More training...

A small group of us snuck out for a quick ride up Mt. Diablo on Weds. afternoon. The day started out nice, but by the time we were gathering to ride it was looking kind of overcast and getting pretty windy. K. Sue called the info line - 42 degrees and 18 mph winds at the summit!

However, we were there so we rode it. At least some of it. As you can see from the pics to the left, the weather was not so nice - although the sun did break through the clouds further west. We never did get the benefit of that!

After an hour or so of climbing (even by my standards we were taking it easy), we got to the junction (more or less the halfway mark) - and find our intrepid coaches Jacqui and Mike waiting for us. They described the conditions further up the mountain (pretty much what we were already dealing with, only more so!). We carried on - but not for too long. We did 2,400 feet of a 3,200 foot climb before deciding it was just too cold and too windy.

One cool thing - it's wildflower season on Mt. Diablo! Sadly, my photography skills weren't up to the challenge of capturing the flowers (how hard can that be, really?), so I'll have to go up again next week and see if I do better.

Last Weekend

So, last weekend (before our little jaunt up Mt. D.), we had a team ride in the Oakland Hills. After a great ride the weekend before, I was feeling pretty confident. Not so fast - I ended up struggling up every hill and generally not doing well on the ride. Why? Who knows - sometimes you just don't do well. I've included a couple of pics - feeling cold before the start, and then summitting the last hill of the day. It was a fun ride, even if I struggled.

Next Weekend

I'm a bit worried about next weekend - we're ramping up both the miles and the climbing - last year this was one of the toughest rides for me. The coaches call it "18 Hills" - most of us are convinced that there are more, many more. It incorporates several classic Bay Area rides - the 3 Bears (named after 3 hills, of course), Wildcat Canyon and Grizzly Peak, going past Tilden Park, and Redwood. Hopefully, I'll remember to pull my camera out of my pocket and grab a few pictures. The weather forecast is for rain on Friday, followed by a nice day on Saturday. However, the weather around here is notoriously fickle. We'll see!

One change I did make - no hard ride on Thursdays! I'll do an easy spin on Thursdays from now on, and save any tough rides for earlier in the week. Both times I've struggled on team rides this year, I did a tough Thursday ride.

As always, I'm continuing to raise money to benefit the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society. My fund-raising website is here. This is a great cause, and directly benefits so many people who are currently struggling with cancer. Please be generous!

Sad Month

Here in the Bay Area, there are lots of cyclists.  In an area like this, tragedies will sometimes happen - and such a tragedy did hit on 3/8/2008. 

A Deputy Sheriff crossed the centerline on a popular cycling road and struck 3 cyclists, killing 2 of them.  I did not know anyone involved personally, but these kinds of tragedies really hit home.  The cyclists were on a team ride, and were very accomplished - one had just won an amateur race, while the other was considering going to the Olympic trials after a career as a professional triathlete.  My friend Pete posted the following to an internet board after attending the memorial ride: Pete's message.

That was an eventful month from another perspective - one of our riders took a nasty spill on a ride with a group of teammates.  We had just climbed a challenging set of hills, and come off a very fast descent.  She had stayed back to snap a few photos, so we were waiting at the stop sign.  After cresting a few rolling hills, she took her hands off the bars and a nasty wind gust hit her.  She went down before she could do anything about it.  We all raced back to her - she wasn't moving, but was breathing.  All we could do was try and keep her warm while calling 911.  The response was really fast - we were in a remote location, and the first police car got there in under 5 minutes, with ambulance right behind. In the meantime, our teammate came around and started talking a bit.  Thank god for her helmet!  She's ok - bruised and beat up, and she has a broken thumb, but otherwise is fine.

This was on top of an earlier team ride, where our community captain took a low speed spill while navigating a section of road he'd been over probably a thousand times.  He was also scraped up pretty good, but otherwise he was fine (his bike needed some attention, though).

So hopefully we're through this rough patch, everyone will keep their hands on their handlebars and the rest of the season will be safe!

The riding in the meantime has been rewarding, but tough.  Lots of wind and some rain has created pretty challenging conditions.  We've been riding in some pretty wide open areas, too - Livermore and out at Pt. Reyes, on the ocean in Marin County.  That last ride to Pt. Reyes in particular was just much tougher than it might have been - we woke up to weather forecasts of 20mph winds with 30 mph gusts and a 70% chance of rain.  Our fearless leader, Kim-osabe, decided the weather was fine, so we all showed up in Nicasio (a one horse town in a pretty isolated part of Marin) to clearing skies but strong winds.  No rain all day long, but boy that wind off the ocean sure made for some tough riding.  Beautiful part of the country, though - and a great ride!  The picture is of a teammate and me climbing one of the many short but steep sections on the way to the lighthouse.  Note all those trees to block the wind!

For those of you who want to make me suffer by riding more miles, well, you've got some work to do!  So far you all have donated just under $1,400 - good, but not good enough.  I've already ridden over 1,000 miles this season - to keep me riding more than scheduled, you guys are just going to have to pony up!  For anyone who missed it, I've pledged to ride a mile for every $ donated through my website.  Go ahead - make me ride!

