My Most Recent Ride 2012 (Part V in a series)

I know the feeling re Swedish flies, just spent a week at the in laws summer house in Hoga Kosten and managed to avoid any bites, but back down south went to visit a pretty village yesterday, walked along a lake in the same and within 10 seconds five lovely bites. Now have very itchy arms and neck with big red patches ! Back to UK tomorrow and the Trike, stuck on two wheels here.

Adrian

 

The High Coast in Sweden is lovely, but to be told about flies there surprises me, Adrian. : We were there last year, spent a lovely evening along the Baltic at a camp ground. A short walk through the trees to a nearby restaurant resulted in a few mosquito bites, but not a single buzzby from flies. I guess we just lucked out!

Posted about the June 29th ride on the blog. Ride report and photo thumbnails with histories of the churches, runestone and Uppsala castle.

Terii

 

Slow Day

Yesterday was the slowest ride I can remember:
14.1 moving average.

Thursday evening, we had some powerful storms roll through.
I watched as powerful downdrafts tore limbs free from
neighbours' trees.

Friday, with no cable & no internet, I rolled out on my bike ride...
yeah, I always ride, but I felt like a voyeur on that ride.
Checking out the damage.

We were very lucky to have electricity.
I learned this morning that yesterday set a new high for temperature.

Limbs down everywhere.
Big trees down on every block.
Our street was completely blocked all morning by a very large
oak: we really enjoyed the dramatic drop in through-traffic!
I personally pedaled over two downed wires.
Falling trees and tree limbs severed lines (power, cable, 'phone and, well, steel cables) every few miles, on average.

So, due to all the obstacles in the road, me rubbernecking
and everyone else sightseeing, my speed was kept very low.

Surprisingly, I got a good workout!
My guess is that climbing hills slowly is still climbing....
It took a lot of self-control for me to ride the brakes
down hills and to roll slowly by the horizontal trees in the road.
Brakes: they really do slow you down!

On top of all that, some guy paced me in his little car
-while the woman in the passenger seat, grinning,
videoed me with her camera.
Dang.

 

Very, very, über dangerous riding over downed lines, especially on a bicycle! It may be difficult or impossible to know which are live, which are power and which are comm, and which might simply roll out from under you & dump you in the street. You may decide it's worth chancing your life on it, but is it worth chancing a perfectly good 'bent <g>?

 

Yes.
Yes it was;
I was there.
I know what you say you know.


Yes.
(Final answer.)

 

It's been a while since I posted last, so I'll update you on a few recent rides.

In May I rode the Mt. Lemmon hill climb by Tucson, AZ, a club supported 60 mile round trip ride with 7000 ft of climbing. I lived most of my life in Tucson but had never ridden all the way to the top of the Lemmon. This ride was on my age denial bucket list (I turned 60 in March), the weather was perfect, I had the day off, it's a good test for bike and rider, so off I went. I was riding my arm and leg powered recumbent prototype and this is the first long climb I have done with it. I now live and ride mostly in the flatland Phoenix area and don't do a lot of climbing. Last November when I rode the El Tour de Tucson century I discovered that I could use a wider range of gears, so I have installed both lower and higher gears on my two ring crank set and the cassette. This set up is good for up to 12% climbs and fast decents. I'll probably end up with a triple crank set so I can take on any hill. The ride went really well and had no problems with either the bike or my self. It took about 5 hours climbing up including stops at the 4 well stocked SAG stations and averaged 8.8 MPH and about an hour coming back down with speeds well in excess of 40+. This is a link to the GABA club site photo page with 1000 photos of the 300 riders. I'm in photo # 7039, 7737 and 7738. There was only 1 other recumbent and I didn't get his photo numbers. They do this ride every year so if you are in AZ next May and like to climb, you should do it.

