Triple D Jan 19th. Bike, Ski, and Run.

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Jan. 19th 2014 the Best Western hotel will be buzzing again. Triple DDD. Some come to race, some come to ride and the camaraderie. Some finish, some don’t. Runners, cyclists, skiers something for everybody. It is more than anything else, a whole lot of fun, the night before, the journey, and the evening afterwards. Come join.

 

Good night

I was thinking about blogging some stuff and thoughts...but the night got away from and I am tired.

"On Our Bikes"

 

Melissa 1986 on her bike

 

 

"On our bikes."

It was over 20 years ago that I last rode a bicycle with her. Her life got so busy. She went on to become an accomplished pianist, a piccolo player and an all-state level flute player. Along with math and State speech competitions, college courses in high school, valedictorian, and a 4.0 National Merit Scholar. By this time the sanctity of the home had crumbled. Alcoholism and drug abuse running rampant and out of control in a parent will do that to any home. I thought I could fix it, make it all better, I couldn’t. It only got worse sending the household into hell.  Melissa needed to get out, and left home at age 17. Iowa State University knew she was an exceptional student and offered her a 4 year full scholarship. Attending classes at a more then full time schedule while maintaining employment with whatever time was left over. Summers found her interning out of state for Proctor and Gamble, and Flint Oil refinery.  

Graduating with a Chemical Engineering degree in 2003 with multiple employers throwing out their welcoming mat she has maintained gainful employment ever since. Giving birth to my grandson Cole she became a wonderful and loving mother and continues to be so. 

Seeking and needing mores challenges she began a grueling training regimen of long distance running and setting her sights on and competing in many half and full marathons. Placing in meets and returning to her home town to take 2^nd place in a 26.2 mile marathon in January through snow covered Iowa trails. Now setting her sights on a 31 mile race and several other marathons. But it wasn’t to be. She “blew” her foot up and after two years of surgeries and recovery and the foot not letting her run the bike became her friend again.
We went riding today, my daughter and I. We had a blast. She rides quite well as we rode snow packed trails with her on a “skinnie” CX bike.  We will race Cirrem together this February across snow and ice covered Iowa gravel roads for 65 miles. "On our bikes."

Melissa and me "on our bikes" today.

 

 

Me and Melissa today and yesterday. 

 

 

...and we ride on..."on our bikes" and in life.

 

 

 

 

 

Cheers and hope your day was good as well. Thanks for stopping by, Dave.

Some things

 

 

LIFE HAS A MUCH BETTER VIEW FROM MY BIKE THEN FROM MY COUCH.

 

 

Love this time of year for trail riding.

I tried my indoor roller, I don't think I will be back again. I have lights, and know how to dress for the cold.

 

 

 

ME AND MY TRI-CYCLE MAKING FIRST TRACKS IN TRIPLICATE.

 

 

My New Toy....

 

Varna Hand Cycle.

 

 

LETS NOT SUGAR COAT THIS.

THE BOSTON MARATHON BOMBINGS.

Forrest is always right....

Needed to drop in and post a couple of pics, got a story or two to tell I shall return.

 

 

DOING SOME IDITAROD TRAINING WITH MY DOG PITTY. MUSH PITTY MUSH!!!

 

NO MATTER WHO YOU THERE IS A HILL(S) OUT THERE THAT CAN KICK YOUR ASS

The Fly

I don't know why, I swallowed a fly.

Recovery

How my legs feel after a hard leg day.

It seems as I age the biggest difference I've noticed is my recovery ability. Injuries take longer to heal, and fatigue comes around more frequently. So to adapt I train smarter, stretch often, use recovery products on long days, and keep riding. I have to. I need long rides  for my mind, and my body is the vehicle that takes me there.

Looking forward to the warmer days, and longer daylight hours and long rides.

Cheers, and thanks for stopping.



Fatty I miss you...

 

.....and hence my problem. My youngest son, Caleb has moved out, the last child at home. So now for the first time I am ''childless" in 31 years. Including the rough times of staying married to a using alcoholic until it could no longer work anymore, sole custody of teen boys as a single parent. An extremely unique and brilliant daughter. My kiddies have always been here. .  Oh I digress, well when Caleb moved out I started some major remodeling projects, I have been putting off forever. Knocking out walls, wiring, insulation, and so on. Now it has become all consuming of all my spare time.


With a more then a full time job and now this sucking the remainder hours of the day out of me I have not been on my bike like I need to be. I miss her. I just want to get this project done, and I will. It is cutting into my riding time way too much.

