Riding like my head's on fire

Ride #88

Saturday, July 16th
13 miles on the American River Parkway

Although I am still recovering from minor shoulder surgery, I dragged my sweetheart and his college-aged son out on the bike trail today.
First ride since surgery!
They had some fresh air and sunshine, and I had minions to unload my beautiful orange beast. Even with the ramp, it is still more than I should lift right now. AND someone else got to pump up 7 tires, which I usually do.

There were a lot of people out today, all enjoying the clear, warm, but not blazingly hot weather.

Since this is the American RIVER parkway, we got to hear (and catch glimpses) of dozens and dozens of happy people in various bright-colored watercraft floating down the river. We could have even stopped for fresh produce along the way!

High racer recumbents, several trikes (hand and foot powered), folks with cruisers with baskets (one with a dog, a-la Toto in the Wizard of Oz), fast-moving skinny racer types, kids on little bikes, pedestrians, lots of equestrians.
I saw one sulky, but it was not hitched up. I'm not sure a sulky is suited to off-roading on dirt (which is where most of the horses are) and I know of no horse (not even a heavily sedated one) that would be OK traveling on the paved trail surrounded by hordes of bright fast-moving scary predators.

There were a group of about 8 bicycle tourists traveling from somewhere over to the group camping at Negro Bar. I'm going to say they were coming up from Davis, since they had sort of a laid-back college-town DIY vibe. I saw one enterprising person who had sewn pieces of bandanna to the back of a shirt for improvised jersey pockets.

I finally dug out my little Kodak Playsport video camera as well as my trusty digital point and shoot. Since I spent more time with the video running than taking stills, I needed to clip scenes with which to decorate this fascinating post.

So that meant I needed to load the video editor on my newish computer, and then remember how to use it. And you, the reader, can't tell, but there was a significant gap between this paragraph and the rest of the post.

I had cleaned up my bike, wiped down and re-lubed the chain, and sorted through my bike bags before I headed off for shoulder surgery.
It took me a while to get back in the groove of what stuff I wanted with me, but I eventually figured it out.
However, there was a lot of standing near the car, pondering, remembering some missing item, going inside to look for it, coming back out, going back in for something else. And it took about 5 minutes of hunting to find the sunscreen. Don't you keep your sunscreen on the kitchen counter?

And I finally have a new helmet, one of the Nutcase ones. In orange, remarkably close to my trike's color, and with FLAMES. Which I suppose ought to make me faster. Or at least odder. And the gray flames match my gray hair.

Does it get any better than this?

No.
No, it does not.

(Today's route was from Sunrise boat launch to William Pond and back)

Not quite cats

Ride #35
Saturday, January 22nd
9.9 miles in lovely Folsom

Led my crew of biking acquaintances around and around and around the paths of Folsom. No one got lost, left behind, or confused. And everybody seemed to have fun. My sweetheart (who came with us and graciously agreed to sweep the ride) said he didn't see a single one of my beautiful blue arrows. I did, but then I knew where to look. I think they look bigger from a 'bent then from a conventional bike. We finished off our ride with tasty Chicago style pizza. Yum!

Lots of strollers, toddlers, dogs, other cyclists, geese, ducks, coots, blackbirds, squirrels and so on. A busy day on the trails. Lovely spring weather in the low 60s - perfect for cycling around.

One usable pic today: of everybody else that was on the ride, stopped for a lot of chat at the duck pond. We left when the geese started noisily fighting over the bread some kids were tossing in. Some of us speculated on the possibility of nice fat goose for dinner. Yum!

I had to straighten my seat out a little bit (and I think I'll take another look at it before I ride again) and I really do need to check the indexing of my rear derailer as well. I like my Detroit Tigers baseball cap as a visor under my helmet, but I would like a visor or hat that does not have such bulky seams. Leaves an impression my my poor forehead! I like having pockets in my shirt, but I hate how the stuff in my pockets pulls the shirt on the back of my neck. Time to get serious about figuring out some kind of seat-side pouches for assorted stuff: camera, snacks, handkerchief.

I'll take a couple of days off and then it will be back on the trike again!

Backwards is the New Forwards

Ride #8. Thursday, September 16th. About 6 miles. I managed to go "backwards" around my 6.1 mile route through Folsom. I'm keeping 'backwards' from now on since there are fewer hairy left turns on the counterclockwise route then on the clockwise route.  This route uses relatively quiet neighborhood streets, some with bike lanes and some without.

