Ganaraska Ride

Last weekend inlaw ride. This past Friday I headed up to Millbrook / Port Hope area to pick up the bairn who'd been camped out at the 'Farm' whilst mum was in Oslo and dad ran around trying to get stuff done in the time not taken up by work or training. Weather as you might know here was outstanding last week and the boy had a great time running about in the yard, sucking on rocks and generally learning how to get back up from spontaneous toddler wipe-outs. I arrived lateish on Friday, spent the night and in the morning after Deco's breakfast and some play time I headed out for a short ride.

As background every time we'd visit there over the years I'd always think "damn, these would be nice roads to ride". Typically curvy rolling hills on the north-south routes and huge long vistas and fairly long climbs / descents on the east west lines.

So, I finally got my chance. Saturday was a beautiful day, Declan was in good form having a blast playing and being spoiled by the old pair and I was at peace with the world. yep, you bet. So I headed out onto No.10 south from Millbrook which looks like this,


and then onto Ganaraska No.9 west towards Toronto. No.9 is an awesome road for riding. Huge hills, bigger views and good pavement. I basically just did an out and back but with 40min each way spent on No.9 that means 3 of these bad boys in each direction.

..the photos don't do them justice unfortunately, but they're good long climbs. Almost a perfect interval hill. So the ride was excellent, the scenery was outstanding and much fun was had.

I noticed this place
and considered dropping off a picture of Declan and my resume, but I've already got so much on my plate I figured I'd only make my life that much more unmanageable.

another interesting thing of note is that apparently 'round Ganaraska way it's mandatory to have a lethal dog patrolling your property. Seriously, I grew up in the sticks, and am not in the lease fazed by big bad farm dogs but the brutes up there were monsters. One was a Pitbull or Staffordshire that had to be 60lbs and was wearing a leather vest/harness. The straps on the harness were the size of seatbelts and he made them look frail. I couldn't count the rottweilers and other notables were the numerous Alsatians with thick, heavy legs. Nothing like the typical american/german sheppard thats lean, low, and fast looking, nope. These brutes looked like they just shook off the plow yoke after a hard mornings work and were looking for a little sport. Luckily none of them considered me 'sport'. Probably looked at me and figured rightly "wheres the sport in that? Better eatin' on a chicken wing anyway.." So it was no bother at all though one did pace me through a few fields on the other side of the fence and made 35km/h look easy.

So, that was Saturday, after an awesome Friday there-and-back to Champlain lookout from home, (first of the year!) and before a 4hr LSD ride with the original Big Ring.

Which brings us to now. and the weather. which has turned to total crap. Cold and rain through the weekend. so, some time might be spent here; unless I don rain gear for a spell. ..which I might. Maybe a Friday double loop of the park at 10 degrees with rain gear to see how much fun can be gleaned from suffering.

which kinda sucks and worse, it's tax time.

..and that means for me one thing. Depression and, or volatile mood swings. Every year without fail I suffer anxiety and depression in the face of submitting income taxes and this year is no exception. ..in fact it seems a bit worse than in past so if you see me kicking my lunchpail down the street, head down muttering at my feet or receive a stoic thousand yard stare in response to a common query or pleasantry please afford some patience my way. Rest assured that at some point this unfortunate time will end and life can go back to normal. I for one can't wait

Phat Tony's O-Cup

Our own Phat Tony placed 21st out of 37 riders in the Masters 35-39, Sport Male category at the O-Cup this past weekend at Mansfield Outdoors Center. Well done Tony!

Just one thing . . . no love for Big Ring Racing? Affiliated Team/Club?!?!? What's up with that?!

Good advertisement

http://www.dothetest.co.uk/

'lil ringer makes it onto Brodie's web site

When emailing Brodie a few months ago for a quote on a replacement frame for Riley's Menace (frame had lots of cosmetic damage from the Austin shipping fiasco), they had mentioned that Riley should submit a rider's profile for a contest.

A couple of months later we get an email to say Riley's one of a few riders who won the contest and will be appearing on various pages of Brodie's web site. Free swag for the little 'ringer as well.

Sunday ride, nicknames and farewell to a friend

On Sunday, Big Ringers got together for the largest team gathering since North Carolina. Also along for the ride were Scott and Joey. The plan was to meet at the border (Champlain Bridge) and do a loop in foreign territory, ie., Quebec, la belle province which also happens to be home to these two clowns. The original Big Bing and shapely bum also met up with us but they went on their own for some BC Bike Race bonding. We rode over the Gats into the towns of Chelsea, Wakefield, Cantley and back to Chelsea. It was a great ride at a moderate pace for the most part with a few spirited climbs here and there. Unfortunately, no-one brought a camera but I was able to snap a few pics with my cell phone and they turned out ok.

