Rewards for the Cyclists

January 27, 2010 · Filed under bicyclez, sustainability, think about it

There’s a management idea of push versus pull.  I like to think of it as:

  • Push: “You better finish that ____, or you’ll be in serious trouble.”
  • Pull: “If you finish that ____, I’ll give you an extra ____ for doing so.”

Some people operate better in a push than a pull, but I think most people like the woohoo idea of the latter.  This morning I came up with a pull method for cyclists.

The ingredients are 2 of those weight sensors (currently used for cars) especially in the left turn lane. These particular weight sensors would be calibrated to a range of sensitivity to >50 lbs and <500 lbs.   I figure most riders+bike will be more than 50 and less than 500 lbs.  Also, the average car weight is 3000 lbs (wikiAnswers), so half the weight [in the bike lane] would be 1500 lbs which is less than the upper specification of 500 lbs above.

With two of those weight sensors and the same controller that decides to change the light for the left turning cars, the controlling system could calculate the average speed of the cyclist and have the light turn green for him right as he would want to enter the intersection.

Ideally this would entice more people to bike commute by drastically reducing any waiting time at lights, which is more of a mental downer than it is one on’s commuting time, regardless if you are in a car or on a bike.

Of course the idea is the easy part of doing it. . .

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A Walk in the Woods

January 25, 2010 · Filed under personal value

We did it; we got the finisher’s patch, for the first time in four attempts.

I steal this description of the race from Rooster:

POCAR is an orienteering race that is put on by Purdue Outing Club. It’s held every year in southern Indiana on MLK weekend. Most years, only about 10-20% of the teams finish the race. For most, the only racing is that of trying to finish before the cut off time (48 hours). . .

. . . Our 2010 POCAR stats include hiking 50 miles, locating all 23 check points and being out for 40 hours (3 hours of which were sleep). The race was held in the 200,000 acre (over 300 square miles; all of which were fair game) Hoosier National Forest.

read more

In addition to the physical exertions, the race requires translating numerical coordinates to a topographical map then finding them using any or all of: roads, trails, ridges, creeks, and compass bearings.   The points are the size of a wind sock and have a reflector on top, to find in the dark.   The rules only allow a compass and map; items not allowed are GPS, altimeters, etc.

We finished the race.  At the moment I knew we were going to finish, I didn’t know if I wanted to finish.

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You can't have your cake and eat it, too.

The elusive tale of the “unfinished” race just change directions to the race we finished once.  For whatever reason, it was a weird gulp take.  I think part of this feeling is due to my personal experience during this 2010 race where my colon decided to cleanse itself during the first six hours of the race.  During that time, I was the weak link: brain dead and slowing progression.  But, I persevered, and everything came together, as they say.

Around 3am on the Monday morning of the race, I wanted nothing more than to stop walking, stop the intense searching, and finally stop my body’s fight for sleep.  Yet at the same time, I wanted to see if it was possible to get my pants any dirtier, my clothes any smellier, and continue the camaraderie of our long friendship.

Instead we went to the final check-in and went through the most anti-climatic finish chute of all time: a bunk house of sleeping volunteers, an IOU for the patch, and a choice of race shirts that didn’t have the size I wanted.  So, at least the race prevailed with more social currency.

My confused feeling about finishing was that of a turning point.  I think what made this turning point harder is the weird confounding emotional response that happens when you combine intense physical efforts along with enduring mental exertions.

Usually, this emotional response is pure happiness.  However, this time it wasn’t.  It had a mix of roller coaster — up’s and down’s — which I think are due to my initial start.  It’s okay; I know that big picture it’s another victory.  Not just the finisher’s patch, but our friendship and health.

My immediate conclusion the morning after the race was: It is one thing to find a group of friends willing to hike with you for 48 hours in a mid-January Indiana winter; but, it’s a kinship to unanimously and immediately decide to sleep two hours in the middle of the woods in only the clothes on our back because we were temporarily lost.

Since it took multiple attempts to figure it out, here’s what I’ve learned about this race.

