another day or two outside, but even if I can’t, it’s been a good season.

The basement calls.

Thursday, October 29

This morning’s ride: 44:54 Distance 10.02 miles Average cadence: 88-92 RPM range*

In order to ride before work, I need to get up at 5AM. Last night, I set my alarm for 6, and turned out the light. Then I swore under my breath, and reset the alarm for 5.

It’s not that I don’t like riding in the morning. I don’t like riding in the morning when it’s pitch black and cold and wet.

However, I still like doing that slightly more than I like quitting.

In other news: I’ve got a training program. A friend of my oldest son is a trainer, and he’s set up an 8-week training program for me. I’ve had it for a week. I still have 8 weeks of training to go.

Actually, I’m not certain that it’s an aggressive enough program, but I have no way of telling if this is so without doing it. What I’m going to do is start the program 8 weeks before a cycling event next year, and see how it feels to do the ride. I’ll talk to him about setting up some sort of winter ‘maintenance’ program in the meantime.

Another thing I’m planning on doing is joining a gym. I’m waiting for my finances to get into a bit better shape before I do this, but that won’t be much longer.

In the meantime, I’ll be riding in the wee, wet, windy hours of the morning.

This is my trainer, on a typical morning at the gym. He works a real formal program.

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*I neglected to set my cadence counter when I started out this morning, but it felt like I was in the 90RPM range.

Monday, October 26

This afternoon’s ride: 44:48 Distance: 10.43 miles Average cadence: 95 RPM

Do you want to know how fast 95 RPM is? Do you know the song “Feels Like the First Time” by Foreigner? Can you hear the opening eight bars in your head? The strident guitar chords? The high, jangly keyboard? The heavy kick drum pounding out one beat per measure?

95 RPM is two complete revolutions per drum beat. I know this, because the freakin’ song was in my head for most of the ride.

And chances are it’s in your head now too.  And if it’s not, don’t click the link above, because I will be after that. Sorry.

Saturday, October 24

This morning’s ride: 55:38 Distance: 11.69 miles Average cadence: 89 RPM

It was an iffy morning. I wasn’t sure I was going to ride. I had a long, difficult day yesterday, and the weather in this part of the world is not always the best for cycling in late October. I had a commitment at 9am on Saturday, and I was exhausted Friday night, so when I went to bed, I set my alarm for 8am, and let the if’s take over:

IF I woke up early enough, and

IF I wasn’t still exhausted, and

IF the weather wasn’t horrible,

THEN I would ride.

Quite honestly, I didn’t think all of that would happen. In fact, as I turned off the light, I doubted I’d even get past the first one.

So wouldn’t you know it–I woke up at 6:45. That pissed me off. It was still dark out. But the adjective in the previous sentence was also the imperative, so I had to get up anyway. Condition one was met.

After my–ahem–needs were met, I took stock of myself. I was a little tired, but overall, I felt good. Well, as good as I ever feel when getting up before dawn. But it was close enough to dawn that I wouldn’t be doing the entire ride in blackness, so all in all, condition two was met.

Which left condition three. I gotta be honest here: part of me was rooting for horizontal rain and low thirties. My bed is never more comfortable than it is in the early morning. Between the hours of 5am and 9am, it’s a seductive siren of a bed–the Jennifer Aniston of beds.* It lies there in wanton abandon, calling for me to enter it.** But instead, I went to the door, and opened it: A perfect pre-dawn morning. The temperature was in the upper fifties, no wind, no rain.

Sorry, bed.

It’s a strange thing, how much my mind tries to convince me that what I don’t want is really what I want. I build up these dreads over things that aren’t dreadful. The truth is, riding a bicycle is fun. And though riding a bike before dawn is less fun, it’s still fairly enjoyable. Come to think about it, even riding a bike uphill on a cold, wet predawn morning with a sore thigh is not really all that bad.

Sometimes I just gotta get out of my head. It’s a scary place, and I shouldn’t go in there alone.

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*You have your sirens, I have mine.

**I gotta get out more.

Wednesday, October 21

This morning’s ride: 46:56 Distance: 9.97 miles Average cadence: 97 RPM

Every other time I’ve ridden this particular route it’s ten miles exactly. I wonder where the three-tenths of a mile went. Maybe the earth’s contracting from the cold.

Although it wasn’t cold this morning. Fifty-two degrees again. And no wind again. It’s about the end of the good weather–the forecast calls for rain and cold starting possibly as early as tonight. That’s why I broke my recent ‘day off’ rule to ride two days in a row.

