Dreaming of a Life Less Ordinary

  A year ago I couldn't ride a bike.  I physically, was to heavy to do it.  If I would have tried to get on the bike my ass would have not let me stay on it.  It would have simply been to painful. If you would have told me then that on 8/30/22 I would be logging on to report in preparation for my 62 Mile Bike Ride on Saturday I road over 853 miles since June 14, 2022 and that number will  around 865 by tour day, then push over 900 miles by the end of the ride on Saturday, I would have said you are nucking futz.  I could barely walk in November 2020 and now I am arguably in the best shape of my life today.  That is insane.  It really blows my mind.   I am really excited for Saturday.  A little scared too.  62 is a long way to go.  2,800 feet is a lot of climbing to do.  However, it is nervous excitement. I was out for 11 miles today.  I had to balance my energy.  Part of me wanted to crank it out.  However, every time I got over 15 mph or wanted to move into the big ring, I made mys

Me and The Narrow Subway: 08/25/22 It is hard to believe that Tour de Fuzz is 8 ½ day away.   Where has the summer gone?   Today is my last official half day, where I take time away from the office to get my distance rides in.   Depending on which Satellite you use, I either road just over 36 or just over 35.   I tend to lean towards Coospo being right but mainly b/c it usually has me going further and climbing more.   What?!   Of course, I like the one better that gives me better results.   Who doesn’t.     I had no defined route for today.   I had an idea of what I was going to do.   Go out Northfront to the Narrow Subway, turn around, take Dyer to the end, turn around go back to Northfront, come down out of the hills, go left on GreenBill, left on Patterson Pass, to Cross, up and down cross, turn around come up Cross and then down patterns, to the end of GreenBill and that should be a day, between 35 and 40 miles.   Not too shabby.   There was just one little problem and I do ap

  The beginning of the Climb up Northfront The Siren continues to call…   Perhaps at this point I should know better, but I don’t.   After what I went through today, I should know better to refer to the hills out on Northfront east of downtown Livermore the Sirens, but I just can’t help myself.   I liken me needing to go ride these hills to what the old-time sailors would say is the call of the Siren.   They call and I go to them.   I never waivered when I left home today.   I was going to go out and ride Northfront up and past Dyer and take it until I got the entrance for the Waste Management Landfill.   Did you know that I lived so close to a Landfill?   I sure didn’t.   I would ride out that way until I either hit the Landfill or 45-minute mark, then I would turn around and come back.     I climbed up to the gentle slop that is Northfront to Dyer without much trouble.   I stayed in middle ring all the way up.   I passed Dyer and thought I will ride it when I come back by

  Training Ride:   The Siren’s Call ~ 35 Miles   The ride was supposed to be 60 on Saturday but unfortunately David, AKA the Beav, was feeling unwell.   No Beav and rising temperatures in Livermore on Saturday made me rethink my cycling strategy.   There was no reason that I had to do 60 miles other to say that I did it twice before the ride in Santa Rosa.   I decided that riding alone and not wanting to ride in 100-degree heat, I would half the ride and do 35 to 40 miles.   Shit happens, and we must modify our plans.   No, need to kill oneself. The riding is supposed to be fun, so go out and enjoy it.   That might rub some people the wrong way, but if it does, I don’t care.   Since, I have started this thing it is about doing what I like when I like to do it.   If I feel like swimming, I swim.   If I feel like riding, I ride.   If I don’t think riding in 100-degree heat is going to be a good time, I am not going to do it.     When I mounted my bike at 8:45 or so on Saturday mo

Cross Meets Tesla and this man is just crazy enough to turn around and go back UP!   Training Ride: There and Back Again – Patterson to Cross and Cross to Patterson   I am not sure when the madness set in.   It was either when I went to bed on Tuesday night or when I woke up on Wednesday morning.   The idea formed very quickly.   It was hill day.   So, it was time to ride hills.   So, I knew that on Hill Day I start out going out to Patterson and ride to Cross and go over the top of the steep deep climb at the start of Cross.   Then after that I go up the slow little roller by the cows to the top of Cross, then it is time to go down, down, down a long and fast hill from Patterson to Tesla.   It is freaking amazing.   It is awesome going down, but it sucks to get there.   I don’t care how many times I ride up Patterson it is a fucking monster which we hate.   We do it, we are doing it twice on Saturday (Thanks Beaver!).   I am not sure why heading east on Patterson, but it is always

