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#136

Monday, January 9th
Folsom, CA

I said I'd go out and practice on hills.

So I did.

I devised a 12 mile route that has just the right amount of climbing and variety for my current state of legs/wind, went out, and took it for a spin.

It was a beautiful winter day. I wore shorts and a summer-weight top. I was comfortable in the 60 degree weather. I got some funny looks in the grocery store after my ride, but I figure most middle-aged women don't wander around in a bicycling skirt and screaming blue shirt in the middle of winter, even in California.

Fashion aside, here's today's elevation profile.

I took the Oak Parkway bike trail west from Green Valley (the little hills trending downward until about mile 3).

Then I scooted along East Natoma St., waving to some of the Sacramento Wheelmen that were out today heading in the opposite direction. (That took me halfway up the first big rise on the elevation profile)

I slogged my way up the short side of Folsom Crossing, admiring flowers, the lake and construction along the way.

I gleefully sailed down the other side (to about mile 5.7).

Then I dragged myself and my trike up to Beals Point (just before mile 8), where I spent some time gazing at the not-lake

How could I resist this picture?

and chatting with a retired Army guy (the ball cap gave it away) about life, the lake, exercise. No idea what his name is. Good conversation anyway.

Then I bombed down Beals (I even pedaled a little bit down the 2 miles of downhill) and crept up the long side of Folsom crossing (for another scant mile) and then down the last downhill back to my start.

My max speed was about 30mph and my average was about 9mph.

I don't know that there is a good way to get accurate elevation information for a ride. The Tracks program (an Android app) I used today uses gps satellite information to determine elevations. That's how a GPS unit like a Garmin would also. Would it do a better job? I don't know.
The ridewithgps site (where I record my trips when I bother to do so) uses whatever system Google Maps uses. I have been told that ridewithgps overstates the elevation by 20-30%.

The Tracks program yielded an elevation gain/loss of +622 / -619 feet. RWGPS wanted to change it to +1706 / -1705 feet.

Two and three quarters times different?
You've got to be kidding me!
Should I split the difference? Flip a coin? Give up and get some coffee?

uh

The coffee won.

See ya later.

(caffeinated update: 600-some that Tracks gave me is the net elevation gain/loss. The other, larger number, is a sum of ALL the updownupdownupdown I did today)

UPDATE: I reverted to my uploaded route information created by Google Tracks on my phone. I decided I liked Tracks' inaccurate elevation information better than RWGPS'. So I will state that my elevation gain/loss was around 1600 feet. Respectable.

Today's ride map. If you go over to the site (click here), you can playback my ride and do other amusing and time-wasting things.

Flapping Nostrils

Rides # 121 and 122

November 2nd and 3rd
26 miles in three counties: El Dorado, Sacramento, and Placer

My overnight hammock/recumbent trike expedition.

Why did I do this little trip? I've always wanted to tour by bicycle and my splendid machine is made for touring.

Beals Point campground (Folsom Lake SRA) is about 13 miles from my house, quite useful for my first human powered vehicle overnight.

It took me an hour and a half of actual rolling time to get to the campground and two and a half to get back. My average on the way out was 9 mph, and back was just over 5 mph. Yes, you saw that right. 5.2 mph. Oy.

Take a look at this little diagram for the reason:

At noon I rolled out of the garage, down the driveway, shifted to my most grannyiest gear, and slogged up the STUPID hill in front of the house. Every from-the-door-tour will start this way so I ought to get used to it.

Then I got to fly down the first hill on the main road and attained 37.3 mph! That's the fastest yet I've coasted on this bike. Or any bike. Ever.
My nostrils flapped in the wind. Weird feeling.

I traveled primarily on roads (usually no bike lane but with a shoulder of varying quality) but used a bikepath over Folsom Crossing (the road/bridge replacing the old dam road across the American River just below Folsom Lake).

There are multiple construction projects all around Folsom Lake.

Look for the guy to the right of the middle two machines.

My own personal lane! (closed to divert traffic from Folsom Crossing)

Sometimes Folsom Crossing is closed around noon for blasting or other exciting things. I timed it just right to have a nice break in the shade of the construction company's office parking lot. No blasting was audible.

OK, so this is a boring pic. The construction folks were cool. So there.

After Folsom Crossing, although I could have continued on the bike path to the campground, I chose instead to take Folsom Auburn Road, since I needed to pay my camping fee at the kiosk. $25 for the off season, no biker discount.

