Vicky's Clicker Training

2nd Long Training Ride

18 Apr 2012 Leave a Comment

by vicky1clicker1tr in Uncategorized

I used my Map My Ride app to show this ride.  I planned to ride 1 1/2 hrs out, and then turn around, and come back, making it 3 hours, and probably 20 miles.  Turning around I decided to follow the road that merged onto Hwy 99, but I forgot that I would then be taken way off my route, and it was a long, long, uphill ride.

I met a gentleman also out for a ride, and I learned a lot from him.  He and his friend have their bikes flown somewhere in the world, and spend 3 weeks riding there.  He told me about riding around Ireland.  He complimented me on my ability to ride up the hill.  Well, thank you, but I know he was only being polite.  However, I am a lot stronger than when I started, I can feel that now.

That day I got to my turn around point ten minutes sooner than the previous week.  I wasn’t intentionally going faster, but I guess I am stronger. I turn around before I actually have ridden 1 1/2 hours, because at that point I’d need to cross the street that is merging onto Hwy 99, and then down a lovely long hill, where, of course, I’d need to turn right around, and climb back up.

Most likely, for my next long training ride, I will do 2 hours out, and then back, so I will be going down that hill, and as I seem to be getting stronger each time, hopefully, the climb back up will not be so difficult.

I want to put the Map My Ride ride for that day here.  I also need to find out if I can do that using only my iPhone, as I am not planning on taking my computer with me, on the Clicker Training Road Trip. If anyone knows how I can do that, I’d appreciate hearing from you.

 Does anyone know how I can make the embed thing actually embed? I did copy the code for that, but no luck making it work, below.

40.46 km Road Cycling on 2012-04-15 15:32

Moving into the Big Time

15 Apr 2012 3 Comments

by vicky1clicker1tr in Uncategorized

Accomplishing a goal has a few steps. First you need to know what the end step is…though of course there is no end, but you do need to be aiming somewhere, or you will get…no where.

So, yesterday, riding my bike back from town, for the first time, since I started riding the 7 miles to town, and then back, I rode up only ONE hill on the way home. And that is a HILL. A SERIOUS hill. I don’t think I will EVER ride up that hill. I know that hill intimately. It starts sneakily about a mile away, with a teeny rise, that is no problem (now) for me to ride along.

In the beginning (nearly two years ago) my mind would complain loudly about the slope of that road. I am not calling that part a hill, because it isn’t, but it is a long, slow, sneaky rise. Now I can do it without thinking about it, but in the beginning, even though I could ride it, I was not happy. Now I ride along it, thinking about the HILL to come.

Now THAT is a HILL. It starts before the cross street, and makes me work quite a bit, before I get to the cross street, which is level, trying to trick me into thinking that I made it. But no…the worst is yet to come. After that cross street it REALLY turns mean. Sharp uphill rise, and long LONG before even the one quarter way mark I cannot ride anymore, and I need to walk. And I can barely walk (and push the bike) up that HILL. Finally, after a lifetime, I get onto the level, and I move the bike over along the stone wall, and lean it there. I get my drink, shakily walk ahead of the bike, and sit on the wall, while my heart and lungs slowly come back to normal.

After nearly two years of that hill, I can ride up to, and across the street, looking back over my shoulder for cars turning onto that street. If more than two cars are waiting to turn onto the main road from that street, I need to get off and walk, as I don’t really have enough room (or strength) to work my way through, or around them.

Most of the time there are no cars waiting, so I ride across the street, and hit the next (serious) part of that hill. There is a telephone pole about ten or 15 feet past the entrance, and I aim to reach that, and sometimes I do, and sometimes not.

And sometimes now, I can get back on the bike before I am quite at the top of that hill, just where it starts to kind of level out, and I can begin riding again, which means I don’t need to sit and rest. Or maybe I’d like to sit and rest, but it is not VITAL for my being able to continue. So, I guess I have improved since I started that route.

When I first started, I had to walk up seven hills, going home. There are more hills going home than going to town. Yesterday was no different on that HILL. I walked up it, and rested at the top for maybe 7 minutes, but I guess I really am getting stronger, because I rode up all the rest of the hills on the way home, and generally now, I walk up three of them.

