Recovery Sunday

I didn't ride Saturday, firstly because I got up late, and secondly, it was raining. Well, So Cal rain, which is a heavy mist kind of thing.

I didn't ride Sunday because, well, it looked like it MIGHT rain, er, mist. And I got up late...

But I DID get a lot of reading done. Read "The Tour" by David Shields the other day.

Weekly Mileage:

Jamis -- 0
Schwinn -- 48 miles

Cooling down

John on the news says it's going to cool down this weekend, and since he FOUNDED the Weather Channel he must be right.

Rode the Dam Ride with all sorts of sidetrips. Took a picture of the poor tool that nobody wants:



Rode around the base of Mt. Helix, past Grossmont High, then on the rim road over to Fletcher Hills. I wanted to share this photo of a Mexican restaurant in Fletcher Hills that caught my eye way back when I did the Cow Ride. Finally snapped a shot of it. We're Open, WE'RE OPEN!



But before I got there I saw a dime on the rode, and this is important, I DIDN'T PICK IT UP!



I made a movie going down a big hill into El Cajon. There are some technical difficulties, I see... (3.69 megs)



I just LOVE these gateposts!



This last pic shows two hills, one burned off in the big Cedar Fire of 2003, and the other one, well, not. This is where the fire stopped. If it had gone farther it might have wiped out Cowles Mountain and then the Navajo community.



This last last pic has nothing to do with bicycling, it just shows where my sister when for her honeymoon last month.

Slighty cooler

It's slightly cooler NOW, but then it's only 8:26!

Did the Dam Ride.

There has been a tool, a pair (pair?) of slip-joint pliers, sitting on a utility box near a VERY busy intersection for several days now. I first noticed it Saturday, when I walked to the library. I didn't touch it because I figured they might belong to the mechanix at the insta'lube shop nearby. But Monday they were still there when I walked to the library again. Nobody has taken it (them?). I finally stopped, picked it up and examined it. The pliers are of very poor quality, it appears to me. Probably came from the $1 store nearby. It is a sad thing when even I won't take them! I mean, I've picked up and KEPT a wrench with half the handle melted off!

I was rather energetic and managed a 14.5 mph average for 1 hour. That put me at the end of the bike path in Mission Trails/Padre Dam. I was pretty whipped! I took it easy going up the Jackson Drive hill.

The ride mileage was 21.90 and the elapsed time 1:39:13, not counting stop lights and a 30 second rest stop. Or even pausing to look at the cheap tool!

Shifting For Myself

Finally realized that I forgot to lower the front derailleur on the Schwinn when I put the new crankset on. It was about 1/2 inch too high! I think I will not have so many problems with the over-shifting now...

Also cleaned and earled same. Now I'm out of degreaser.

Also earled the chain.

Also tilted the handlebars a little more "up". Now the brake hoods should be a little closer, a little less tilted down. This is in lieu of installing, and more importantly, BUYING, a stem with a shorter "reach". Or even getting the proper size frame in the first place...

Stupid

Did the Dam Ride today. Saw about five lizards, in various places. Seemed like more than usual. Did a side trip up the Murry Park/Madra hill. Piece of cake in the 24/32 combo!

While going around Lake Murray I came upon a bicyclist who was going 8-10 mph slower than I was (i.e. the speed limit). She came up (slowly) behind a runner and swung out (without looking) to pass. I made a decision, passed her on the right. She did not like that. She said, "You're SUPPOSED to pass on the LEFT!". I COULD have said, "You're SUPPOSED to LOOK before you pull out!". I COULD have said, "Sorry!". I COULD have said, "@#$$#". I DIDN'T say anything, I just kept going.

I should have rung my bell, and passed on the left. THAT'S what you're SUPPOSED to do! Oh, well, that's why I don't like bike paths. I make poor decisions. Also why I don't like to drive!

25.02 miles for the ride, at 1 hour, 59 minutes (and 18 seconds!), which I guesstimate would average 12.5 miles per hour average speed.

Got back in time to watch the end of le Tour. Very cute seeing the various winners on the podium, with their kids.

Weekly Mileage:

Jamis -- 0
Schwinn -- 88

Time trial

LANDIS WINS!

Well, not the stage, but the man is in yellow again.

Assuming he doesn't fall off the bike tomorrow in the last stage, he will win. He did a great time trial today. No tire problems, not late to the start, and no handlebar mishaps.

But then you knew all this, because you were watching too, right?

No Title

I can't think of anything with which to title this entry.

Rode the Dam Ride this morning. Fortunately I got up at six and hit the road pretty quickly, after consuming my cup of bran flakes with powdered milk. There were few clouds in the sky, so I knew it was going to warm up when Mr. Sun got above the horizonal cloud layer. It was that wierd cool yet not cool because of a bit of humidity weather. I was wearing my San Diego Zoo/Holiday Bowl Bicycle Safari 1993 long-sleeve t-shirt because I didn't want to put on any sun screen. Probably a bad chose, but how much sun damage can you get that early in the morning? It did eventually warm up a bit, but not too bad. I think it will be a hot one, again, today!