JB

Death Ride Training Season - 1st Month

OK, 1 month into the Death Ride training season, and so far it is going great!  We're doing a lot of the same rides as last year, and I'm in much better shape than I was (ok, last year's fitness level represents a pretty low base, since I was hardly on a bike for 10 years).  

Even the week 3 ride, covering some pretty good climbs on Palomares and Norris Canyon, was a great ride for me this year.  Last year, I sent out my infamous "Ouch ouch ouch" update after that ride - it was the first time I had ever climbed anything like Palomares, a 4.5 mile 1,200 foot climb that has been featured on the Tour of California several times.  The map above is the elevation profile to give everyone an idea of just how tough some of these rides are.

Speaking of the Tour of California, there was the debut of a very cool, new aerodynamic bike.  I want one! 

 Check out the Youtube video.

One cool thing - the team is larger than expected, and I've been asked to be a mentor to a few of the teammates.  I'm still fundraising, but I'll help them out with fundraising and any other issues they're having that aren't directly related to coaching.  As always, donations are for a great cause and help support my participation in the event.  My fund-raising website is here.

Want to create a little extra pain for me this season?  One of the things I'm doing is pledging to ride 1 mile for every dollar donated on my behalf.  If I do all of the team rides, that is about 2,000 miles.  That would leave me looking to ride an additional 3,000 miles if I hit my fund-raising goal of $5,000.  Go ahead - donate more!  Make me ride!

I almost forgot - we got a new dog!  We picked her up from a local shelter - a 2 year old mutt.  She's great with the kids, and loves exploring all the local regional parks (where she can be let off leash on the hiking trails).  She's deaf, which makes training interesting, but otherwise doesn't seem to bother her one bit.  Of course I have a couple of pictures.

JB

New Year, Old Goals

Well, we're several weeks into the New Year, and I'm ramping up for my big event for 2008:  once again, I'll be attempting the California Death Ride.  129 miles, 15,000 feet of climbing - a friend mentioned that he gets tired just driving that far!

I will be riding with Team in Training again, and am psyched for the first team ride on Feb. 2nd.  Our team last year was phenomenal - great people, and we really ended up coming together as a true team.  Lots of support for the times when things went wrong, and always a huge amount of energy at each training ride.  Our team this year is shaping up to be just as much fun.  I've been riding as much as possible, trying to carry my base from last year into the new training season.  I remember how painful the first few months were last year - I was so out of shape, I probably should have signed up for an easier event!  However, the coaches never gave up on me, kept me going and got me into the best shape I've been in probably since high school.  I hope that if I start off with a better base, I'll be able to build on that and get faster in the hills - my big weakness.  Not a great weakness to have when you're training for a ride with 15,000 feet of climbing! 

Team in Training is a fund-raising arm of the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society.  Please visit Jon's Fund-raising page and donate to this great cause!  

Since we haven't started training yet, here's a few pictures from last year's riding season:

El Tour de Tucson

Wow, have I ever been slacking off on keeping this blog updated!  Well - here it is - a full update on what I've been up to since the Grizzly Century.  

Last time I posted, I was worried that I was actually losing fitness.  Well, it got worse - much worse.  I started suffering from a nasty sinus infection - one that just wouldn't go away.  Needless to say, this got in the way of my training.  Then, my son's soccer coach asked for some help since he would be out of the country for a couple of weeks - that killed several team rides, and complicated riding during the week.  

As a result, I went into the Tucson ride hardly having ridden in more than a month.  Not good.

However, some great teammates and coaching helped pull me through.  Based on my early season fitness, I was riding with our fast group - yikes!  I had started the season hoping to pull off a sub-6 hour century.  With a better final month of the season, I probably could have pulled it off - during the event I was on my bike for 6 hours 15 minutes and finished in 7 hours 45 minutes.  This included a bunch of stops to work a persistent (and very painful) cramp out of one of my calves.  The cramp basically hit at about mile 25 (at which point I let the fast group pace line pedal off into the distance) and didn't really ease up until about mile 80.  As near as I can tell, the cramp was caused by a combo of dehydration and poor conditioning.  So I was actually pretty happy with these results, all things considered.  I may do this ride (nice and flat - good for really fast times) again next year to see if I can crack that 6 hour time barrier.

My teammates did even better.  2 broke 6 hours easily, and  2 others  just missed the 6 hour mark (including one rider who was new to the sport!).  This was despite the sea lion stuffed animals that someone thought would be cute on all of our helmets.

  

Everyone finished, except for one teammate who had her crank fall off just after mile 100 (Tucson is a 109 mile ride).  What a horrible feeling to put in all that work and effort, and to be that close to the finish line and have that happen!  Marci was a trooper, though, and kept smiling through it all.

As a team we raised more than $75,000 for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society.  Combined with the Death Ride team, that makes almost $250,000 raised by the teams I was involved with this year, with almost $8,000 of that raised by me.  Pretty good!

