... Back on the Road

Some of you may have noticed that I haven't been riding my bike all that much. Some things have changed ... My job, for example. I have a somewhat nasty 12 mile bike ride to get to work plus a 45 minute train ride -- meaning 3-4 hours of commute everyday ... If I drive it's only 35 minutes.

My bike bag has been gone. For quite awhile. Which means a backpack (umm ... no), or the crap bag made by timbuktu&trade (again no). Or not being able to carry anything on my road bike. Despite having a couple of mountain bikes ... as soon as I had a decent messenger bag I took the racks off my bikes and gave them away. They never were all that good at carrying my stuff -- a computer, a stack of groceries, and so on.

SO today I bought a new Chrome Citizen, just like my old one. It has some new features, like the insertable laptop cozy, keyring loop, light attachment point, and new phone and Ipod carrier. Generally it's the same awesome bag, but strictly for righties (left shoulder?) ... never mind us goofy footed bastards. I bought one anyway, figuring it would be good to try it on the dark side. It could take awhile to grab my bag, swing it on, clip the buckle, stick my left foot in and cowboy it all up on to my steed, but I'll get the hang of it. C'est le vie.

Yesterday, at the gym ... I was doing the fly with like a 12 on the weight scale markings and I surprised something in my chest and it responded with a popping sound and some pain ... And I noticed the weather outside was suprisingly good. Like 70 degrees, sun, slight breeze, you know ... the barefoot me in shorts everywhere weather. Pass me a whine cooler. Winter, it seems, is fading. And so is weight lifting. I tried to row a thousand meters on the machine in my typical 5 minutes ... and I looked outside again. I went down stairs and got into the hot tub.

SO today I rolled my road bike out of it's winter hiding place. Added new stuff to it's bike bag, watered up the drinking bottle. Put my bike bag stuff in the new bike bag. Called up my bike riding buddy. "I think it's time for a ride," I said stupidly.

We rode 13 miles, and stopped for sushi in the middle. We rode back in the dark ... and it was really dark. Not too bad for the first ride in a while. A good start to the Spring.

Ask Me Where it Hurts ...

The Mushroom Girl shooting God beams at Fort Funston.

A while ago, The Mushroom Girl scored a bike, a X-country Peugeot, possibly about 15 years old, all steel and set up to bring home the bacon. She has been riding it everywhere. I think she likes it. I would have bought it for myself if I could, but it was exactly her size, and it's the perfect bike for her.

So, the Mushroom Girl came to me and asked if I wanted to go for a thirty mile ride with her before she leaves for some Asian islands in about a week. She said -- well -- "I want to go to Lake Merced", and I am thinking -- oh, that's like a fifty miler. We'll need to start early, say -- 11:00. She's training for the ride for your life AIDS thing, where you have to raise a crapload of money, and then also ride your bike 450 miles (from SF to LA) or so in 5 days. So I am all for helping out.

Well, I haven't been on a bike since October 1 or so, but I figure, well -- I am in pretty good shape. I've been working out ... and so on. So we park up in Hillsborough by the watershed, but away from the trailhead at Crystal Springs, where so many cars (including the Mushroom Girl's) have been broken into, And head North. It's like 2:30. We tear down the first 6 miles, so quickly, neither of us believes it.

Seriously, we bounce down the bike trail and the crazy girl is pointing and calling out Mushrooms alongside the trail (it rained finally) and it's looking like a serious roll into the city. We break briefly and I ask if she has any lights ... No. I think, well I have lights. We hammer up Skyline road and gracefully descend past Fort Funston and into the city. At one point we found ourselves on the freeway so rode back to a Starvebucks™ and asked a Barristar™ if it was ok to ride on the freeway. He said it was, so we believed him and did. Zoom-Zoom.

We found the Lake. I looked at my odometer and it said 15 miles ... We briefly debated going around the lake, but decided we better turn back for fear of the approching darkness.


There's a HangGlider in This Shot.


Or Maybe the Hanglider's in This One.

At Fort Funston I discovered that I actually only had a headlight (the crappy Blackburn tailight has fallen out of it's holder) ... and we were probably going to be riding in the dark. I estimated 1.5 hours of useful light. We could make it, but we had to Go. Despite a fairly tough ride back, championed by the MGirl, we still were trapped by darkness, with the last bit being a bit challenging.

When I got home I ate like a horse. A roast beef dinner with a baked potato, cornbread, and green beans, followed by a 700 calorie protein shake and a pint of vanilla ice cream. Yummy. I love riding a bike.

There was this one spot during the ride where I had to stop and walk while climbing Trousdale Blvd., due to some cramping, but it only slowed us for a few minutes. I might have pulled a quad slightly. I suppose I'll know before long.

Any one care to have a guess at where today's ride really hurts?

Sobriety Checkpoint

Last night at about 10:50, I spun through the Burlingame PD's sobriety checkpoint on California Ave. at about 18 miles an hour. It was strange and odd. They didn't stop me or even seem to notice me.





This afternoon I rode out to San Carlos Airport and back on the Bay Trail and it was about 30 miles round trip. On the way back we took the frontage road from the Airport to Oracle and my Red-Headed Riding Buddy blew a tire. I had a spare that was not right, that bought him an additional 10 miles. At the bridge my Presta tube on his Schrader rim gave out at the valve, leaving him on foot. I rode to get a car and came back for him, cutting his trip down to about 23 for the day, and leaving me with about 28 all day.


Site of the Blowout.


The interesting bit is this; from my house the bridge is five miles, Oracle is ten, Holly street is fifteen, and where is twenty? Round trip, these are 10, 20, and 30 miles respectively.

Date: 17 March 2007
Mileage for the week: 85.54
March total: 245.23
Max: 29.8
On the Ipod: Neil Young: Rockin' the Free World

A long way ...

I am somewhat inspired by Lauren's post describing her commute to work. Did I mention I was jealous, too. It's a very nice ride. For some time now I have been contemplating riding (all the way) to work one day morning a week, in an effort to get my weekly base up to about 125 miles. Currently, if I push it, I can break 100 a week, but even if I am busy, I usually end up at about 75. Adding 15-20 miles will help.

I washed all my riding clothes, especially the padded ones. I never wear the ride specific clothing, but rising temps combined with longer rides seem to imply occasional showers and a change of clothes, and my saddle has been asking me for a little cushioning against my sit bones. So tomorrow I will pack up a shower bag and haul it into work. I have a shower at work.

In trying to plan a route through 17 miles of the SF Peninsula, I discovered several things.

1. There's a bike route map of San Francisco from the SF Bike Coalition
2. San Mateo County has this, which looks like a scary route. I don't like two lane roads with street parking and no bike lane.
3. There are other maps, too, here.
4. It ain't easy to get there from here
5. This is a very nice article (dated) about the progress made in San Francisco for cyclists in recent years.

Maybe this week I will try the full commute. I have something that looks like a route, thanks to mapquest's (thanks fritz, for sharing) "avoid freeways" option. I run the Bay Front trail out to the Airport and then ride Bayshore into South City, and on past Potrero Hill. With an occasional deviation that I'll need to navigate when I get there.

If I can get to work it will mean I can get across the GG bridge which will mean I can get to Alaska... it's all in the journey ...Wish me luck.

5 Miles Out

At about Chestnut and Embarcadero I turned back. For a total of 8.8 miles. That is Coit Tower.

Hi Dive

Lunch Ride

I have an appointment at 11:00 down near the Moscone center, so I am going to take a lunch time ride after that. If I can make it this far, it will be 17.6 miles out to Chrissy Field and Back. It's glorious out. The actual map.