I chose Site #1 since I was tired and wanted to set up camp and there were two trees Right There for my hammock and I'd have plenty of 'campground TV' to watch since I was right off the main drag.


I loafed around and read and people-watched. Had some tea.

I critter-watched.

Loafed some more and ate dinner (sandwich from the deli I'd stopped at on my way through Folsom).

Gathered some HUGE pinecones (sorry, forgot a pic of those) which helped my twig and small branch fire look Much Bigger than it was.

Finally crawled into my hammock (this is what I use for backpacking - it has insulated quilts above and below: toasty) and read or listened to some podcasts until about midnight.

Got up multiple times in the night (why did I have two cups of tea with dinner? I KNOW better!)

Woke up for good at 6:30am and wandered around the lake shore for a while, then packed up and headed back.

Back over Folsom Crossing, then up all the hills I'd gleefully sailed down less than 24 hours before.

I whined a lot climbing up the hills, but I also had a chance to stop and admire the landscape.

Look! More hills!

Remember the 37.3 mph hill? Well, I had to go back up that. Ugh.

Arrived home 23 hours after I'd left, with way too many pics and video to process.

If you have not had enough of this tall tale, here's a link to a Youtube video I did.

Sproing!

Ride #115
9.5 miles on the American River Trail
Sunday, October 9th

I set out with the intention of going up to Beals Point, then back down and around Lake Natoma. Hey, at least I did the climbing part (I ended up skipping the lake today).

I set off from old Folsom across the bridge and up the trail to Beals.

A very pretty Nor Cal fall day. Not a lot of rain yet, so the hillsides give a nice contrast with the always-green oaks.

That's the backside of Folsom Prison on the far hill.

After the newish construction at Folsom Auburn Road, there is an encouraging sign.

Of course, it is 1 mile of hill but I got to the top and took a snack break by the lake.

These trees looked neglected so today was their photoshoot.

Coming down Beals I still did not quite reach 30mph (29 today, 27 point something the last time). Today, since I had planned to go around the lake, I went all the way back down Beals to old Folsom.

There is a lot of rough trail (tree roots) and I have no way to avoid it. I used to stand up on the bike when I encountered these things. Now on my recumbent I had to just sit there today and let the suspension take the hit and try to remember to keep my teeth from snapping together.

Then there was a sudden rattling! Oh no! My rear fender stay came unstuck. The Gorilla Tape I'd 'repaired' it with had given way. The rattling was driving me NUTS so I did a U-turn and headed back. I'm going to avoid that rough section from now on. Too hard on me and the trike.

Coming back on the bridge there were multiple groups of walkers, including one family who had the BEST way of keeping their kids to one side of the bridge (the interesting side), "Hands on the railing!" Thanks, folks. Made me much less nervous going by them with oncoming bicycle traffic. My trike looks WIDE but it is really not. It looks even WIDER when I'm on a ped/bikeway with high concrete on one side and a high fence on the other.

So my task before Foxys on Saturday is to get a mirror and a flashlight and see if I can see underneath the fender to figure out how the stays are supposed to "stay" (ha ha) and FIX it. I think there is supposed to be a hex nut under there.

I don't really want to ride around Davis/Vacaville/Winters with Gorilla tape stuck to my beautiful trike.

Oh yeah, and last ride I had a soft tire. I pumped it up. This morning it was FLAT. So I stood around in the parking garage changing the tube. I had TWO holes in that stupid tube. So after my ride, when I got home, I sat around and patched it.
grumblegrumblegrumble
Stupid thorns!

Well, wouldya lookit that!

Ride #107
41 miles all over the place
Sunday, September 18th

This was another organized ride. I led it.
I put it together with my upcoming metric century in mind. I had planned to try for 47 miles, but decided to stop a little short.

4 other riders came out for this "tourist's pace" ride: one new to road bikes, one working toward a sprint triathlon, another road-biker, and a friend from the casual bicycling group. For various reasons everybody stopped after 22 miles. I kept on rolling for another 19 miles.

We spent most of our time on bike paths with a little section on some of Folsom's nice roads. We worked hard for the first 12 miles, riding up to Beals Point and then up the Folsom Crossing bridge. One of my rest stops had to be altered since the bathrooms at Briggs Park were locked! But the grocery store across the street was a handy alternate.
From the grocery, we hopped back onto city streets and played in traffic for a while.
I think we were a little relieved to get back on the bike trail, it was certainly quieter.
The next rest stop was at a state park boat launch area near the Nimbus Dam.
Then I stopped (by myself at this point) just past Sunrise, then again at Wm. Pond where I decided it would be wiser to make that my turnaround point. So I did, stopping again near Sunrise, then back to the car, pleasantly tired but not whining.
Yay for no whining.