Here's a link to a u-tube video of the Tucson event put together by the son of one of my teammates: Tucson Video

Since then, I've been trying to keep riding, but life keeps getting in the way.  I'm still fighting that sinus infection, and I've moved, which took a lot of time and energy.  Plus, Sheryl Garrett, founder of The Garrett Planning Network, Inc. (yes, I'm a member) and author of several books, including the just-released "Personal Finance Workbook for Dummies", was in town promoting the new book just after Thanksgiving.  We put on a comedy night/fund-raiser for The Leukemia Society, and had a great time while raising some money.

Despite everything, I have been getting some riding in, including a revisit to Morgan Territory with a large group - organized through BikeForums.net.  Lots of fun - I already knew about half the people, and met the rest for the first time during the ride.

The weather's been cold, but there's been surprisingly little rain for this time of the year (not good, actually - one more dry winter and we'll probably have another drought around here).   I can keep riding as long as I carry lights (it's not really light until almost 7 am, and is dark before 6 pm right now).  Either that or just blow off work entirely....

A special thanks to all the donors who sponsored me this year in the two Team in Training rides.  Plus a very special thanks to Valerie and Michael, and to Anne and Kris, who watched my children during many of the training rides this year.  I wouldn't have been able to do it without your help!

JB

Grizzly Century

OK, I've gotten a good week of riding in - starting with last Sunday's ride partway up Diablo then up Morgan Territory, several good rides during the week and then a great ride doing the Grizzly Century with some other TnT alumni. Lots of great scenery, like this photo. Yes, that's Yosemite Valley we're looking down on in the background. As always, click on the picture to see a full-resolution version.

This was a cold day - as in 35 degrees at 7:00 in the morning, when we met to start the ride. The organizers decided to not use one of the roads due to snow and ice! Not to fear - they had a backup plan. We still rode 100 miles (and then some), but lost some of the climbing. We did about 9,500 feet of climbing instead of the advertised 10,000. Still enough to leave me leg-sore and tired at the end of the day.

It was cold enough that I started second-guessing how warm my layers would be - I had a base layer (aka t-shirt made out of the same material as a cycling jersey), the cycling jersey and a wind vest (aka a sleeve-less windbreaker). I also used knee and arm warmers and long-fingered gloves (and comfy wool socks - sometimes the old-fashioned stuff works best). The temperature briefly got above 60 degrees - but we spent most of the day riding in very chilly temperatures. There were patches of snow on the side of the road for a while, and even a bit of slush on the road.

I was riding with a great goup of folks, all from the last Team in Training Death Ride Season. I'm still the slowest climber of the group, but I'm still working at it! I still manage to make up some of the lost ground when we start going downhill.

The hills were not horribly steep - just long, really long. Basically it was the kind of ride that if you weren't climbing, you were going downhill. I felt a bit bad - everyone was nice enough to wait for me at the top of the climbs, and then each time there was a descent I'd take off (knowing that they'd pass me again on the next climb).

Overall, just a nice ride with great scenery. It could have been warmer, but you never know what you're going to get this time of year in the mountains.

JB

PS - I'm still fund raising for Team in Training! Please visit my fund-raising website.

Mount Diablo and Morgan Territory

Hey, everyone,

Well, I'm still not riding as much as I want to - life keeps getting in the way. I'm now an assistant coach for one son's soccer team, business has been busy and I'm buying a new townhouse. All of this has conspired to keep me very busy.

I did manage to get in one good, long ride on Sunday, Sept. 30th. We went up to the junction of Mt. Diablo (about halfway up), then continued on a long, hilly ride that culminated with climbing Morgan Territory Rd. This road is very remote (yet still only 20 miles or so from Oakland as the crow flies). It circles around the backside of Mt. Diablo, and is basically one lane (as in if someone is coming the other way, both cars have to get over on the shoulder to squeeze by) with really, really bad pavement. It is also a good, tough climb. Some sections hit 20% (or more). After that is the real treat - one of my favorite descents in the area. It's fast, not too technical and wide open enough that you can see if a car is coming several turns ahead. We ended up riding just under 70 miles, although I'm not sure how much climbing we did. My riding partner had an altimeter, and he had it pegged at more than 6,500 feet.

Here's a picture of me climbing the rollers just south of Morgan Territory Regional Park:

I did the ride with an acquaintance from bikeforums.net - we were pretty well matched and had a really nice ride. I took it easy since I'm doing the Grizzly Century next weekend, which promises to be very tough - especially since I really haven't been riding that much. We'll see how that goes.

I'm still training with the Team in Training Tucson team, but I haven't been able to make a team ride in a few weeks. Now that my new home is closing I should be able to make some more of those, and do a better job of sticking to the weekday training schedule as well. Otherwise, if I'm not careful, I'll start losing fitness as the event approaches - not good!

Team in Training is a fund raising arm of the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society - as always, donations are for a good cause! Jon's TnT donations page

I've been asked a few times about the jersey I'm wearing - it's a Peet's Coffee jersey, and the net proceeds (aka profits) from the jerseys are donated to the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. You can get one at the Peet's Coffee website.