Back in the Saddle

After a two week hiatus, I'm going to be riding my bike to work again. I had to replace both wheels. The front one I replaced immediately after the crash, but the back-wheel I didn't realize was also bent.
Then, after riding it to work the first time after the crash, I felt more resistance than I expected. Turns out, my back wheel was rubbing against my brakes the entire ride.

I just bought the new wheel on Saturday, replaced it on Sunday, and today used the tool from the kit Mia got me for my birthday to release a little tension from my back brakes.

Everything appears to be in working order now and I'm going to ride back in this morning and see if I'm still in shape enough to make the full trip. I have to admit, that since I haven't been biking, I've also let my diet slip a little. I'm still not drinking soda but I have been eating more junk. Well, that will have to change again.

More bike woes

I got back on the horse (well, bike) yesterday and rode to work. Then, on the way home I felt that the riding was more difficult than normal. Looking behind me, I could see my back wheel was wobbling and the brakes were shaking back and forth.

Once I finally got home, I tried spinning my back tire. It went about two revolutions and stopped. I think I discovered what made riding home so hard.

I'll be spending some more time this weekend trying to fix the back tire. Looks like I might have to buy 2 new wheels :(

Have I mentioned that I'm frustrated about this crash?

Crash into me

Well, I suppose that it follows that having a bike, I would have a bike accident. Of course, I was hoping for something small. I'm not sure this qualifies.

I was riding home from work today (not something that I normally do on Fridays) and at one point a trail merges from behind a grocery store. Another biker merged on, going pretty slowly. No problem, they were on the right, I was on the left. I moved over a little further just to make sure.

Then, as I'm getting closer they look back. Suddenly, after seeing me, they swerve over to the left side of the trail. I hit my brakes, but it's a dirt trail so I skidded and we collided.

We totally got entangled, flipped, rolled, all that bad stuff in a crash. My leg and shoulder got scraped up and the other person got the wind knocked out of them. Neither of us were badly hurt. So, that was good anyway.

Of course, on the bad side, my front tire was totally bent, in multiple places. I'll have to get a picture. So, I was about 1.5 miles from home and had to put my bike up on its back wheel and walk it the rest of the way home. When I got home, I was sore and tired. And had to talk care of Ethan for the rest of the afternoon.

But, we made it through. We even went to the park.

So, I'll be going out tomorrow to try and get my bike fixed.

Rainstorms

Just wanted to do a quick explanation of a new feature on my blog. I'm going to be trying to ride my bike to work as much as I can. And, I'm keeping track of that in the bike section of my sidebar.

Unfortunately, I don't often check the weather online or on the TV. I just look out the window and see if it's raining or not. So, today, I rode to work in the morning but then it started raining around noon. So Mia had to come pick me up.

I locked my bike up in my bosses office, and hopefully I'll get to ride it home one of these days.

My bike ride

Apparently, my style of posting does not attract people to read my blog. Fortunately, I'm mostly only writing for my family but I thought I'd try my hand at something longer.

Maybe I'll get a few links from the few people I know that blog.


So... topic... topic... topic.

The problem is that I spent my days on serious stuff so I'm not sure that I could whip out something funny. And, since I doubt that anyone wants to read my pontification on marketing, I'm going to write about biking.

Recently I had a conversation with some friends about biking. One of my friends asked what kind of bike I had. To which I confidently responded "A Schwinn". And of course, that showed just how little I knew of my new hobby.

I can now give the update that I have a Schwinn 26" Men's Ranger. Which is more specific but I still don't know what that means in comparison to other brands or models.

But, what I can do is talk more about the ride. I used a Google Maps mashup to calculate that I ride about 4 miles one-way. It's not that long, but there are a couple of hills. It takes me about 35 minutes to ride to work. That's much longer than I want to take each morning. And much longer in the afternoons once work is done. So, the first thing that I'm working on is improving my speed. I can feel it in the muscles on the tops of my legs (quads for you smart people).
Which is working. I have already noticed that I'm able to go faster, which makes my legs hurt even more. Hopefully at some point in the summer the hurting will stop.

I've also got some cool biking equipment. I won't spend too long talking about the shorts ;) but I've got a nice helmet, a pedometer, and sunglasses. I've also been using my iPod on the trip since I ride along the river trail here in Boston. I don't have to worry about getting hit by cars (for you worried mothers, my wife already brought up that point).

Because I ride along the river, I tend to ride through clouds of gnats on the way home, when it's warmer and humid. The sunglasses are a lifesaver. But the river is so green and lush that it's totally worth doing.

And one last thought about biking is that it makes me much more aware of the weather. I never really cared before because I'd just be driving and then sitting in the office all day. But now, I always have to know what the weather is going to be like the next day (or the morning of) so that I don't end up riding in a rainstorm. I did that my first week of biking... it was not fun.
In fact, Mia picked me up at the grocery store along the way. We had to put my bike in the trunk with the back wheel sticking out. Every bump along the road made the trunk smash down on it. Even after I tightened the bungee cord that was holding down the trunk.
I don't want to repeat that kind of abuse to my new bike.

Anyway, I'm a biker now. Next step is a tattoo I suppose.

Addict

One thing that I've discovered, or rather articulated because I remember feeling this way two years ago when I was running in the mornings.

While there is some inertia to get over when starting an exercise regime, once I get going I crave more of it. After having ridden my bike about 5 times now to work, I totally want to keep doing it. Even though my legs are sore, and I still get very winded, I want to keep doing it.

I'm not going to take a before picture but maybe when the summer is over, I'll post up an after picture of how good I look.

My biking saga

I decided to bike to work today, after the morning commute. I wanted to see if I could do it, since I'm going to start riding to work every morning (as soon as I can).

Well, the first trip was really really hard. And it took me about 45 minutes to bike the 4 miles (one-way). That has to be some kind of record (not the good kind).

But I figure I'll use my blog as a diary of my biking efforts so that at the end of the summer I'll be able to proudly tell you that I'm biking 4 miles to work in 10 minutes... well maybe not that fast.

So anyway, I'm sore, but feeling good about getting outside and doing some exercise.