And I discovered that it is indeed necessary to do that. Today’s ride was an exercise in restraint. Any attempt at overexertion was met with pain. Overexertion in this sense has to do more with resistance rather than speed–riding at 90 RPM in an upper gear was more painful than riding at 110 RPM in a lower gear. So I had to be cognizant of that for the ride. Which meant, that if I wanted to keep my RPM’s up, I would need to keep my gearing down. This made for some awkward riding situations, because when I replaced my rear wheel this summer, I didn’t get my gearing meshed perfectly. The only time it’s noticeable is when I’m on the lowest gear on the chainring and the higher gears on the cassette. This rarely happens, but since I was shifting in the dark, I ended up both lower and higher than I normally ride. What happens is a very noticeable delay in shifting–I wanted to pop up to a higher gear while cresting hill, but even though I shifted, the chain didn’t move. I then shifted the chainring to a higher gear, which caused the chain to drop down on both gears simultaneously, causing the bicycle equivalent of going from skating on ice to walking in ankle-deep mud instantaneously. Add to that the fact that this was at an intersection–well, let’s just say some early riser saw a very good impersonation of Jerry Lewis on a bicycle.

Other than that, it was a great ride. Hopefully, I’ll get at least one more in. I’m still not liking the basement riding idea.

Tuesday, October 20

This morning’s ride: 47:41 Distance 10.43 miles Average cadence: 93 RPM

Wow. Actually posting on the same day I’m riding. That’s unusual for me.

It was about as nice a morning as I could hope for in late October: 52 degrees, and very little wind. The sky was overcast, so no moon, but the clouds were low enough that they managed to reflect some light, so things weren’t completely dark.

But it was dark. And drivers were drivers.

Hey people, here’s a tip: If you see a cyclist riding into the intersection, wait for him or her to actually get through the intersection before turning right on red. If they’re still a hundred yards or so away from the cross street, and you’re really in a hurry, go ahead and zoom through. But don’t wait until they actually get into the intersection before losing your patience.

My inner thighs were very sore when I got off the bike this morning. But the forecast for the next two days is for more days like this morning. So I may back away from my ‘every other morning’ pledge and ride both days. We’ll see how I feel in the morning.

Thursday, October 15/Sunday, October 18

Thursday’s ride: 48:40 Distance: 10.65 miles Average cadence: 92 RPM

Sunday’s ride 57:00 Distance: 12.19 miles Average cadence: 94 RPM

The weekend got away from me, so I’m doubling up here. The over-arching theme for these past two rides–besides the fact that I’ve become progressively slower as the weather turns colder–is my stupidity.

Take Thursday’s ride: please. (Ba-dum-CHING!)

Actually, on Thursday, my stupidity took place before the ride. I rode in the evening on Thursday, since the morning was 32 degrees at 5am, and I’m still holding out for a few more nice days to ride, so no basement riding as of yet. As I was getting my stuff together for the ride, I noticed a bag of potato chips on the counter. They were left over from the previous Sunday’s football tailgate party, and over the course of the week had been nibbled at so much that there was only a small amount left. So–as much to tidy up as any other reason–I ate them. Munch munch munch.

Only, there were slightly more than I had expected. Well, now they really are almost gone. Shame to waste them. Crunch crunch crunch.

Oops. Just a few left. Nam nam nam.

Then I rode. And all was well. For 4.8 miles. The 4.9th mile, however, was unpleasant. That salty, greasy, ball of potato product in my belly started complaining. I don’t want to get into too much detail here, except to say that it was a good thing it was so cold, because that meant there wasn’t anyone downwind of me.

Sunday’s stupidity, ironically, also began at 4.9 miles. Sunday was the birthday of a friend of mine. I decided I would make a card for her, and drop it off in her mailbox while on my ride (she lives about a mile east of one of my more frequently-used routes). My plan was to just ride up to her mailbox, drop it off and ride away. I figured she would have plans for her day, and I didn’t want to disturb her. It was around 8:30AM when I got to her house. As I dismounted and got the card out of my bag, the thought occurred to me that she has two dogs who, well, behave like dogs. Including barking their fool heads off whenever someone comes to the door. I just wanted to drop the card off and leave. Her mailbox was on her front porch and I knew that if I stepped up onto it, the dogs would bark, and if she was home, she’d likely come to the door and, as I mentioned, I just wanted to drop off the card and leave. So, I reached up and carefully slid the card into the mailbox. Success!

I got on my bike and started riding away. As I looked out into the street, I noticed someone who looked remarkably like my friend walking down the street, on her way back, apparently from church. Well, too late. I was on my way.

Without one of my gloves.

There was no way I could ride home without that glove. So, sheepishly,  I turned back. This was not the plan. I was supposed to be the wind–blowing in fast and mysterious, leaving only a well-crafted inkjet printed birthday card to mark its presence. Unfortunately, the wind would have gotten frostbite without that glove.