At the Wakefield Bakery- Coco, Vegan Vagabon, T-bone, Zamboni, Lenny, Scott

Kari has inherited the nickname T-Bone, the vote was unanimous!


Suggested nicknames for Zamboni: Milk man, Milk bone,
tighty whitie, Bib (The Michelin man), Glad Man. We need a poll!

Zamboni was quite pleased with his bum in his
white spandex - he thinks it is as sexy as Tanya & Kari's!

This was my last ride on my Giant TCR1; the best bike I have ever owned. In the 6 years that I owned this bike, I never had a single mechanical failure (not including flats, of course). I can't say enough good things about Ultegra components (they are flawless) and the very effective compact frame design. The bike now belongs to a young triathlete; I wish him as many great rides with it. My new ride is coming this week... stay tuned!

A farewell to a very dependable friend...

Coco & Zamboni

Who knew that Coco was such ladies man?!?

Hope Anne doesn't find out!


And Zamboni . . . . when are we going to see you in your whity-tighties?

Look'in good Stef. You been working out?

Breaking News: the Gatineau Parkway is open!

Woohoo!

I rode from Gameline all the way to the Champlain lookout via Blacks. I came down the same way so I can't say what the Fortune climb looks like.

Very exciting!!

It's Official

The people have spoken . . . . and Tobin's nickname is now officially "Coco"
or "Coco the monkey"

T-Bone says, "What's not to like about being called Coco?"

First timer!

Just getting used to this posting stuff....very easy.

Hey, not that I've had problems with this much in my days but... someone or maybe all of us should share tips on personal lube. I always get asked and since I don't have many problems with this, my answers are limited. But I may want to be more pro-active in my next 24 hrs events.

In Adventure racing, I used Silicone glove cream, especially for the feet since in AR we get and stay wet. This protects the skin, let's it breathe and helps to keep your feet from getting all white... and works for those other private parts...no nude review for this one!

Commuting

Today being earth day I enjoyed a coincidental first (partial) commute to work.
I'd been a good long while since I've commuted on account of the distances and locations of my client locations. typically between 65-84km from home, if not in entirely different cities (but I think I've closed that chapter of my life).

As background I'm a contract designer, draftsman for food industry, so being a 'non-employee' I get to enjoy some freedoms but these freedoms go hand in hand with some restrictions also. Notably supplying my own workstations, measurement tools and other awkward heavy shit. I'm also sometimes required to travel to other client facilities during the day (with all the awkward shit) so commuting hasn't always been possible. However, I've been pretty stable working with one client for a while now, have my own office on site, a change room and a locker so I really have no excuse other than I'm expected to be on site by 8am, and like to be on site by 7:15-7:30 which makes for early mornings if yer gonna jam in a ride on the way.

Anyway, enough about me, what do you think about me?? ha.

so, given the distance, timing and route (half of which is 400 series highway) I'm forced into doing a hybrid commute. I drive the first 40km and park in a (extremely convenient) 'park n ride' car park and ride the remaining 43km from there on classic eastern Ontario roads. which is to say flat flat flat, mostly straight and windy. Eastern Ontario is flatter than a heroin chic runway model and mostly open farm fields so if theres any wind in this hemisphere your gonna feel it full on. Further, theres a curious pattern to the Eastern Ontario wind. Its always a headwind. Seriously, maybe not 100% of the time but easily 99%. It's only redeeming feature is that it's better than a friggen compass. (which are riddled with error given the magnetic pole axis' are out of line with the rotational axis' pole) but no fear! just raise a dampened finger to guage the wind direction and head into it. Doesn't matter where you're going, it's virtually guaranteed to be into the wind so you know if you've got a tailwind yer only screwing yourself for later on. So wheel around until you hear that familiar roar in your ear that's coupled with crawling along in your granny and be content in knowing that you're headed safely toward your destination.

o.k. it's not that bad and today was pretty tame but it's pretty freaky that I've been on the receiving end of tailwinds about 3-5 times in the last several years of riding and on at least two of those occasions I was lost heading the wrong way so.. today was a headwind. Not a frightfull bastard of a headwind but headwind nonetheless. oh well.. sounds like complaining I know but its really more of a curiosity now as I've given in accepting that I'm just going to have to work a little harder for my speed.
..that I'm only curious until the wind goes up over 25km/h in my face and then I'm bitching & cursing with my head down, burning legs, heart rate stratospheric as the ground crawls by..

but! Today was not that day. Today was a bit of this;



with a lot of this;

which is a pretty awesome way to start a day, headwind included. Even the chicken farm I have to pass each day didn't reek up the joint as much as usual which was a major blessing cause when that place is ripe it's bad. Like, unspeakable bad. Like, how could anything considered "food" in any form come from a place that smells bad like a-cholera-victim-getting-a-perm-in-the-basment-of-an-abattoir-bad. ..but there I go again, getting away from the point. (guess I'm not a linear thinker) which is that commuting rocks and today rocked better than lots.