  • Sleep is very important in the race.  Not a lot is needed.  We slept three hours this year.  I think rest is just as important mentally, as physically.  The pale, distraught look of some teams shows how important a little rest is, to me at least.
  • Combine all maps onto the detailed topo map.  With physical fatigue comes mental stupidity so KISS: Keep It Simple, Stupid.  Investing 30 minutes of the race to combine maps prevents mental hang-ups that you can create by mentally overlapping multiple maps.
  • Obey the contours of the land.  Walk in creeks and atop ridges, instead of just shooting a bearing.  It’s a path of smaller resistance and a way to match the contours of the map with the land, to keep from getting lost.
  • Develop the will to get the fucking patch.  What started out as a joke became a sort of clause that no matter what, we weren’t giving up.  There will be setbacks, but keeping the mental goal in mind will help overcome the setbacks.

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Report of Stolen Thunder

January 11, 2010 · Filed under runnin

This was my first thought Saturday when I saw dre whiz past us for the finish chute to PR a half marathon by 9 minutes, breaking the 2hr barrier.  If I’m an optimist, I think it is only because I am a reformed pessimist.

Really, I should be happy to have an additional form of inspiration in my life.  But at the same time, a 3 second PR sounds like monkey poo compared a 9 minute PR . . . just as much as when she cut 16 minutes from her half marathon time the same day I cut 16 minutes from my marathon time, making her feat seem twice as awesome.

I’ll get over it, and I really am happy for dre, as well as myself.  Besides, it’s not always about the bragging rights.

Now, back to the focus of this blog, narcissism.

In my mind, my one year goal seemed to mentally register as more of a journey.  That is I see remarkable progress, in only three months so far; progress I was not expecting so fast into the training.

The last time I placed a PR for a 5k was during a running phase where I was enamored with the 10k race.  My training was much different.  I was probably running 15 to 25 mile weeks.  In hindsight, I was going about the training somewhat ineffectively, with only one track workout per week accompanied with exploratory urban runs in anticipation to set awesome hash courses.

This past Saturday when I laced up for the SoCal Half Marathon 5k, my goal was to run under 20 minutes.  As far as my performance goes it felt good, but not great.  That is, I can tell that my training focus is not the 5k distance, nor was I set to peak (which is good for my goals).

I was proud that during the race I looked at my Garmin 4 times, only.  jeff called me out on a tempo run recently, which helped me realize that I was not using my Garmin correctly as a tool but rather crutching on it.  His terse “Stop looking at it!” comment made sense right away.  A tempo run should focus on perceived exertion.

The Garmin was nice to look at after the first quarter mile, during the excitement that follows the gun.  It felt like a hard pace, but a 5k isn’t meant to be a stroll.  My Garmin let me know that I was on a bonk-promising, pack-excited 5:00/mi pace.  My second look at it during the half mile confirmed I was in a better spot, 6:20/pace.

It also boosted my pace after the 2.5 mile mark when the pack I was in slowed to a 6:40/mi pace.  I don’t know if I would have set a PR without my Garmin, and I will never know because of the flux of time.  I was happy for my progress in this state of time, regardless of my personal records.

Extrapolating my races in my most recent roadie era with a McMillian Calculator and then extrapolating even more with an exponential regression, we get this fun graph, which implies a slight ridiculous amount of assumptions, but showing that my chances for qualifying for Boston aren’t as much of a dream as they somewhat appeared to me a few months ago.

The major assumptions in the model that I think are ridiculous is that once you start building mileage, you leave behind the same potential for aerobic improvement.  Trade-off’s.  Also, I want to stop the intensity of training after the OC half in lieu of some summer ultra running and/or something more like this:

Thunderclap, jeff's son, playing in the street while anticipating dre's finish.

Another victory for my progress in fitness, learning about building speed in the roadie world, and claiming my own damn piece of thunder.

rumble rumble crack ga-BOOOOOOOOOOM

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Mandatory High School Curriculum

January 7, 2010 · Filed under think about it

Since my high school reunion invitation didn’t ask me, I post my suggestions on how I think we can change high school curriculum, here.

Dilbert

I think English and Math are important skills.  Poor English can only adds to the case that you are indeed a moron.  Algebra is also a nice skill to have, since I don’t think anyone wants to get ripped off via a bank statement or a restaurant bill.

However, one skill I wish I had was water cooler talk, office politics, brown nosing, and the ability to more naturally quantify my work.  I think this would fit well into second semester junior social studies, and in addition to proficiency can bolster job performance.  Yes, this is quickly realized in the first months in the real world. However, I don’t think corporate training can start too early; that is actually part of the first course of corporate training.

To teach the course, there needs to be a specialization added in The Schools of Education: Dogbert.