My friend was delighted to see me. Which made me glad, in no small part because she was talking to one of her neighbors, who had driven up in a car, and wanted to know why some strange sweaty dude was sneaking around her front porch. He looked to be the kind of guy who wouldn’t have a problem with making a speed bump out of someone who was messing around in his neighborhood. Especially with the nice single lady down the street.

So instead of becoming a hood ornament, I went into her house, and we had some coffee, and talked for an hour, and then I continued my ride–with both of my gloves. It was a very nice visit, and she was glad that I stopped by. And I was glad too.

I don’t know about you, but the stupidity there was fairly obvious to me–why did I not want to stop in the first place? I spend too much time worrying that I will be some sort of imposition. I need to stop planning people’s reactions to me, and just be okay with what they are.

Because to do it any other way is–well–kind of stupid.

Tuesday, October 13

This morning’s ride: 47:40 Distance 10 miles  Average cadence: 90 RPM

Not even my bike likes it this cold. It was shifting very sluggishly, and the brakes aren’t grabbing the way they should. Plus there’s a random squeaky noise coming from the front fork that I need to look into. I’ll do a little bit of maintenance tomorrow after work.

My son came up from west Texas for the weekend. He and I and his youngest brother went to Buffalo to catch a Bills game. Too bad it was a Bills game. We did the whole experience, which included pre- and post- game tailgating with some friends of mine, and my youngest had a great time. His brother, however, was less than thrilled. I mention this because the game became a sunup-to-well-past-sundown event, which meant no riding on Sunday. And although I took Monday off to be with my kids, I overslept and had a conference call in the morning, then worked a hockey game in the evening, which meant I only had the afternoon, and I could either spend time with my kids or ride my bike. Guess which choice won?

Something unusual happened on the ride this morning. I quit.

Actually, quitting’s not at all unusual for me. I quit this thing all the time. Sometimes I quit four or five times before I even get out of bed. It’s just that I keep unquitting as well. I’m the Brett Farve of cycling.*

The quitting has a pattern. I quit, and I slow down, then I get pissed off, or inspired, or engineer some sort of motivational attitude inside my head, and continue on. The process usually takes anywhere from 10 seconds to 3 minutes. But this morning, as I was climbing a hill–not a particularly steep hill, but a hill nonetheless, the thought came to me:

I quit.

It was as the thought was bouncing through my brain that the interesting thing happened: I started accelerating. My legs pumped harder. I moved faster. They did this on their own, like they knew the drill and thought ‘why wait’ and just picked up the pace. No further motivation required.

I don’t know if this phenomena will happen again. I’d like to say that I won’t give myself the opportunity to see if it happens again, but that wouldn’t be the truth. I’ll quit again. Probably more than once. I’ll probably quit 15-20 times while actually riding to the top of the mountain.

I wonder what it will feel like to quit because I’ve accomplished my goal?

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My boys at the game

*Except, of course, for the money, and the fame, and the actual talent. Other than that, we’ve got a lot in common.

Friday, October 9

This morning’s ride: 48:47 distance: 10.45 miles Average cadence: 89

Hey–want to have some fun? Then don’t ride 10.45 miles in the dark when you’re dizzy. Because doing that is a whole bunch of not fun.

I think I have Ménière’s disease. My mother has it. I’ve seen what it does to her, I’ve heard her talk about how it feels, and it sounds very similar. The linked article gives a very dry explanation of what it is, and how it’s treated. It also covers how they test for it. I draw your attention to the following paragraph.

To test the vestibular or balance system, physicians irrigate the ears with warm and cool water or air. This procedure, known as caloric testing, results in nystagmus, rapid eye movements that can help a physician analyze a balance disorder.

The procedure also causes the patient to become sick as a dog. No, thank you. I’ll just go on the assumption that, since Mom has it, I have it too, treat for it accordingly, and avoid the puke-o-rama.*

Interestingly, the actual riding wasn’t bad. When I had to stop for traffic–that was where I felt it. The same thing happened during the day: when I had to concentrate on things, I didn’t really feel dizzy. It was the moments of relaxation where I had problems. The only other thing that helped was eating and drinking. Luckily, I mostly drank water and decaf.

In other news: I have my first sponsor! Someone’s now on board for helping me with product and possibly financial assistance. I’m very happy about this. Now that I have one sponsor, I think it will be progressively easier to get others.

I don’t want to mention too much about the sponsor, since it’s only a verbal commitment at this point. Once we hammer out some details, I’ll be more forthcoming.

On an entirely unrelated note: the good people at Rochester Optical have just opened up an office that specializes in sports eyewear, including high-definition lenses that allow you to see much clearer throughout the range of the curved lenses in sports glasses. Plus, they have a wide selection of fashion and kids frames too. Just thought I’d mention that. For no real reason at all.

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*By the way, my family physician thinks I have Ménière’s disease too. He also thinks that the test is worse than the illness. It’s not like I’m ignoring my health. In this instance.