My Ironman Experience

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

Congratulations Kari!

Just wanted to post up a big congratulations to Kari for finishing (and finishing very respectably) in her first ever Ironman Triathalon in Arizona last week. Way to go Kari!!

Century

Phat Tony and I went out Saturday and did managed to get in our second "Century" ride of the season, (the first being the Tucson Century back in February). We started out at 0700 and did an hour easy warm-up out Prince of Wales, across Hunt Club to Riverside, to Hog's back, and down Colonel By, 24km in total. We arrived at CycleLogik at 0800 and joined their weekly group ride, same 81km route as I posted two weeks ago. This is a fast-tempo group ride (33km/hr this week) that I'm really enjoying. We then met Tanya and Stef at Cyclelogik at 1030 and headed out towards Manotick. Check out Anthony's new wool Molteni jersey, a la Eddie Merckx which he got for his birthday (which is actually today -- happy fook day assface!).



The ride to Manotick started slowly in the heavy traffic on Wellington street, but we felt safe because we had a pace-bike keeping the road clear in front of us:



Conditions were lovely for riding, here we are on River road. Notice the radar has our pace running pretty high. It slowed down a bit once Tanya stopped pulling the pack. Tanya had also been out riding for a couple of hours so we relied on Stef for most of our pacing.



The Manotick leg was 58 km done at a 27.7km/hr, almost entirely zone 1 (except when Tanya had us going 70)

Got home 100.7 miles since the start of the day, and spent the afternoon doing some work outside with Anita and Kona cheering me on. They are both getting bigger by the day:



I was very pleased to get this ride in, since I have been an allergenic wreck all week and had called Anthony on Friday night to tell him I might have to bail after the first hour because I was feeling like shit. Turn out allergies only make you feel terrible, they don't seem to sap your strength as much as you think.


I'm taking today off to enjoy this taste of summer.

Commuter gets a cleaning . . .

With the warm weather I decided that my commuter could use some lov'n and I figure the best way to do that is to start with some cleaning. The bike hasn't seen the entire winter, like a lot of them have and I had hoped mine would, but it did get to commute at least once every month which says something I guess since we did get 13 feet of snow this winter!!

Here she is . . . all 50 bucks worth. My buddy Scott thought I would like road riding so he hooked me up with this ride last spring. I put 2k+ kms on it last year so I think I got my money's worth.

One of the things that I keep clean on my bikes is the chain, unfortunately the commuter doesn't get its share of this cleaning. Sometimes I use a typical chain cleaner, sometimes I soak the chain in degreaser, then brush it, rinse it and dry it. I don't know about you but one of the things I hate is getting greasy from a dirty chain.

Sometimes it happens on the trail when I am fixing a broken chain . . .

and sometimes it happens at home when I am cleaning up the commuter!

Either way the end result is that I have grease where I don't want it!

No matter how it gets there it can be a real pain in the A$$!!

I recently tried a "Citrus-Powered Degreaser Hand Wipe" or CitraWipe that is made by a company called Zogics. They come in a very portable and convenient little package that can easily fit in a jersey or a pack.

The pictures above were just taken a few minutes ago in the garage and this one is what my hand looks like after a wipe down, pretty sweet huh!?!

Here's a shot of the packaging and the wipe after I beat the crap out of it. . . . or into it as it were.

I'll definitely be carrying this in my hydra-pak this summer but I hope I only have to use it on my hands!!! I better throw one in my seat pack on the road ride also in case I get a flat, it'd be good for cleaning up after any messy incident.

P.S. If you're wonder'n whether or not the grease came off everywhere you'll have to ask the boss! :-o

Almonte, Paris-Roubaix

Three Big Ringers braved the elements to make fools of themselves riding mountain bikes at the OBC Paris Roubaix on the weekend, in celebration of the Paris-Roubaix race. Here we are at the finish (picture unceremoniously stolen from Craig's Blog, where you can read a longer account):



In the end, the ride was 76km which we covered in about 3hrs and 2 minutes, putting us in about 90th spot of the 115 entrants. Now, to be fair Craig and Fritz could have easily finished a fair bit higher (even on mountain bikes!) if they hadn't been waiting for me to catch up after every hill in the 2nd half. It was nice to have team mates watching out for you, even if they were the ones who broke you in the first place. Fritz, I owe you a beer.

Now, it's not like I didn't know I was going to blow up, it was more of an experiment to see when. I had done the CycleLogik group ride the week before and was quite pleased to have been able to run for a full 2 hours at about 85% of my max HR. Trying to keep up with Craig and Fritz however had me running at 90% (just over my threshold). I figured this was a good opportunity to see how long I could last doing that. About 90 minutes it turns out:


The good news is that when we slowed down to my pace, nobody passed us and we still reeled in and passed at least two groups of people on Cyclocross bikes. The bad news is that my legs were none too pleased doing 40km of commuting today.