http://http://www.bikegaba.org/index.php?option=com_exposeprive

Yesterday while riding my normal 34 mile loop I had a fun run in with a young fast DF rider. Less then 3 minutes after leaving my house I noticed that I had forgotten to turn on my PowerTap so I pulled over to turn it on. A few seconds later I started out again, but at a slow pace of about 16 because I hadn't warmed up yet, when I was passed by the DFer. I gave him a polite "morning" and a friendly nod with no reply. Then I thought what the heck I'll run him down to see how fast he is going. When I caught him he was going 24, which is my cruise speed in that area, so I just stayed on his wheel. At one point he glanced back to see how bad he had smoked the "old guy on the recumbent" and was surprised to see that I was right there. He then picked up his speed to 25 and then 26 before a traffic light slowed us almost to a stop. Many more glances and still not a word out of him. The light changed and he sprinted off and was doing 24 to 26 to the next light a mile away with me still right on his wheel. We were traveling west in the early morning SUN so I placed my shadow right next to his bike so he could see me with out looking back. He could easily see the arm power and pedal motion in the shadow and could tell that I was doing a lot of coasting trying to stay behind him. As we slowed for the next light he finally said "man your really keeping me honest here". We rode the next mile at 22-23 and he turned at the light with out saying anything or even waving. I think it was score 1 for the old guy on the recumbent. It was good for my ego anyway.

Ride safe, have fun.

Louis
Gilbert, AZ

 

Louis, the shame...you probably made that poor young'n feel bad that he wasn't "the man". Glad you had a good time...playing. Love the story.

 

I went out to get ice cream and saw a British roadster pizza delivery car. Triumph, Austin Sprite, etc. Old small classic car with a plastic sign on the trunk, since it can't sit on a ragtop. Then I had ice cream.

 

Dusting Rob Off

Rob Clayton and I have started riding during mid day in Knoxville out Hardin Valley road to and from Watt Road. Y'all remember Rob? My riding buddy since 1988? He has a Volae Tour, A Catrike Road and a Tiger clone I designed for him. Well, we also have been doing some riding on the weekends, occasionally riding with Ed and the guys on Saturday morning at the Cove. We rode last Saturday morning from Coulter Bridge to the Park. He was on his Volae. Stopped at the U-Man Power and changed out that stupid wal-mart tire I got on my tour in NC with a good 120psi 700cx23 that was supposed to be on it. Man, it was like strapping a rocket to that bike. I was on my old faithful BenTech USS and on the way back Rob says "Hey, let's get our average up". I said, "Well, let's move then..." and put the hammer down. Soon, I could not even see him in my rearview mirrors. I had to slow down to let him catch up. He was doing 22 when I took off so no idea how fast I was going.
I had forgotten how fast this old bike was. Wow.

 

Been resting the past 2 days. My legs have just been feeling weaker and weaker so it seemed they needed recovery time.

I've finished up the post of my 7 mile ride on July 6th. Lots of pictures of the Gysinge ironworks and the river rapids near it and lots more from Koversta village open air museum.

Terii

 

First Metric of the year and first on the Cheetah. I can't get overmhowmthis trike climbs, still can't descend fast because I'm chicken s***. The joystick is still feeling pretty squirrly. Much easier to ride fast than on the Venom and more comfortable. Had a tailwind on the one big climb and beat my best speed by almost 2 mph.

http://app.strava.com/rides/12823302

 

WOW!!! I love this thread. Lots of people riding. Lots of people enjoying themselves.

Will give much more details on my final Erie Canal ride in the next couple of days. I am home.

if anyone would like my copy the the Erie Canal Ride book published by the New York Park service, let me know. First response gets the book FREE!! Just give me a mailing address. Book is great for planning this trip!!

 

Sprint Home

-Low on water, I slowed at the entrance of a flat road, the road I like to use for a final sprint at the end of a ride.
I slowed to allow a bicyclist who had the right-of-way enter the flat road first... she got to be the 'rabbit'.

Swallowing the last of my water, pulling even with her...
she asked me about all the heavy weather she'd missed.
(We know each other on sight: I'm that recumbent guy and she's
one of those local, really fit young women who ride all the time.)

I filled her in about the winds and, being my usual antisocial/sociopath
self, wave, " 'bye"
-downshifted-
and accelerated into my final sprint.

Left her fast and shrinking rapidly in my rear view mirror.
Gained plenty of time to stop at the sign, look both ways
and then GO.

She caught me in the rollers before my house, cooling down,
where she passed me.

So... I'm as fast as a woman half my age!
WoooHooo!

 

Recumbent rid'n withdrawls.

Since i left Jezzie in California, i haven't ridden at all since May 28th. So to combat the growing withdrawal pains i decided to take out my tired but trusty old Mongoose and see if i can remember how to ride.
Is it ok for me to post here that i rode a wedgie MTB approximately 60 miles today to see a doctor in Morristown? NO? oops my bad. I take it all back...

 

I just finished posting my latest ride on the Erie Canal. If you would like to read it, it is in the Epic Ride section. Click here.....