There were several areas of MUP (multi use path - come on, I know you missed those TLAs) congestion this morning. Again, I utilised the wonderful stability of three wheels and just parked it until the congestion cleared, enjoying the wetlands and other biomes the paths travel though. The area with the most variety of trail-users had a set of three fitness walkers all abreast, two cyclists thinking about passing them, and a family with a toddler who really really wanted to see what was on the other side of the path. All that was missing was a dog or three. Then, just as the congestion cleared, a jogger overtook from behind. I saw the handtrike gentleman again, and a roller blader, and a grandma with her grandsons' razor scooters (Grandma walks them to school every morning and has scooter-toting duties also). I talked briefly to the gentleman with the mountain bike again (his name is Al). No jackrabbits today, but I did spot a fast moving vole or mouse - he got startled but not squashed.

I tend to speed, I admit it. There are so many tempting curves on the Folsom bike paths. There is a particularly nice little curve on my route that I really enjoy. This time I kept pedaling around it and leaned into the corner like some kind of speed freak. Only to emerge almost in the middle of another clot of trail users! I demonstrated the power of disc brakes and we all had a good laugh at my expense.

I have a mystery noise when on the largest chainring in front - it seems to me it might be one of the chain tubes (sleeves the very long chain runs through to help keep it clean). I'm not going to use that ring very much yet, so I won't worry about it at this point. Next time I have the trike in the garage I'll see if I can pin it down. My messing about with the barrel adjuster on the rear derailluer seems to have done the trick - shifting is back to the smooth side of things.

I've ordered an extra long visor for my helmet, since yellow face is out in the mornings still. Looking forward to some fog.

This is how it's supposed to be!

Ride #5, just under 7 miles. I feel good after this ride - no twinges or anything. Not too tired. So I think this will be a good distance for the next week. Then I can see about increasing a little more.

A few posts back I mentioned my shoulder troubles. Well, a night of rehearsing for an upcoming concert can often set the shoulders talking to me and last night sure did. I went to yoga this morning and had a lot of trouble with my shoulders, enough that if I had planned this ride on a conventional bike I would have had to have canceled my plans. I was a little slower and more careful getting the trike in and out of the car, but that's the only way my shoulders affected my ride. Yay! Boo-ya! Go Team! And there was much rejoicing and so on and so forth.

The Friday morning population of the bike paths is a bit more dense (like: populous, not dim) than other weekday mornings. The usual assortment of fitness walkers, dog walkers, and other cyclists. Including one tending to the road bike side of things. My route today was essentially a torturous double lobed circle and every time I came around to face east, which I did 14 times, I got a face full of early morning sun. Bleah! I'm considering a longer visor for my helmet.

Today's route was planned with streets! So I loaded up my bike with two flags and two rear taillights and a headlight.

Parked for a moment just off a bike trail

The large pink flag comes from a small company called Purple Sky. This is the largest flag they have and the gray circles are reflective material. Someday I will learn to take photos without excessively cluttered backgrounds.

The pole for this flag is six feet tall, and the theory is that it will be about windshield height on a SUV. I figure the little orange bike flag will get the rest of the vehicles.

I don't normally succumb to naming vehicles, but I know a couple of people who specialize in horse names for their bikes. They've had classical names (with Homer you never need to run out) and I think names from horse stories (but don't quote me on that). And not just ordinary horse names, but Elvish ones from Tolkien. So how could I resist naming my beautiful orange machine?

Sleipnir.

You know, that crazy eight-legged horse of Odin's. Half stallion and half Loki in the form of a mare. Those gods.
What can you do?

So I need to make a Sleipnir flag (a little preview - based on an eighth century stone carving). I figure it's perfect - a trike has too many legs for a bike and not enough for a horse. And the trike is made in Germany (yes, I know Germany is not Scandinavia - sue me.)

Anyway.

Besides the flags and lights, I also added a tiny bike computer (odometer, speedometer, trip etc.). What is this insistance on having directions with NO WORDS - I like words. Pictures are OK, but words make more sense. Anyway, I'm still figuring out all the things it can tell me but, assuming I've set the tire size correctly, my top speed today was 19 miles an hour. I did get pedaling pretty fast at one point so I'm not totally surprised.

This trike is working out very well and I look forward to going outside and getting exercise. And aerobic and all that.
A cycle, no matter how many wheels, does you no good unless you use it.

So get out there and indulge in your favorite form of exercise!

Next ride, and next post, this weekend.