So yesterday was a milestone! Walked up only ONE hill!

And for my upcoming trip I got: biker shorts: now I can at least look like a real bike rider

a bike pump, and a little package of patches for holes. This is ‘insurance’. You know…if you are prepared, you won’t need them. Well, I am not really ‘prepared’ as I don’t know how to change a flat. That is on my list of ‘to do’ things. If I know how, then I REALLY (I hope) won’t need it.

A stove I looked at the web site of Mountain Equipment Co-op and found the one that sounded best for me, then went into Vancouver, on the bus (a long trip) and looked at what they had, talked to the guy who knew what he was talking about, and ended up getting the one I was planning on.

And, tomorrow I am planning to do my 2nd training ride, of 1 1/2 hours out and back. Maybe one more of these and then I will do a two hour out and back ride. That is probably a third, to a half of the distance I plan to do on my first day of the trip, so I am on schedule.

I think I have an ‘in’ to get a tent, so, really, all I need now is a sleeping bag, and maybe a pad for under it.

I just found a book in the library written by a guy who rode his bike from Newfoundland to Latin America, over a bunch of years. His name is Martin Lobigs, and his book is called ‘A Life on Wheels.’

I am also following the blog of ‘Jeremy’ who is one month into his trip (in real life) right now, and is in Carolina, I guess. He seems like a very nice young man. He doesn’t say the state in his videos or blog posts. I also don’t know where he is aiming at, except ‘west’. Also, for some strange reason, he is not wearing a helmet. You can still die wearing a helmet, but I’d still think it is a good idea to wear one. At least he is wearing proper shoes now. He started out with flip flops.

There are actually a lot of people either on bike trips right now, or who have made trips, and written about them, and put videos on You Tube, which is helpful.

So maybe I will use my ‘Map My Ride’ app, and post that tomorrow, after my training run, and see how it works on here. Stay tuned.

Thinking about the future

Twenty Mile Training Run

08 Apr 2012 Leave a Comment

by vicky1clicker1tr in Uncategorized

Beautiful day, and I rode the furthest I have ridden. One and a half hours out, then turn around and come back, which added up to about 20 miles. My thighs and calves are making little worried sounds…I’ll see how I feel over the next few days.

When I start my trip, in about July, I will be heading west, to the ferry, which is about 30 miles from me. Or it would be, if I were a crow. But being human, I need to go around the giant body of water, which is part of the Pacific Ocean, and called Boundary Bay.

So, when I have ridden an hour, I arrive at Highway 99, and then head north, and that is on a very slight hill. Not too bad though. Today I had two minutes left in my plan of ‘ride toward my goal’ for 90 minutes. At the end of that time I was being squished between Highway 99 and a busy entrance lane of cars on my right.

Being a little tired, with a bit of a sore neck, I knew I would need to stop, get off the bike, turn, and wait for a space, before hurrying across the lane that was merging with the highway. Then I would have been on a downward sloping hill, and well before I reached the bottom, my two remaining minutes would have been up.

So I wisely decided to end that day’s run, and turn around and head back. This is the furthest I have ridden, and really, two minutes would not have made that much of a difference, unless I was tired enough that I got ‘messed up’ trying to make it across that lane. Not a good idea.

So, I got off my bike, in the small painted wedge of pavement, between the two lanes of vehicles (though the one on my right was actually empty at that time) turned, got back on, and wondered how I was going to do working my way 3 miles back to where I got on this highway, because it was all very slightly up hill. But, I did fine. I think I am getting stronger.

Then we (Vinnie and I) headed east, toward the road that leads down across the US/Canada border. We don’t go down it, just cross it, and the shoulders are very wide. We stopped at the store there, and got a garlic sausage bun that a guy was selling there, and had a break. Vinnie is a great passenger, but his tail wags wildly when I open his cage, and lift him out. He was quite impressed with the sausage bun that I shared with him.

Then, having done 2/3s of our planned run today, it was back on the bike, thinking about the hill I will need to walk up.

Ok, let's go

And here is that darned ‘S’ hill. Not nice! Time to get off and push.

Looking down the hill

Looking up the hill

But the view was pretty:

Blue sky and sunshine

We’ll do another run like this in a week or so, when I recover!