I passed someone going up the Jackson Drive hill. Whoot!

Humidity

Went on a Dam Ride today.

It was pretty overcast the whole ride, so even though the humidity was up, it wasn't too unpleasant. I'd say, just this side of unpleasant.

Some hotshot (in full regalia) did the (stupid, I think) go-to-the-front-of-the-line thing on a left-hand turn, whilst I was waiting patiently in line, taking the lane. I followed them for a while, and even though they kept jumping the red lights and coasting through red right turns, I wheelsucked them for a couple miles. Rightous. I don't know if it was a boy or a girl (Bowie?), but they DID have a cute butt.

On The Project, in Santee, they were cutting up those big pipes I mentioned before, with a chainsaw. It smelled like a backed-up outhouse, so I guess those were definetly poo-pipes!

I saw the couple with the two dogs at the bike path again. Wished them a "good morning", and they wished me a "good ride". Thank you!

I managed to over-shift past the big chainring, and pedal a couple times, so as to wrap the chain around the crank arm. Wrapped it GOOD! Never done that before. I'm sure it was good for the chain to get all bended! No picture of THAT little greasy mess, but here's one of all the scratches to a formerly pristine crankarm.



Found myself riding up a small hill in the big chainring/big cog combination. The derailleur handled it, unlike that time years ago when the chain was too short and I broke the derraileur doing that very same thing!

After the ride I went grocery shopping. After that I went to the Trek Superstore (Woo Hoo!) and claimed my prize from the Trek Tour de France Scratch-Off game.



I am a winner!

Cloudy

Did the Dam ride. I felt very tired, wages of sin, I guess. It was overcaset until I got to El Cajohn, then Mr. Sun came out. He went away when I entered the Padre Dam bike path (What IS its official name?). It was overcast the rest of the way. Nothing much happend, nothing much to comment on.

I was watching the clock so I could report to you my average speed, but as it approached 1 hour I forgot about it.

Cheryl L. caught me at a light in her SUV and asked how I was doing, and commented on my apparant incredible bicycling prowess.

There is an interesting (read: irritating) soft click coming from the pedal/bottom bracket area. I hope it's the pedals!

Sunday roundup

It's a lot cooler today, was 82 in the shade. It rained last night, or rather, early this morning. It's rather muggy now. 46% according to the weather station on Mt. Helix. It's no New Orleans, but it's something.

I washed the bikes yesterday after riding the Schwinn. And waxed them both. The new car wash stuff I bought in anticipation of washing the vehicle for the first time seems to work ok. I used paste wax on the bikes, but I'll use liquid wax when I do the vehicle.

On the radio Whad'Ya Know? is doing a repeat of the San Diego show from last year, which I was able to attend with my son. It was great!

Weekly Mileage:

Schwinn -- 64 miles
Jamis -- zero

Smooth

Did the Dam Ride this morning. Got up at six, watched 10 minutes of the Tour, hopped on the bike and took off. Nothing bad to report, in fact nothing bad has happened for several weeks, I'm thinking. Knock on wood.

Saw a diesel locomotive sitting on the tracks (where else?) in El Cajon. Wish I had the camera. (Went back later and took pics.) Click the pic to see larger image on Flickr. Two more pics at Flickr.



At Padre Dam bike path said "Good monring" to the couple with the two dogs that I've seen for the last three rides. One of the dogs is a puppy. The headwinds were terrific through the gorge, the trees were waving all over the place and it was very noisy! I bet the wind was 30 mph or so, a seven on the Beaufort scale, which is a near gale. I don't know, it was VERY windy!

Did the Lake Murray sideride. Rode behind a lady on single speed cruiser for a couple miles. She was chugging along at 12 mph behind her husband who was towing a baby wagon. When the headwinds hit, she was hard put to manage 10 mph, so I finally passed her.

My mileage at the hour point was 13.5, for an average of 13.5 mph to that point. The mileage for the ride was 21.99, the elapsed time was 1 hour 47 minutes, for a average speed of 12.33 mph.

Oh, forgot to say, wore the purple Gordini jersey.

Thursday?

Rode the Dam Ride this morning. It wasn't as cloudy as Tuesday, so it wasn't as cool. But it was earlier, so it wasn't hot yet. And yet I sweat! Profusely!

I've gotta get a new helmet. I had this one since Tecate To Ensenada, and that was more than ten years ago!

Today I saw again the socket wrench socket that I didn't mention that I saw on Tuesday at Jackson and Fletcher Parkway. This time when I rode past it I decided to stealthily sneak down the frontage road and make a new approach at the shiny thing and GET IT this time! So I did. Turned out to NOT be a socket, but instead a locking lug nut.

Oh, poop!

How do those things fall off all the time, anyway? I see them all the time. Why buy them if they are going to fall off, and how secure do they make you wheel if they can just fall off?

What with all the forth-and-backing I achieved 22.79 miles, which COULD be rounded up to the next-heighest ten. But I won't. Took 1 hour and 45 minutes. You do the math.