I got home and ate 3 pieces of cold pizza and took a 4 hour nap.

Ok, so maybe this was a long ride!

I saw a handful of two-wheeled recumbents, a hand trike, a guy on a handbrake-equipped longboard (skateboard) being towed by his two absolutely gleeful dogs, and a bike like no bike I've seen before.
Let's see if I can describe it. It had two wheels, I think equal in size but I'm not sure. Feet below butt (so not recumbent). It looked like the handlebars were up under his chin, supported by what looked like a metal tee-pee. I don't think it was a tall bike (go look in wiki) but it might have been. If I see it again I will turn around, pursue, and shoot! (photo). I did not see the unicyclist, but that's OK.

Here's the map, and there's more blog below.



Instead of riding on Thursday, I decided to crawl all around my trike with wrench and list of torques in hand, checking and tightening if necessary. Now, my little torque wrench does not go past 15nm, so there are some things I can't check. And I will admit I don't really understand the suspension terminology, so I checked what I was sure of and poked around at the stuff I was not.
The rear suspension was the only thing I found that needed a little tightening. Oh and the fender mounts.

I also put my front fenders on. This is how it went:
Find fenders in garage. Look for bolts that WERE taped to the fenders and are no longer, find replacement bolts.
Remove left wheel, put on fender. Put wheel back on, check for fender placement. OK.
Remove wheel, Remove fender. Add locktite (blue) to fender bolts, put fender back on. Put wheel back on.

Repeat for right side, with an additional step of 'wiggle fender mount to correct position' and repeat all.

Oh. and I forgot to mention that before I was even putting on the fenders, I noticed my left tire was a rather low. Look! A goathead! From my garage?! No clue.
Replaced the tube with one of my patched ones.

After I put both fenders on I decided to test ride.
&*(@^%#*? the left tire's flat! Changing the tube with the fender in place is not bad.

ttttttthhhhhhaaaat's all folks!

My day off

Ride #103

Monday, September 5th (Labor Day)
32.5 miles

Being 'self unemployed' you'd think every day was a day off. Not so. Especially after hosting a weekend music party. Guests arrived around 6pm on Friday and the last ones left sometime on Monday.
I bailed out Monday morning for a self-indulgent ride so I can't tell you exactly when they left.

I hit the trail at my old favorite place, in a shopping center in Folsom. I wound down through the bike paths in Folsom, stopping here and there to fiddle with my camera.
I was trying some trick shots involving clamping my old portable "clamp anywhere" Manfrotto tripod to various bits of my bike. I did have some trouble getting the video to run consistently, and I ran through many batteries! HD video is a real juice-sucker.
I've reviewed the video and there is not much there I can use. Oh well. The clamp is nice and heavy and quite stable so the idea is OK, the execution needs work. I just need to figure out how many minutes of video one set of fresh-charged AAs will give me and plan accordingly.

I popped out on the American River Bike Trail near the Folsom outlet mall, then took a break at the State Park near the CSUS Aquatic center for half a ham and cheese sandwich. Then I decided to go up Sunrise to get a tasty Jamba Juice treat. I debated heading over past Wm Pond to the CSUS campus, but returned instead to Folsom via the Hazel Bridge and the north side of Lake Natoma. I slogged my way up to Beals point, ate the other half of my ham and cheese, and chatted for a while with a woman on a trike with an e-assist motor. Cool stuff!

I whipped down Beals, took the Folsom Crossing and a hidden bike path back over to where I had parked my car. I discovered there a note stuck under my windshield wiper from Al, the fellow I'd met last year in this parking lot (mentioned here, and here). We were on the same schedule for bike rides when I first got my trike but lately we'd diverged. Turns out he is looking to buy a recumbent trike, and wanted to pick my brains. I earned my coffee dispensing opinions of dubious value (thanks for the cuppa joe, Al!) and I hope I didn't confuse him further.

During the week of cleaning in preparation for the house party, I rinsed my bike off (I sweat a lot and salt is corrosive) and finished my light bar. I need a way to clamp it to my trike, and Al had the answer. I need to find a part and I can debut my light bar! Yay!

Today I gave that UnderArmour shirt a work out. I think I like it. It really does a terrific job of wicking moisture away. I got chilled enough in the shade at Jamba Juice that I put my windbreaker on.

Here's my ludicrous loop from today.