Personal Finances

The university system is the first step of the rat race for many.  By dumb luck, the interests of math and science, and a little elbow grease, I made it into a couple programs to exit college debt-free with a professional job offer in hand.  But, to note it was mainly dumb luck.

After going separate ways, I’ve reunited with a few high school classmates in the past few years.  By this point in our quest through life, those peers and I realize what debt amounts to.  Not just a payment schedule, but the psychological burden of servitude to something we’re not always passionate about.

It is weird to see some of the smartest kids from the class that sunk the deepest in debt.  Although, the smart kids were the ones learning what the teachers tested on . . .

While in college, I saw a drastic change of a 100% tuition spike; however, the college experience (of personal and intellectual growth) stayed the same before and after the spike.  What changed was a nicer campus appearance, financial focus on research, and an initiative to recruit more out-of-state students.  The transition from an attempt at a learning utopia to a business.

I value my learnings in future value calculations, annuity payouts, and the magic of compounding interest.  A higher education is cool, but so is [financial] freedom.  I think an advanced society would provide their young to better understand, as well as the capability to calculate the payback period of a cool liberal arts education.  I’m not trying to knock liberal artists.  If anything, I’m jealous of their four years developing crazy ideas.

I just think it would be more fair to have our young apprentice in society, either saving up some money and/or earning “credits” for classes while deeper contemplating their career. I always value buying something after earning it, as opposed to abstractness of debt.

History as Research

I remember having an “aha!” moment reading Howard Zinn’s A People’s History of the United States: 1492 to Present.  It was the first time that I learned history, like all other subjects, is open to human error.  Perhaps, Wikipedia is already opening this door.

How to Pack Heat Under a Trench Coat with Your Friends

Just joking.

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Top 3 of 2009

December 30, 2009 · Filed under personal value

Rooster asked me last year what my “Top 3 of the year were.”  I like the idea; it’s a dense statement of that person’s year.  My top three of this year are processes I’ve incorporated into my life.

Functional Cycling

I think it’s amazing to look back last year, at this time, when I was completing my first 6 months of bike commuting.  As a casual observer you might not notice the outward differences between how much I bike commute between last year and now, but from an inward perspective I see a great change.

Last year, bike commuting seemed like a big deal. As in, a hard-core activity.  Since then, I’ve discovered bicycle touring which catalyzed my love for getting around on a bicycle.  Bicycle touring changed the way I like to vacation: a slow, but moving adventure that throws you into someone else’s community faster and deeper.

I think bike touring changed my view of functional cycling from more of an ego based push to a more inward happiness pull.  Cycling to and fro work allows me to unwind.  It allows me to feel alive with the breeze against my face, the blood pumping through my veins, and the close-up visual appeal of watching the asphalt quickly transform from future to present to past.

I don’t have as much interest convincing people they should try bike commuting. It’s not that I care if you do or do not bike commute.  The thing is I just like to.

Give me bike, or give me liberty.

Dawn Patrolling

I think running on your own motivation is totally possible.  The human brain is a very powerful device.  So much so that I think running is 80% mental with the remaining half just being physical.

Running with others creates a social commitment for those days when you’d rather sleep in or sit around and watch football.  Some people are gifted with the natural drive to go out day after day and week after week training hard, but I don’t think the average person naturally has that gene.

The Dawn Patrol is a group that organically formed from the SoCal Trail Headz.  It’s a group that is entirely inviting and welcoming, with one exception: you need to be at the trail head at 5:00:00am.

Since I’m a half hour commute away, I usually wake at 4ish.  I have not once regretted waking harshly out of my peaceful slumber to run with this group. Actually, I cannot speak highly enough of this group, and I bet they would the same of me.  It’s a natural symbiotic journey together on the trails.

This group was the journey that helped me finish my first 50 mile race this year, set an Absolute Personal Record (APR) in the 50km, as well as PR in the marathon and the 50km.  Not to name drop, but the group constantly gets visited by such incredible people like the Easter Bunny, a leprechaun, Santa Claus, and Super E-Rod, to name a few.  And, the best part of all is that my body is now used to the process of waking abnormally early one to three times a week now!

Home Adventures

As far as project jargon goes, I would say that I am in the experimental phase of home adventures.  I consider a home adventure something of personal growth you experience in your place of temporary permanence.  For me this year, I allowed myself to watch television, grow stuff, and gain comfort wrenching on bikes.

There’s still a lot of room for growth — or adventure — in this area.  So, I have that going for me, which is nice.