  Broke out the Trash Panda Socks Training Ride: 3 Weeks till the Tour and it is time to start the Taper!   Ahhhhhhhhhhh…. It is starting to be my favorite time in any training schedule!   The Taper.   But Billy b you are riding 60 miles on Saturday, how can you say you are starting to taper?   Well… two weeks prior to the tour doing a big ride still gives me plenty of time to rest up and get ready for race day.   The 60 was supposed to be this last weekend, but we are nothing if not flexible.   However, everything else is coming into taper mode other than the 60 this weekend.   Today my two hours rides were reduced to 90-minute rides, then they will go down to hours long rides.   I can’t believe I have ridden through this crazy bike schedule I created.   I have pretty much met all my goals on it, except I had to substitute swimming with weightlifting and rest days, but that is ok, the bike has been very good to me, and I am loving it.   So, picking up an extra bike day and mainten

  Training Ride: 30 Some Miles   Saturday’s ride was solo, for the first time in about three weeks I went out on the road myself for a longer ride.   I must admit, I wasn’t mad at it at all.   I road within myself and my limits, which is what I need to remember to do when riding with better more experienced riders.   I am slow.   That’s ok, I have been on the bike for 3 ½ months.   A year ago, I couldn’t even ride.   I am more terrapin than hare, and that is just fine with me.   Slow and steady finishes the ride.     Going up my first climb on Saturday which is GreenBill Climb #1 was amazing.   For the first time that I remember I went from East Avenue to Tesla with a big shit eating grin on my face.   GreenBill #1 has never been so easy or felt so good.   I was amazed with my progress up and how good I felt going up.   No panic, no worrying will I get to the top, just a nice assent to the top and back over to Tesla.     Climb #2 on GreenBill was also a really good climb.  

     151 Miles ridden since my last entry.  42% of those came in one ride.  It has been a wild and crazy week.  I won’t possibly be able to sum up everything that has happened.  I am not even going to try to.  What I will say is that I was exhausted on Sunday, so I didn’t pick up the pen, and then work has dominated every aspect of my life the last 96 hours.  We all know the “All work and no play makes Billy b a dull boy!”  At least while being busy with work, I was also able to make time for workouts this week.  Three bike rides: Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday.  One session of weights with Clayton.  Total of 40 minutes walking with Shiner today on my rest day. So, I guess all work and some play makes Billy be, something, something, something.... who knows I lost it.    Wednesday 8/3 :  The hilly hotness of a 21.8-mile ride.  I climbed from the south of Cross to Patterson pass.  Man was it hot.  Cranking out the bad gunky the day before wasn’t such a great idea in hindsight b/c my legs

Fine Italian Seat   Recovery Ride:   Cranking out the bad gunky   OMG!   I was so pissed off today.   It happens ya know.   Sometimes you just have bad, busy mornings.   Today was one of those mornings.   To make things worse for the third week in a row I missed my Tuesday swim.   I am starting to wonder what the pool even looks like.   Sometimes shit happens and well what you have to go do is get your bike out and crank out a ride.   Today was an angry ride.   I geared into big ring in the front and my small rings in the back and just took out some frustration on the bike.   It was FUCKING great too.   I didn’t go to hard.   12 miles in an hour.   The Coospo doesn’t lie.   It is just what I needed was to get out of the house and exercise the body and as I did that, the mind opened as well.     As I came around the final stretch of the ride, I realized that I was in the right with most of my frustrations.   That I was sitting in a good spot.   That I just had to work out th

  Two Hour Training Ride:   The Coospo and a fine Italian Seat :(   Let me tell you something.   The Italians must have asses that are made of solid granite.   No really.   I bought me a nice new Italian saddle for my bike.   David and I, LOL, that is rich, David put it on Saturday.   As I did a test ride around the block, I thought man this hurts my bum.   However, I assumed that was just the 55 miles talking.     Well on my two hour and 24.26 miles ride my ass definitely let me know it was not happy with me.   My saddle was sore.   I am thinking it was residual soreness from the weekend.   I am hoping for better things out of my Italian Bike seat, but who knows my ancestors from Italian might just have had rock hard bums.   The bike information even said it had some fancy gel cushion in the entire seat.   However, if it is in there, I couldn’t feel it.   David who is also know as the Beav also put on my new bike computer with speed and cadence tracker.   The Coospo BC107-A an