Being too lazy to oil the chain on Jamis, I pumped up the tires on the Schwinn (slight leak in the Schraeder pump head, but vigorous arm action overcame THAT!) and headed out.
I'm sad to report that all the trees are gone, as I prophesied, along the new section of bike lane blockage on Fletcher Parkway. Go going, La Mesa! Stay classy!
Pedaling up the grade northish on Fletcher Parkway I came upon a woman walking southish, yakking (is that pejorative?) on a cell phone (is there another kind of cell device?), walking, as I said, in the bike lane. Against traffic. I pointed out, to her, that there was a sidewalk (in case she hadn't noticed.). She yelled something in a sentence form, but, as the Fat Cyclist points out in his article, eventually, we cyclists cannot really hear what people are yelling, usually. You know, my hard-earned taxes PAID for those sidewalks, those foot-travelers need to GET OFF THE ROAD and OUT OF MY WAY!!
I rode, or, actually, coasted, which is possibly different, down Swallow to El Cajohn, rode over to Gillespie Field, then, let me tell you, THEN, I made a very big decision, as Lou Reed sang, but in a different context, but still vaguely relevant, if you've been reading the OTHER blog. Instead of climbing back up to Fletcher Hills via Fletcher Parkway, I decided to hump it up Swallow. A very steep hill. I am reminded of what The Big Swede, Steve the L., related to me, about when he introduced Ryan to Swallow. Ryan said, and I may be misquoting here, "Aaaaagggghhhh!"
Thank goodness for the granny granny 24/34 gears on the Schwinn. Saved my life. That and it being a fairly short hill, a few hundred yards, I guess. I was wheezing to hard to take note of the odometer. I'm still coughing a little as I type this!
Well, that was the climax, in more ways than one, of the ride. The ride hope was uneventful, except one little interesting, to me, observance. I was going along on a fairly flat, but slightly dowhill, part of the Fletcher, at about 25 mph, when I thought, "I really never pedal if I'm going over 25, I just coast." Then I thought, "Hmmmmm, what if I did pedal, how fast could I go?" Well, I shifted higher into the 46/16 and got it up to 28.something mph. So, I just thought that was interesting. UPDATE: The Bike Analyzer tells me I must have been in the 46/13 combo and pedaling 100 RPMs to have achieved 28 mph. I can't dispute Science, but I would have SWORN I was in the 46/16...
The average time on the ride stats assures me that I CAN ride faster on the Schwinn than Jamis. Makes sense.
I am hereby setting myself up for a fall, and making a New Year's Resolution/Goal.
I will do a ride with a 15 mph average, of at least ten miles, this year.
There, I've said, it is cast in stone, and I must abide. And how hard can it be? It'll be like a time trial, and all I need is a nice, flat, piece of road somewhere.
Ride Stats
Trip Mileage 13.6 miles (21.9 km)
Trip Time 1:01:13
Avg. Speed 13.38 mph (21.54 km/h)
Week Stats (so far)
Schwinn: 13.6 miles
Jamis: 0 miles
Week Total: 13.6 miles
Odometer
Schwinn: 6,809 miles
1 comment:
Interesting about the lady on the cellphone walking on the wrong side of the street in your bike lane as we saw something similar today when we were driving home from My Kid's Clubhouse. A lady was running on the wrong side of the street in the bike lane. She was so close to traffic and parked cars that I thought for sure she'd get hit. What is up with that? She had a perfectly good sidewalk to jog on. I know that they say that running on the road is a bit easier on the body than running on the concrete but it won't do any good if they get rolled over by a car!
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