I ask because I’m interested: What are your top 3 accomplishments for the year?

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Goals for Oten

December 23, 2009 · Filed under personal value

Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure, than to take rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy much nor suffer much, because they live in the gray twilight that knows not victory nor defeat.

- Theodore Roosevelt

As you can see, that’s a quote from my homeboy sportsman, Teddy.

In 2009, I created three goals for the year.  I’ll recap those as well as my Top 3 experiences of the year at a more appropriate time, like once the year is over.

Now, I look forward to setting direction to ‘010 (Oten).

Electricity.

My first goal is to understand electricity more, with a slant towards renewable energy.  It’s weird to call myself an engineer, considering my lack of knowledge in this field of electricity.  I don’t quite know how, but these are my current interests:

  • installing a generator bicycle hub
  • creating a solar powered device to tell people the sun is out
  • programming a micro-controller with some LEDs or something

My goal is to understand the fundamentals, through a couple concrete projects.  I think it is interesting to read the limitations in solar and wind power.  I think it would be rewarding to get some first hand experience understanding electrical loads and how to physically put the pieces together.

Boston.

I have a one year goal: from the 2009 Chicago Marathon, to run the Oten Chicago Marathon (on 10/10/’010) in less than 3:10, then qualifying for the Boston Marathon.

I have two major races planned to get me there: Surf City Half Marathon (February) and the OC Half Marathon (May) to help the training.  Other than that, I want to keep the amount of racing low.  From what I’m reading, I’m focusing on two workouts during the week: the speed work and the long run with recovery runs sprinkled in there.

The hardest part I see so far is: (1) recovering from a run with less than desired expectations and (2) not talking to all my non-runner friends about how awesome my splits were in the intervals I did 5 days previous.

The first requires grin and bear.  Excuses or not, you need to be able to “lace ‘em up again” to fix it.  The second is not so bad, and probably a good exercise in listening (not interjecting) in conversations.

I think it’s a good goal: challenging but possible to bring a 3:35 down to a 3:10.  I think it will be a good experience. . . what’s the point of doing something if you’re not extreme about it??!

Budgeting

I hate planning.  I try to automate things, like saving, in my life  to avoid spending time doing anything close to planning.  However, I think when you budget the surpluses in your life — for me, projects and entertainment — it becomes something more revered.

4 Big Books

One of my interests is to become more pretentious cultured.  Since I started the corporate gig, I usually read a book if it keeps my interest.  Time for reading was easier to make when I didn’t have pressures to always look busy during the day.  Anyway, I want to coerce myself to read some classics.  My first book I picked out is Dr. Zhivago.  I don’t know if this a classic or not, but I think it seems pretentious enough to fit my goal.

That’s about it.

I think the key to goals is creating something concrete, yet flexible.  For, my real goal is not the end, but the journey.

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Evangelize Indifference

December 15, 2009 · Filed under think about it

Today on my commute, I saw a licence plate: “DIV NAKD.”  My initial thoughts were, “I wonder if the driver might be a SCUBA diver.  Sure enough two feet above the licence plate the sticker with the SCUBA DAN Flag, read “Discover Diving.”

NAUI certified me as a SCUBA diver a few years ago.  I don’t like SCUBA diving.  The actual diving, with Go-Go-Gadget lungs!, is fun.  But for the most part, I didn’t like all the preparation, clean up, and the general energy demands that the “sport” requires, like compressing air, transporting compressed air, sometimes getting a boat ride, and the need for all the gear that goes along with the sport.

I still value the experience.  It was a great way to actively learn about partial pressures and molecular diffusion that bores the average chemistry student, yet becomes suddenly more exciting when “death by nitrogen asphyxiation” is thrown into the mix.  And what better way to determine if you like a sport then to try it out!

Discover Diving.

It made me think: why?  Does DIV NAKD think my life will be fulfilled if I discover diving?  Is it the missing link to nirvana?  Will chicks finally dig me?

Then, I took inventory on my self-applied advertisements.

  • Bee Friendly (with a smiling cartoon bee on it).  Yeah, I’m ok with that one.* My main goal with this is for me to smile, when I see it.
  • Pass Gas (with a picture of a gas pump and a bicycle).  This is probably breaking my above rule to spread the message why have more foreign dependency than we need, if you can help it.  But, I like the implied fart humor, so I’m keeping it.
  • Yes, my bicycle has issues. If you don’t understand this sticker, then show up to any roadie group ride.  You will learn why I like this sticker.

