More Excuses

Memorial Day, 2014

Barely made 100 miles this week. I've been feeling a twinge in a certain spot in my right knee, which usually means the saddle is too low. I raised it about 2mm and the twinge went away, but after riding that way for several days I noticed that both my hands were starting to go numb after about ten miles of riding, my neck and shoulders got stiff and sore, and I had some numbness and pain in my legs after riding. Sunday, after a moderate hill-climb about six miles into a ride, I felt stabbing twinges in a couple of spots in my spine. I stopped and put the saddle back down. Rode another 25 miles, going easy. My right knee popped on a small uphill, but feels OK otherwise; after the ride my spine is a bit crackly, but no phantom pains or numbness in my shoulders, arms and legs and no pinched spots in the vertebrae.

These tiny adjustments can make a huge difference in comfort, but sometimes it takes a lot of tinkering and trade-offs to find the sweet spots. And I expect the exact right set-up can change depending on the season, fitness, fatigue and injury, the type of terrain I'm riding, etc.

Almost Forgot - Ski to Sea

The annual Memorial Day weekend Ski to Sea relay race is coming up early this year, this weekend. I'll be missing the fun because I'm going on an excursion to the Seattle International Film Festival with my community college class.

I haven't been watching the Nooksack River as in previous springs, but here are some photos of the big woodpile, for the benefit of passing canoes. The old pile at the base of the railroad bridge has washed out, leaving just a sandbar with a few old trees stuck in it on that side. Now there is a loose, dirty pile at the Main Street auto bridge.

From the sidewalk on the other side of the bridge, you can see the starting point of the new Nooksack River Trail. This view is of the off-leash dog area near the boat ramp. The wide, packed gravel path runs along the river side through Hovander Park, with side paths to Tennant Lake, as far as the Slater Road bridge. The trail continues on the other side of Slater Road to Marine Drive, but it's not developed yet, and it's pretty overgrown, muddy, rocky, rooty and narrow; also, the Slater Road crossing is a bit dangerous. I've ridden it a few times on my Surly CrossCheck, though, so it's not exactly brutal terrain.

A Slightly Off Day

Actually it was a nice, sunny breezy day and my class was cancelled, so I went out for a 35-mile ride in the afternoon. Unfortunately there seemed to be an unusually high proportion of bad drivers on the road. I was barely out of downtown Ferndale when two SUV's with British Columbia license plates passed me illegally in an intersection as I was making a left turn from the turn lane. Two cars almost crowded me off the pavement when I was riding near the edge of the lane on a road with no paved shoulder. I moved left, taking the traffic lane to keep following cars from passing too close, but the drivers continued to make dangerous passes, crowding both me and oncoming cars. I even got blocked in by two guys on skateboards on a fast downhill near the university. I was going faster than them and wanted to pass, but they were weaving across each other's paths trying to slow down. My eyeballs went nuts trying to track both of them at once. I finally had to pass them on the right while they zigzagged across two lanes.

Also, it's tent caterpillar season. Bleaggghh.

So it was not a fun day, despite the nice weather and unexpected mid-week day off.

To keep perspective, though, I remind myself of the many magazine stories I've read by or about people who have made solo long-distance bike trips. Almost every one of them admitted to melting down somewhere along the way, sometimes more than once, sometimes because they had crashed, been chased by a dog or harassed by drivers. But often there was no reason, other than fatigue, hunger, thirst, heat or cold, plus loneliness and homesickness.

Several times when I've been out rambling around the county for hours on some back road, I've suddenly been overwhelmed by a feeling of something or other, thinking "Why am I doing this? This is so dumb. What a waste of energy. What a waste of time. I could be back at home . . . "

Doing what? Keeping my cat company. Tidying up. Reading magazines about bicycle travel. Actually, I feel bad about leaving my cat home alone so much and I miss him if I'm gone overnight, but otherwise rambling around on a bike is better.

Another (metric) Century

Just dropped in to pick up the mail . . . 