After the race, we had some of the best hot chocolate ever made (according to Craig). The secret recipe you ask? NoName (tm) powder, hot milk, mixed in with three and a half hours riding in the cold with mud splattering all over you.

Day 2 Ride 1

Day two started off with a ride called Amasa Back, an out and back (actually up and down) of about 25 km. A short road ride amongst some huge sandstone walls and you are onto the doubletrack climbing.



Basically this one goes up an old jeep road with some moderate angle and moderately technical climbing. At the top you get some nice views of the Colorado River.






No pictures of the ride down, it was basically a rowdy descent as fast as you could go over drops , rocks, ledges, and little gaps you had never seen before. Because it was wide you had lots of choices to make but some of them had negative consequences.....



my only flat all week!


Day 2 Ride 2

After a quick lunch we headed North on Highway 191 for Baby Steps , it was supposed to be a light ride but it turned into a bit of effort, 20+ km of rolling desert single track and some slickrock. Excellent riding especially the hard pack, twisty singletrack, it was like being in Albion Hills without the trees.



The coolest thing was the Dinosaur footprints, seriously.



And another one for scale

Starting the Cycling Season Off Right

Starting the Cycling Season off Right

With the snow starting to melt and the temperature rising, we are all itching to get back out on our bikes. For those who have put their bikes away for the winter season, it is extremely important to build back to your previous fitness level and form gradually in order to prevent overuse injuries. This is even more important if you have a history of previous injuries.
Early in the season is when extra keen cyclists are at particular risk of injury.
So to start the cycling season off right :

Bike Tune Up
Make sure that your bike is safe and in good working condition.
Worn out or improperly adjusted bearings, brakes and derailleurs can lead to a less efficient ride and more work than necessary.
Have your favorite LBS examine the condition of your bike and tune it up for you if you are not mechanically inclined.

Review your Cycling Clothing and Equipment
Check your clothing and equipment for wear and replace them as needed.
A worn out saddle or shorts will affect your comfort on your bike and as a result may affect your entire riding position on your bike.
Make sure that your handlebar tape and gloves are still offering good comfortable padding.
Make sure that your cycling shoes aren't worn and too flexible in the sole. This will be less supportive and may lead to discomfort and numbness in your feet.

Dress of the Weather
With the cooler spring weather make sure you keep your body and working muscles warm. Cover your extremities, hands, head and feet well if it is cold. Dress in layers so you may remove one once you or the weather has warmed up. Keep a light rain jacket in your back pocket in case the weather turns foul.

Build a Base
Start the season off with shorter rides and easy spinning at 90+ RPM. Your easy rides will allow your cycling muscles to slowly and safely build and adapt to the new work of riding again. Ride different bikes. Road riding is a valuable training tool that can help build your aerobic fitness and endurance. Supporting your body differently and requiring different muscle recruitment patterns helps prevent injuries.
Avoid pushing big gears up hills or against those nasty spring headwinds. If you can; go out against the wind and back with the tailwind to give yourself a nice recovery ride on your return.
Increase your mileage slowly to build your endurance.
Start off with non-technical rides and slowly increase the difficulty to retrain your riding skills.

Warm Up
Always start each ride off with a warm up at an easy pace for the first 10 minutes. This will start the blood circulating in your muscles to warm them up. Even if you feel energetic and enthusiastic, don't start out like a bat out of hell ! This is the best way to strain a muscle/tendon or flare up an old injury.
After 10 minutes it's a good idea to get off your bike and stretch your quads, hams and calves. It only takes a couple of minutes.
Gradually increase your pace and your body will thank you.

Cool Down
Ride easy for at least the last 10 minutes of your ride. This will flush the toxins out of your working muscles and allow your body to properly cool down.
After your ride it is important to stretch for 5 - 15 minutes to help your muscles regain their flexibility.
Tight inflexible muscles will increase your risk of injury. Stretch your major cycling muscles :
Quads, Hamstrings, Calves, and your back. Repeat each stretch 5 times holding for 20 seconds. You should feel a mild tightness, but not pain with each stretch.

Pay Attention to any areas of Discomfort
Other than tired muscle aches your ride should be comfortable. So be particularly aware of any discomforts in your back and neck or knees early on. If any pain does not disappear over the next couple of rides and maybe a couple of adjustments to your bike; then make sure to have someone take a closer look at your riding position. Continuing to ride in a poor position can lead to a serious overuse injury. Back and knee pain are not an integral part of cycling as some have come to believe. Mountain biking should be a fun and enjoyable experience.

These simple tips and patients in building your foundation will translate into a season of success !!

Safe and Happy Cycling !!!

Mary Paterson PT www.bike2body.ca