Before this commute, I saw a message of camaraderie, #whyweride.  I decided that I liked this message.  It wasn’t so much, if you don’t ride a bicycle your life will suck.  It was a more: this is why I like to ride a bike.  The difference I see as evangelizing versus leading by examples.

*Although maybe “Bee an Ass” with an evil grin and a big stinger on its backside may bring out more emotions or entertainment, if that’s the end goal.

My next upcoming trip has two goals: alone time for my own reasons and POCAR training.  I’m going to areas people consider remote or rugged terrain.  So far, I’ve heard:

  • Sweet!
  • Huh, sounds like something you would do.
  • That is dumb; you are going to die.

I understand the first two.  I don’t understand the third.  Of the people that make this death statement, ALL of them have less outdoors experience than I do.  I think they might be extrapolating that with his experience, I would die.  (I don’t think he would.)

I’ve heard these statements before.  On one occasion, I learned the most culturally when I did NOT follow the nay-sayers’ advice.  So, I have experience tuning these pressures out.  I seek my own adventures and failures.

Just because you’ve gone down one path doesn’t mean that others should, too.  And, just because you seek to not go down one path doesn’t mean that it isn’t right for others.

So in general: unless you agree with me, I don’t want to hear your opinions.

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Slab City

December 1, 2009 · Filed under a real trip, sustainability

On the few bike tours I’ve ridden, my elevator speech to the question regarding “the best part of the trip” includes a favorite natural scenic landscape and a fun cultural experience.

On the Turkey Tour, my favorite cultural experience was visiting Slab City.

I like the summary of Slab City is Krakauer’s Into the Wild.

The Slabs functions as the seasonal capital of a teeming itinerant society — a tolerant, rubber-tired culture comprising the retired, the exiled, the destitute, the perpetually unemployed.  Its constituents are men and women and children of all ages, folks on the dodge of from collection agencies, relationships gone sour, the law or the IRS, Ohio winters, the middle-class grind.

And, my favorite visual summary is the school bus converted into a sailboat trailer.

I imagine the resident(s) live in the yacht year-round, roughly half the time on water and the other half on a school bus in the desert.

Here is dre’s map of our Turkey Tour.  Slab City, or the Slabs, is near the far east point, Point F.  From this view, I think the Salton Sea looks phallic.

The Slabs are three miles east of Niland, CA.  Niland is a small town located within a few miles of the Salton Sea with a couple of restaurants, a gas station, a grocery store, and a laundry mat.

I find the amount craftsmanship very interesting in the Slabs.  Not just a sailboat on a school bus, but the way so many people are able to live not only independently, but also communally.

Most people reside in RVs.  Actually, if you look around the internet, it is frowned upon to camp in a tent.  The reason for the frowning is not the more common American housing value but in disposing human waste.  Like other biodegradable wastes, human wastes take much longer to biodegrade in harsh climates like the desert.  Junk waste is actually the biggest problem in Slab City.  There’s a lot of trash from transients, broken down cars, tires, regular trash trash, and dumping from Niland townees.

A part that I found interesting was the amount of solar cells there.  Virtually all of the RVs have renewable solar power.  Around a campfire, I learned the buzzwords in solar power: inverters, modified sine waves, and true sine waves took the cake in addition to the other more traditional electrical words.

I think it’s neat how independent these people are.  They don’t pay “rent” or pay for utilities like electricity and water.  Water is free behind the gas station, bee tee dubs.  In addition to that, the campfire we found included retirees making fun of home-buyers.  I don’t express the thought much because it’s tireless to someone with closed ears, but in society I am apart of the minority that thinks taking a large bank loan, in hopes of “my” housing value increasing is a bad investment.

Note that I don’t say it’s bad to have a house; there are pro’s.  But, I think a loan is a bad investment so much that I view it is as a liability and a speculative gamble which I’m not interested in even if you rent out a room or whatever. (In my opinion, an apartment building is more of an investment than a house.)

Anyways. . . it’s always nice to find your other birds of the same feather to flock together.  It was just a passing comment around a campfire, but it put a little smile on my desert chapped lips.

The community of the Slabs felt comforting.  In our short 24 hour visit, people constantly introduced themselves to us and our claimed patch of dirt in the range of young seniors, middle aged, young adults, and even a boy of about 10 years of age.  We were fortunate enough to make a connection earlier in the bike tour which catalyzed our ability to eat a great traditional Thanksgiving dinner which later led into the campfire.