Me and the kiddies back in the day..



Just saying......

In Search of the Meaning of Life.

A short story regarding  a bicycle, some black berry brandy, a country trail, an elderly gentleman, and his thoughts....

I turned 60 this past Wednesday. This got me to thinking. I’ve been around for a very long long time and I need to start acting my age, and be wise.  That thought lasted for about 10 seconds.

So with having the day off from work to celebrate my 60th birthday, I set out to spend the day on my bicycle riding in remote peopleless countryside and reflect and seek on what is the meaning of life.

I usually do not do this during my ride but being it was my birthday  I packed along for my journey plenty of “pedaling fluids” to enhance the ride.

 

 

 

My Trek XO2 Cycle Cross bike was my choice of steed for the day. She has been very good to me, with 1000s and 1000s of miles that we have shared together. Hot, cold, wet, rain, mud, you name she has been out there with me, with no complaints.

I was soon out of town and on a county trail that was a mixture of puddles, slush, and interspersed by a few dry spots with snow on the sides. It was like riding through thick peanut butter, for the most part, a lot of work, slow going, but what did it matter? I had no destination, no goal, except just to ride and seek out the meaning of life. 

Riding along, IPOD tunes in my ears, buzzing on life and endorphins I remembered my Black Berry brandy in my reachable “Jerry Bag”.  I took my first sip.

It tasted good, and as I pedaled along, I consumed more and more. Feeling good I noticed some very scenic country side down into the valley and near the creek. I rode over through the woods and sat myself down and took another swig.

 

 

Three geese wandered past me and into the creek. I don’t think they saw me, or maybe they just didn’t care. I really wasn’t gaining any insight on discovering the meaning of life, but it didn’t seem to matter much to me at the moment. I reflected on the fact that 100s and 100s of much smarter folks before me have spent their entire life's pursuing after the meaning of life. Theologians, philosophers, all with good intentions, many coming to completely different conclusions. For the moment nothing seemed to matter outside of this little encapsulated bubble I created around myself.  I felt that everything was ok, and why sits and thinks when I could just sits.

I then  noticed the sun getting lower on the horizon, temperatures were dropping, and being 30 miles from home with slow pedaling I got to thinking time to leave. Besides I was out of blackberry brandy. Time to leave this place of total harmony and peace. Time to go back, back to house chores, taking out the garbage, fixing the leaking faucet and setting the alarm clock to wake up and go back to work in the morning.

I will be back to this place in my mind and often as I can. As for finding out what the meaning of life is, it doesn’t seem to matter much  to me when I feel like this. May we continue to ride on, climb our "mountain" and keep exploring ourselfs.

Oh and just one more thing. A Big Big shout out to an unnamed extraordinary competitive cyclist from Iowa. You see this fine young gentleman drove all the up to the Twin Cities to pick up a winter’s supply of dog poop in my daughter’s back yard. Melissa, my daughter had major foot surgery and has been unable to go out and harvest her dog’s Jack, endless supply of poop layered in multiple snowstorms. He did it. Thank you.

 

 

CHEERS........ and thanks for visiting.

Dave

Just riding around and around....

Some bike rides are more extraordinaire than others, today was one of those rides.  Extraordinaire that is, I have no reason why it was, it just happens and when it does, you ride it out.

We  the local Fat Tire riders were planning on a group ride today and communicating via Face Book. The weather forecast was for over an inch of rain with temps in the low 30s. With lots of snow cover out there it was mutually concluded to stay off the snow mobile trails because it would be nothing but slop, muck, mud, and sludge.

Well I’ve never been accused of following the crowd and I decided to go out and ride the snow mobile paths and Heritage trails anyway. The trail I take to get out of town was a lot of work to pedal over. With last week’s snow storm there was only frozen footprints to ride over and that was quite a hard chopping bouncing ride.

I arrived at Heritage trail at the same time the icy rains did. Occasional squirrels and deer were the only other creatures out here besides me.

 

 

Riding  in the drizzling  rain, settling in to my zone, listening to music, and slowly getting soaked as my “water resistant’’ outer garments began to break down and let the rains in to my inner wool layers, I became very peaceful.

 

 

My Garmin said 32 degrees, the temperature where water and ice will co-exist together simultaneously.

Hence was the case, puddles of water were forming on top of the frozen trail and getting deeper. I tried to ride on the edge of the trail where there was an ice ridge and stay out of the increasingly getting deeper water puddle down the center of the trail. That wasn’t working because I was sliding all over the place and would be crashing if I continued to ride this icy ridge.

