Sunday, Sunday, Sunday

A quick ride at the end of the weekend. Hopefully, we'll have at least one more Monday night ride at Panther Creek tomorrow night. It's hard with the sun going down at 6:30 now. It's almost time for spinning classes to pick-up through the winter.

Today's Mileage: 8.2 miles
2008 YTD Mileage: 552.2 miles
Miles to reach 2008 goal of 750 miles: 197.8
Avg Price of Gas in the 'boro: $3.79

Monday Night Ride

With it getting darker sooner, the Monday night ride started at 5:30pm. We still had light when we finished, but not much. I dread these days of waking up in the dark and coming home from work in the dark. I'll still get to ride on the weekends for a few more weeks, but soon it will be spinning class to get my time in the saddle.

Today's Mileage: 20.3 miles
2008 YTD Mileage: 544 miles
Miles to reach 2008 goal of 750 miles: 206
Avg Price of Gas in the 'boro: $3.91

Bike to Work

Gosh, it's been sooo long since I biked to work. Yesterday Uncle Ike, a tropical storm, came to visit. We had nasty wind up to 75mph all afternoon. I lost power around 11am and it didn't come back on until 3pm today. I am not sure why, but I decided to bike in this morning. Lots of trees down and leave and limbs everywhere. Over 75% of the city didn't have power yesterday. Most of it is back up tonight, but schools will still be closed tomorrow, too.

Today's Mileage: 3.3 miles
2008 YTD Mileage: 523.7 miles
Miles to reach 2008 goal of 750 miles: 226.3
Avg Price of Gas in the 'boro: $3.98

Bowling Green Sprint Triathlon

A couple of weeks ago, I did the Bowling Green Sprint Triathlon. I had thought I was done with triathlons this year, but a friend at work approached me and said he was thinking of doing this one - his first one. I was glad he was considering it and wanted to support his entry into multi sports, so I said I'd join him if he decided to sign-up. I got worried the week of the race, though when he came to me and said he hurt his calf running over the weekend. I was afraid I would be doing the race alone. However, by the end of the week, he felt good enough to try. He ended up walking much of the 5k, but he finished with a respectable under 2 hr finish time.

Bowling Green is more hilly than even the eastern part of Daviess County. In addition, the race promos actually mentioned challenging hills. This can't be good!!! Before the race I was able to drive the bike course (in reverse) and confirm that the hills were going to be tough. The first big one was at 3 miles and I finally had to get off the bike and walk a bit. I was a little upset because I thought I was stronger than that, but my breathing rhythm was off and I just didn't feel like pushing through it. I still managed to catch my friend, Joe, finally, around mile 8. He had a a few minutes on me after the swim. There was another tough hill at mile 10 that I handled pretty well and of course there was the descent that I coasted down at a slightly terrifying speed over 30 mph, but didn't crash. (Thank God!). This event had only a 400 m swim, and I improved my 100m split time, but there is work to do.

The run was pretty good, too. My average mile splits were under 11 mins, which was good for my triathlon runs, so I was happy about that. All in all, I'd do this race again, and I'm very glad that my friend was able to finish without injury and had a good time. Now, I'm done with triathlons for 2008!!!

Today's Mileage: 14.3 miles
2008 YTD Mileage: 520.4 miles
Miles to reach 2008 goal of 750 miles: 229.6

Labor Day

Well, my last post was 2 weeks ago and I hadn't ridden in 2 weeks when I posted that one. It's been 2 more weeks and I'm back to posting and riding. The only excuse I have for that layoff was a big, hairy upgrade of our computer system at the hospital. Lots of long, crazy hours were not conducive to much of anything, including bike riding.

I missed being on the bike though so I headed out to Panther Creek and did one lap of the flat route on Labor Day. Only one other car was in the lot Monday night, so I guess most people were off cooking out and enjoying the 3 day weekend. I had to get back on the bike, though because I am signed-up for the Bowling Green Sprint Triathlon this weekend.

Today's Mileage: 10.3 miles
2008 YTD Mileage: 506.1 miles
Miles to reach 2008 goal of 750 miles: 243.9
Avg Price of Gas in the 'boro: $3.66