Even without that catalyzed close knit experience, I think it is place worth spending some time to either winter over, stay a night, or even check out Salvation Mountain during an afternoon of your Southwest road trip.  It may pull you out of your consumerist and isolated housing comfort zone; it may give you renewable energy ideas; you may find cool trash or all the books you want to take home in the library; but, it will help your craving for a shower.

If you are interested in more pictures from the Slabs as well as the rest of the Turkey Tour, check out dre’s picture journal on the ‘book.

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Reliving the Mental Barrier

November 30, 2009 · Filed under a real trip, bicyclez

It’s hard to tell someone less experienced that a future event is “challenging but very possible,” when you are nearing onto the decade mark in the arena of said events.  Specifically, I am referring to my experience in slightly stoopid endurance events, and in particular a 400ish mile bike trip.  No matter how many days that are on the agenda, 400 is big number.

The trick is to divide the miles into days.  I remember reading something like this when I was embarking on my first marathon.  ”Yeah, it is ‘just one mile at a time,’ but it’s 26 of those!”  It didn’t sound quite right to me.

In marathons, the experience that I go through involves a few major stages: the initial start of finding a good pace, the majority miles where I’m in some kind of groove, the decision point to keep the pace or speed up, and the final push to the end.

So, a marathon isn’t quite one mile at a time, for me.  Yet, it’s no longer a daunting big mileage to me, either.  It’s now roughly four stages I pass through.

I enjoy life moments that let you relive personal learning experiences.

Even though I heard her perfectly, I asked dre what she said when she told me, “That was a fun [up-] hill [climb].”

She thought a climb was fun??

I was shocked.  Days before, the same person that gave me an earful of concerns and reasons of how our 400 mile bike ride was nearing impossible to hear that she just enjoyed climbing a hill!

The previous day was a tortuous 33 miles in a mix of rain and freezing rain.  We broke up the frigid day making hot chocolate in a state park handicap bathroom.

. . . and after a day like that, I could see why an 8% grade incline in a snow covered mountain range with a big tail-wind and a warm sunshine on your shoulders which also marked the halfway point for the day, really could be a fun uphill climb.

Kudos to dre, for turning another leaf and my ability to live vicariously.

On our 2009 Turkey Tour in Awesomerica.

Disclaimer
It turns out there aren’t always food drops and water bottle hand-offs in real life; who knew?  If you’re some roadie thinking that 40+ miles per day isn’t that accomplished, put some gear, food, and water on your bike so that you can cook and camp along the way.

Or, just remain calmer than I am.

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Et tu, Bicycle?

November 17, 2009 · Filed under bicyclez

As jiff explained to me this morning, I am cursed by the Ides of Yesvember.  On Yesvember 15 in 2008 and 2009, I crashed on my left elbow.

2008

My crash was worse in 2008 as I endo’d a mountain bike at nearly top speed. (Haven’t had any interest mountain biking since; who knew?)

Mountain bike crash on Yesvember 2008.

The worst part of this experience was that I crashed between laps in a team relay.  During the laps, I saw a rider with a ghost white face bee line to the medic tent because he had 5 to 10 sticks the size of my pinkie finger lodged into his deltoid, like from a warrior scene in a movie.

As if the seeing this guy wasn’t enough to bring down my mental bruise from the crash, a crazy lady soon came into the same area with half the skin on her face missing from her road rash.  She was doped up on adrenaline and requesting that she get cleaned and patched up as soon as possible so she could still compete.  After the adrenaline wore off, she decided to drop from the race.

I eventually made my second lap, even though I rode much more cautiously.

2009

This year I was in an intersection barely riding at a walking pace, when I decided to stand on my pedals [to accelerate faster].  My chain fell off the front chain ring which threw me into a tailspin where I landed on my same left elbow as the year before. In throwing my left hand off the bars, my handlebars impaled my gut. Furthermore, I created a “yard sale” with my bike pump and pannier coming off the bike.  When dre and a cop asked if I was ok, I did the wind-is-knocked-out-of-me-just-let-me-wallow “Yeah ok” and a wave.

The cool thing about this year is that I put another hole into a shirt I crashed in before, on an alpine slide.  The shirt has about 20 holes now.  So, I have that going for me, which is nice!

[And, I understand more why dre recently bought me a Road ID!]

‘010

I am forewarned about the Ides, Bicycle.

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