Cloudy Tuesday

I had the good sense to get up early this morning (actually, I had trouble sleeping, also, I did one of my famous karate kicks to the wall during an action-dream) and found that it was cloudy! I ate my bran flakes, watched a couple or five minutes of le Tour, then went on a Dam Ride while the cloudy was good. And it was good! Cool and sunny is good, but cool and cloudy is pretty good too!

I dropped a book off at the libery.

There was a helicopter lifing stuff to the roof of Target at Grossmont, that was pretty neat to watch. A lady walking her dog said "Good morning" to me, that was pretty neat.

I saw a rabbit.

The bike path in Santee has sewer pipes (from the SMELL!) laid across it, so you have to carry your bike over four or five largish (25 inch?) pipes. That was different.

There were not many people on the bike path at Mission Trails, but most of them seemed to have dogs.

SDPD had a motorcyclist pulled over at the Mission Trails entrance road. I guess he had been speeeding. There but for the grace, and not having any money, go I!!

A fellow passed me going up Jackson Drive hill, said something, but I couldn't hear him because of the blood pounding in my ears. It was probably something really good.

Skipped going through Lake Murray, so didn't get the total mileage.

I noticed I forgot to take my pump, also must not have taken it Sunday on the ride to UCSD. Swift!

An hour into the ride I check Mr. Bikecomputer and he said I had gone 13.6 miles. This of course means my average speed was 13.6 mph (Yes, I CAN do that one in my head!). That's not bad, but it seemed I was going a little faster than that. It's mostly flat or downhill all the way there, it seemed everytime I looked I was going 16 or 17 mph. So, I don't know.

Obit for a bike rider

Just ran across this obit today for a man who was quite a bike rider. He passed away in December, 2005, and had over 8,000 miles logged for the year. He was 76 years old.

I doff my hat to you, sir!

The whole article is

here .

Warm Sunday

It's a warm Sunday now, we are bar-b-queing, but this morning it was cool and cloudy. For a while. I managed to get up at 5:30, watch the tour for an hour, switched to "the Hawaiian church" by request. When I couldn't stand it any more I suited up and went for a ride. Rode to UCSD (and back). 45.2 miles, 3 hours 17 minutes, for an avg. speed of 13.77 mph according to Big Al's Handy Avg. Speed Calc. For Arithmatical Dunces (an OpenOffice spreadsheet), which my son teases my about using. "You can't do that in your head?". No.

Ride went well. I fell over quite un-gracefully while NOT walking the bike to the bike path near the In-N-Out/Day workers on Mission Bay Drive/Damon Ave. intersection. A careful cyclist who walking properly walking his bike declined to laugh. I appreciated that!

I got passed in Missing Valley by a group, but I keep up with them untill I turned off, they wuz taking it easy, going about 15-17mph. oh yeah, there was tail wind, too...

I thought my average speed would be faster, but sadly, it was not.

Weekly Mileage:

Jamis -- 0 miles
Schwinn -- 56 miles

The other day

I've been feeling like crude the last few days, but I forced myself to get on the bike and run some errands. I took some prescriptions to the drug store, which is about 3 miles away, and then I rode over to the cigarette store to buy some, well, the weekly ration of two cartons of cigarettes.

I got up to 24mph along one flat stretch, with a tailwind...

So the whole trip was around 10 miles. It was pretty warm out. I felt a lot better after the ride, and did some yard work chopping roots.

Flat Tuesday

When I came back from the Mt. Helix ride I THOUGHT the rear tire was a little soft, but I said, "Oh no, it's just my imagination, it was like that already". Well, when I went out today, guess what, it was flat! Imagine!

So I fixed it.

I should have counted how many patches are on the tube now. But I didn't. Probably five.

I cleaned the chain on the Jamis. Need some more chain cleaner. The Vetta chain cleaner is pretty grungy, but it's doing its job. The magnets I glued on the bottom are collecting all sorts of gunk.

I lubed the chain with that goofy Finish Line pump bottle stuff. I don't care for the pump bottle, it squirts out toooo far, gets on the tire, and there is WAY too much lube. And it smells. And it keeps ON smelling!

I prefer the Tri-flow bottle with the needle applicator, so I can put just a drop on each side of the link. Much less messy. Although I read (Chain Maintenance)you are supposed to earl the CENTER of the link on modern bushingless chains.

Sultry Sunday

Decided I had to do SOME riding this weekend, so I decided to give the new gears a test. I decided to go up Mt. Helix, which is a 1,370 peak near here. I see La Mesa is at 507 feet, so that would be an 863 foot climb. It doesn't sound like much, so why was I breathing so hard, eh? anway, I pronounce the 24/34 combination a winner!

I got up to 38 mph coming downing Lemon, so that is possibly a new record. The Specialized bike-o-meter on the Schwinn doesn't record highest speed, so I have to actually LOOK at the computer while tearing down the road at a frantic pace, terrified! Needs a pic.

Weekly Mileage:

Schwinn -- 49.11
Jamis -- 8.71 (thought it was more!)