Saturday, May 31, 2008

A Great Ride

I am very excited about this summer (and nervous, but let's not talk about that)! I think about biking all day at work, and then when I get home I go biking all evening it seems.

Training is going good. I'm trying to bike 200 miles a week, but I am mostly constrained by time. It's hard to work 8 hours than bike for three hours and still have time to do other things.

Last Thursday I crafted the best cycling route around the city. It was going to be a long night (especially after working for eight hours), so I started right from work. Here is where I went.


View Larger Map

At the start, I not only got to bike along the river enjoying the vibrant lush green plants and trees, but I followed Chris on his way home. The roads were quiet and the temperature was pleasant.

I recently bought new shoes (Sidi Zeta), pedals (Shimano A530), and a saddle (Brooks B17 Narrow) so I have been slowly adjusting it to the perfect position. I snapped this pic while stopping at a church for fine tuning my shoes.

080522 Grand Rapids Bike Trip

One of the reason I love biking is because it can feel like you're flying at times. And who doesn't want to be able to fly? This picture shows what it feels like at times! (Also, I purchased a new camera, a Canon SD750, so I'm enjoying taking lots of pictures!)

080522 Grand Rapids Bike Trip

I stopped at Creekside park for a quick bite to eat while I enjoyed a quick snack/dinner and watched a couple minutes of a girls little league game. After leaving and heading into farm country I almost was sliced and diced by this machine. Trust me, it's a lot lot bigger than it looks. And a lot more scary when you're on a bike!

080522 Grand Rapids Bike Trip

I have bought a lot of important items in the last month (memory card for my camera (HP 8gb), a hat (De Marchi Countrour Skull Cap), gloves (Pearl Izumi Attachk Glove), 2 pairs of shorts, backup sunglasses (Nashbar No Frame Sunglasses), Rain Jacket (Canari Eclipse), Rain Pants (Novara Express Pants), and a travel towel (MSR PackTowl UltraLite Towel).

I feel torn as I try to be careful to only buy the bare minimal of what I need, but also I need to be prepared for this summer. If I'm not, any problems can really set me back as we have a pretty intense schedule.

Also, a group of us got together mid-April and biked down in Dorr Township. I was going to write about it, but one of the other cyclists did here.

I hope to be blogging more and more, but with more pictures and less words as I'm spending a lot of time make sure everything is ready for June 28th when I leave!

1 comments:

Anonymous said...

Wow - that's a big ride! We just got Brodie and Luke their first bikes yesterday and they think they are the coolest things -ever-! It'll pop up on my blog soon. :>