Last Thursday we had a spring downpour and I stayed home in the evening to do a little yoga-therapy. It was nice to crack my windows open a bit to listen to the rain and smell the fresh air while going through a gentle routine. Friday the weather cleared up a bit and I did a ten-mile ride in the afternoon, and an easy thirty-mile ride on Saturday. Which all turned out to be just the right way to work up to another 62-miler on Sunday, when I rode a loop from the Silver Reef Casino on Slater Road, to the town of Blaine.

The most memorable feature of this route is that it truly felt like more downhill than uphill. It seemed much easier than the Chuckanut-Colony Road 62-miler I rode two or three weeks ago. (That is a pretty hilly ride.) Possibly I got lucky in preparing for the ride, or maybe the wind was at my back all the way around. There are also a lot of pretty views, and an interesting change of scene in the border town of Blaine.

From my apartment I rode Ferndale Road, to Slater Road, then on to the casino. There is a well-known bike route up a steep hill climb on Slater to Lake Terrell Road, but I turned off early to Elder Road. Partly I wanted to skip the steep climb, and partly out of curiosity, because Elder Road is marked as a tsunami evacuation route. It's a narrow two-lane road with little to no shoulder, but very fun to ride, straight with gentle waves tending downhill all the way to Douglas Road. I turned left there, rode up a short hill to Lake Terrell Road, which becomes Rainbow Road, and then Kickerville Road, which I followed north until it t-bones at Loomis Trail Road. I turned left there and continued north all the way to Blaine, where I toured around the harbor and marina and stopped for a snack break.

I believe this used to be the Canadian Consulate - or the Customs House.
Mail services are big business in Blaine.

Heading home I took the long, scenic route around Drayton Harbor, Semiahmoo Drive, and Birch Point Road in to Birch Bay Village. There is one shortish but steep climb up from Drayton Harbor to the Semiahmoo Parkway intersection, followed by a nice downhill stretch on Semiahmoo Drive.

From Birch Bay I followed the familiar route of the Coast Millenium trail, riding Aldergrove Road to Kickerville, Rainbow, Lake Terrell and back to Slater Road. There I tore down the steep hill I'd skipped climbing at the start, maxing out at 38mph and holding above 17mph as far as the Haxton Way stoplight at the intersection by the Silver Reef Casino, only stopping because the light changed to red. Then I rode Slater Road until it crossed the Nooksack River, where I went left across the road to the river trail through Hovander Park, and on to home.

Nice spot for a coffee break

Mushroom Season

http://velonews.competitor.com/2014/05/news/opening-stages-across-ireland-produce-surprises_326703

I should be ashamed to call myself a Pacific Northwesterner. The weather has followed a pattern of a few sunny days followed by a few days of heavy rain, and I've been wimping out. I've been managing a few 25-30 mile rides each week, I've developed some funny tan lines on my arms and my face is a little less pallid. But it's been more maintenance-level training than progressive improvement.

Five Days of Rain

That's the forecast. I managed thirty miles on Saturday, while running errands and shopping, but my training plan called for a seventy-plus-mile ride. We probably won't have a sunny day - or a rainless day, at least - until later this week. So I'm falling far behind in trying to build up to the distances I'll need to be ready for a century ride at the end of June.

The weather has been perfect for envelope-stuffing, though, so I got some fund-raising letters out over the weekend. (My appeal is posted on the RED-BELL 100 page tab at right.) The purpose of this ride is to support World Bicycle Relief, an organization that provides bicycles to people in struggling communities in Africa.

I was a little suspicious about this project when I read that the ride is limited to 600 participants, yet the fund-raising minimum is only $150 (plus registration and event fees). It just didn't seem like this would raise enough money to cover event costs, never mind benefiting poor African communities. Then I read about some of last year's participants who raised $6000 or more, and realized that the problem is more with free-riders like me, not the event. A little further checking, and I found that although World Bicycle Relief gets some low marks for accountability and transparency, 77% of the money raised goes to the cause and not to administration or event costs.