Crappy cycling session

2008 07 31 Thursday 20:45 finish

Cycling in Somerset
duration 33:34
avg 12.8
max 24.0
distance 7.24 miles

Why is this "crappy" ?

Well... it started before the ride, when I discovered the rear wheel of my Trek had 3 broken spokes and was badly warped. I found this out as I was installing the new Continental Contact tires which I bought in hopes of increasing my road speed. I probably bashed the spokes while car-racking the bikes back from Brooklyn a couple of weeks back. [Sigh.]

So, off came the tire and the wheel went to the bike doctor.

I decided, "Hey! Why not put the new Contis on my Fisher and see what happens?" So I did that, and in the process somehow got the rear derailleur cable out of its little holders. I found I could get it to go back into any TWO of the three holders... and eventually, thanks to some brute force, I got it back into all three.

Then I quickly measured the wheel rotation (202.7 cm, rounded up to 203 for the Cateye Enduro 8), set the computer and grabbed my helmet.

So, now that it was pretty much dark, I turned on my lights and decided to go for a short ride. One thing I noticed right away was that the new tires didn't seem any faster than the Bontrager knobbies that came with the bike. A harder, quieter ride to be sure, but not significantly faster.

Did I mention I felt like shit from too much ice cream today? Now's as good a time as any, I guess. Anyway, maybe that's why I was slower than 2 days ago, even though it was a shorter ride and these tires are supposed to be super fast thanks to the magic of "low rolling resistance". Or maybe I didn't have enough air in them, or too much.

Or maybe I was just tired from Mon/Tue/Wed's workouts. Or out of sorts from the gears not shifting up too smoothly. Or from searching for an easy mountain bike trail earlier today online and not finding anything definite. Or from my saddle being half a finger too low and its nose being tilted one click two far up.

Whatever.

I get the wheel back from the shop either tomorrow or Monday and then the Conti Contacts go on the Trek, dammit. I'll maybe try the Town & Countrys on the Fisher, or maybe just stick to knobbies. I think I'll go check the tire pressure right fricking now and double check the rotational distance. And raise the saddle half a finger and tilt the nose back one click.

And maybe pat myself on the back &mdash that makes 185 of my target 275 minutes for this week, leaving only 90 for me to nail that on the weekend, maybe on an easy mountain bike trail.

NordicTrack and bad 90s movie

2008 07 30 Wednesday (20:00 finish)

NordicTrack
time 40 minutes
distance 3.8 miles
avg speed 5.7 mph

calories 747
avg heart rate 140

A pretty good little workout. Again, I'd have liked to have kept my heart rate a little lower, but part of the difficulty with that comes from yesterday's intense session. That other part comes from having expectations about how fast I "should" go. Chalk that up to 12 years of Nordic Trackin'.

I did increase the tension from the previous session (the machine I have in NJ is the Pro model, so I don't have objective tension measurement) but still found myself going in the mid 5s to low 6s, only slightly (if at all) slower than before.

In a break from previous convention, I'm counting my cool-down period in the workout. I did 36 minutes of the main workout, with a target HR of 135-140. I did the last 3 minutes of the main workout up to 170.

I rolled the machine in front of the TV and surfed into the end of The Chase, a Very Bad Movie starring Charlie Sheen. When that ended, I checked out the Satellite radio and discovered BPM, a dance remix channel which was totally excellent.

That's 151 of my 275 minutes for this week....

Two recent workouts...

2008 07 28 Monday 8:00 PM (finish)

Bally Total Fitness, East Brunswick
30 minutes on the LifeFitness cycle
20 minutes snorkeling
20 minutes swimming

This was one of the most satisfying cardio sessions I've ever done. During the cycling, I concentrated on my cadence (target 85-95 rpm) and posture. Maintaining my target heart rate of 135-140 was easy. I finished with 2:30 of high intensity, raising my HR up to 170 and spinning as fast as 110 rpm. During the swimming, I concentrated on form and abdominal breathing. I did 20 minutes with fins/snorkel, another 10 minutes with snorkel but sans fins and finished with 10 minutes of regular swimming (alternating laps of breaststroke and freestyle). Breathing with the snorkel is addictive! One reason is the 'sensory deprivation' factor which makes for a meditative experience. Another reason is the removal of breathing from swimming, enabling more concentration on form and breathing.


2008 07 29 Tuesday 8:30 PM (finish)

Cycling in Somerset
duration 41:34
avg 13.7 mph
max 24.5 mph
distance 9.51 miles

avg heart rate 155
burned calories 875

So that's 111.5 of my 275 minutes for this week....

I used my new Gary Fisher Advance for this one, just as I did for a slightly longer ride last week. I'm getting some new Continental Contact city/trekking tires for my Trek later this week and when I do I'll start using the Continental Town & Country tires (currently on the Trek) on the Fisher. Even with knobbies, the Fisher is my faster bike. I'll post some pics of my bikes as soon as I get around to it...

Cycling is much more enjoyable now thanks to finally getting my saddle properly adjusted and a couple of good purchases. The Brooks Flyer saddle was an excellent call. My Pearl Izumi liner shorts are also making for a more comfortable ride.

It's also good to have lights that I can depend on. My Cateye Triple Shot headlight and Planet Bike Superflash tail light are both exceeding expectations. The headlight is a good 'seeing' light as well as an inescapable 'be seen' light. Battery life seems pretty good.

The only thing I want to improve is level of exertion. This was supposed to have been easy to moderate and actually ended up being intense. I need to drop into a lower gear more often to maintain my target HR. Part of it is the hills. Due to fatness, even small hills present major challenges. My Heart Rate shot up to about 160 in the first few minutes. As I've seen many times in all types of exercise, once it goes up, it stays up. I was in the mid 150s for the most of the ride, which is about 15-20 beats higher than my target. Well, you know, the biggest room in the world is... the room for improvement.

Back in the Saddle Again (again)

It's been over two frickin' years since I posted anything on here. It hasn't been quite that long since I exercised, but I'm going to dive back in now -- or at least dip my toe in to test the waters.

The main things I've been doing lately:

• Bicycling. I've probably been doing about 3 times as much tinkering as riding, but I've done a few canal towpath rides, some street riding and one recent mountain bike ride at Hartshorne State Park. My current bikes: a Trek 800 rigid steel ATB, rigged for commuting and/or touring; and a new Gary Fisher Ascent aluminum framed hardtail for mountain biking. You'll recognize me on the trail, because I'm the one with the honey-colored Brooks Flyer sprung saddle. Laugh if you like, but my ass thanks me...
  
  
• Swimming/Snorkeling! These are my new favorite activities. Again, you'll recognize me as the guy prowling the pool at the East Brunswick Bally Total Fitness wearing a snorkel and swim fins. At first I just went for the hot tub, but I can stay under for 20+ minutes now with no problems and my swimming is also much improved.
  
  
• Nordic Track. Still plugging away on my old Nordic Track pro, 12 years and counting... I finally found the right lubricant for the squeaky wheels (I hope): lithium grease. This is still the smoothest cardio workout I know of. Even the newest elliptical machine at the gym doesn't come close.
  
  
• Strength training. Right now, I'm averaging one full-body workout about once ever two weeks. Obviously I want to improve that. Also, we recently got a Bosu ball for at home. It's difficult but I like it!
  

So I'll start posting again and maybe that'll help motivate me. I'm very fat so I hope so!