 

 

Water was filling my cycling boots and was getting to the point where I thought about taking them off and ringing out my socks and pour water out of them. Wool socks do an amazing job of doing their best to keep you warm when wet but that can only work so well, my toes were numb. I was 10 miles from home and had 40 miles in and decided to just keep going. I pedaled fast, I wanted to get my feet warm again as soon as I could.

 

Arriving home, hungry, cold, exhausted, and happy.

Now my clothes are drying and I'm getting wetter.

 

 

 

 Tomorrow is looking like more of the same.

Cheers,

Dave

 

 

THE END OF WINTER

Seems I always marked the coming of March 1st as the end of winter. I know we get snow storms and often get below zero in March but the the 'muscle' of winter is gone. Snow storms may come but go fast, the days are longer and getting warmer.

The weather forecast for this Monday and Tuesday March 5th and 6th is this.

"A storm system is expected to track into the Midwest and slow down, producing a prolonged snow event with periods of moderate to heavy snowfall. 8 to 12 inches or possibly more can be expected, with the exact locations of the heaviest snow to be determined"

This weekend I rode a metric 62 miler on trails that Snow Mobile inhabit and own in the winter on Saturday. Rode myself into exhaustion fat tires on a fat bike on snow zapped my legs, and I was loving it.

Rolling out the front door and thinking I should shovel my sidewalks when I return.

I found the path out of town virgin, and I got to make "first tracks."

Went out and explored gravel roads on Sunday. The snow was mostly gone out on open gravel and found myself weaving in and out of ice patches. 40 miles of gravel and back home.

As much as I enjoy the winter riding I am ready for spring and summer rides. Bring it.

Sent my registration in to race 2013 Dairy Roubaix 4/20/13. A gravel race of 100 miles. At 60 years of age the race has become a ride and my plans are to hook up with who is riding my pace and enjoy. I will take my Cycle Cross bike that I have been working on, going toobless and trying a few things.


meanwhile meet my new friends..nyuk, nyuk nyuk.

 

Thanks for dropping by,

Dave

WINTER STORM Q IS COMING MY WAY

Trail riding lately seems to have me on my toes and the edge of my seat. The reason ICE. Most of the trails have thawed, melted the snow and refroze. Note the picture below of what the trail looked like and what I did not want to look like.

 

 

But now "WINTER STORM Q" is coming. This weekend should be lotz of fun riding snow mobile trails on my FatBack. I'll lift weights, stretch and ride indoor stationary bike on the days after work this week and hope for a couple of long fun filled days of outdoor riding this weekend.  

 

 

Seems every year about this time I get the urge for some long hot gravel rides. My Trek XO2 cycle cross is ready to please. I ordered a pair of tubeless wheel sets primarily for reduced flats.   I took that bike out for a ride around town and it felt fast and zipppy being I've been riding the FatBack exclusively since last October.

A couple of pictures of hot summer riding below.

 

Cooling down with the water hose after cooking myself out riding.

 

 

All righty thats it.

Things and other things.

I took tomorrow off from work. For one reason and one reason only. So I could ride my fat tire bike all day on country trails. My bicycle is packed and we are waiting for sunrise. I anxiously wait. Meanwhile I leave you with these photographs.

 

 

 

Riding with the pack.   

 

My new Fat Tire rig.

Riding with Albert

Having a stare down contest with the little man. He is starting to break me.

Waiting for the bus.

Rain and ice...

Woke up to pouring rain on icy streets. Began to ponder how do I manage riding in this? Riding indoors on a stationary bike for me is mentally painful and I can handle only an hour it seems, that's it. Riding for hours outside is mentally delightful for me. So therefore is the reason I have bikes for all seasons and clothing to follow.

Checking the radar showed most of the rain storm would be passed through by noon. So I visit with my papa and then riding it would be.

The ride out of town on a paved trail on hard packed snow was a rough ride over frozen foot prints on slick ice. A lot of hard bouncing

Riding today took a lot focus to keep the tire side down. Slick wet ice was most the ride.

 

At 20 miles out and a couple of close calls of almost going down on the ice I decided to turn around. Take my time and get home without bodily damage.  Trying to keep my focus was first on my agenda. Watching every rut, the changes in ice and snow as I rolled along. Having went down hard last year and ending up having rotator cuff surgical repairs I wanted to avoid that feel you get before you crash and one of your tires starts to slide slightly to the side. Which is almost always followed by a hard body slam to the  ground.