how to work off that Turkey when stuck in Napertuckey?

I'm in Naperville Ill stuck without a bike. But it's beautiful and 45 degrees, perfect weather for a fall run. I've not been running but with my schedule (and the hopefully impending rain in California) I am trying to rebuild my running base. My legs and weight are such that I need to build my running base very slowly or I will get some gnarly shin splints going, so I ducked out of the In-Law fest for a quick 3 miler today. Not bad. I'm going to try and work in some lunchtime runs at nVidia, sadly nVidia is far removed from the better trails over near AMD and my old job at Sandcraft. Anyone know good running trails near Central and San Tomas?

Time Trial and Tire Change Prep

Leave work 30 minutes before train. Nominal time to train - 25 minutes. This is on Central Expressway which is flat, fast, not too many lights, good shoulder so you can get down on the bars and let er rip. But with an extra 5 minutes to spare - how to make for a good time trial?

Puncture! Also allows one to practice a fast tire change. Somehow I managed to make my train. I think the high intensity work of racing to Caltrain is actually pretty good stuff, but I need to do some stretching on the train or something, I am feeling pretty beat up.

I am picking up an insane amount of glass lately. I think the commuter bike needs to downgrade from the Conti 4000's to something more robust, it mostly gets used on Central Expressway and on the Google rides anyway.

Off to Chicago for the holidays, no bike so I am going to try and (gulp) run...

Nov 24 ride to work

For some reason I always end up finding time to ride once the season is kaput. This has the downside that this is when the rain starts. In tribute I am shopping for a cross bike. No need to repeat the day when I decided I was training rain or shine, rode up Page Mill in the rain then crashed and broke my hip coming down.

I managed to get in a ride this AM from SF to work, minus the PA->Mountain View section plus an extra sprint from PA back to Menlo after I missed a train in PA. Despite fighting a cold I felt ok as the pace was not too brisk, and it was good to meet a new rider (Bruce I think) who had some serious mojo and was only slowed down by a broken spoke.

And I stuck to a banana/pomegranate smoothie for fuel, better than some lard infused muffin from the train station.

Onward and upward.

I am a fat slob.

Training and diet have gone to hell. Occasional google rides sprinkled in but not much otherwise. Lack of cycling leads to bad diet. Work is crazy, wife is pregnant.

Resolved - no more cokes, better diet. Decided this AM I would get up and hop the 7:04 to Redwood City and ride some better roads than seen on the google rides, and eat a banana on the train. Of course wifey had eaten all the bananas and I missed the train. There is now a place at 22nd that sells stuff so I finagled a banana and took the next train, which only stops at Palo Alto. Did get a nice ride in from there. It's not like I turned a corner but it was a worthwhile day.

I've decided I need to diary more of this to put the fire to my feet, and do the RWC to Sunnyvale ride which includes Jefferson and the bottom half of Page Mill on the way to the office. This will be more effective than dealing with the crazy bike paths on the Bayway.

Good News, Bad News

Good News. The new Seven has arrived!

Bad News. I showed up for the Google ride via Skyline today and was promptly dropped. Not even on the climb from John Daly - on the little roller coming up from Lake Merced. I made it about 3/4 the way and my legs went to zero. We have some work to do. These guys are pretty tough so I don't feel that bad. One is a lean and hungry guy who rides to work and back - SF to San Mateo - every day. One is a young guy who "just got into cycling 6 months ago" - clearly that was a change of pace from doing 2:30 Marathons or something. And the other guy - EACH of his quads is wider than his waist and he goes only by the name "space" (no capital letter). Severe.

Worst News. I started up from John Daly, with the terrific threesome vaguely in sight, figuring they would probably wait at Hickey and I could probably get a ride that I could handle through the rollers to Palo Alto. Then I punctured. I laid the Seven down and realized I had not moved my tool bag with tube and patch kit to my new bike, and had to call for the team car. Someone did ride by with a patch, but knowing I could flat again, still without gear, in an even more remote area that would probably have zero cyclists, I hung my head in shame and called my wife to come get me...

The Winters of my discontent

Perhaps I am all talk. I have a pretty high batting average for the top stressors in life these days - we bought a Vacation Rental in Healdsburg which we had to set up and are now trying to manage ("Rural Realities" have hit hard). We then lost our apartment and had to move. Then I switched jobs. Oh, and my wife is pregnant. All good things (OK, moving sort of sucked) but stressful and not leaving a lot of time for riding.

Nonetheless I have probably managed to maintain some semblance of my early season form by getting up at o dark thirty and riding to work with the Google folks, and sneaking in a few Healdsburg area rides. Not the sort of hillclimbing that leads to faster times but keeps the base going. Also my wife spent her first trimester completely naseous so instead of us going out on brisk couples rides, we tried to keep her from getting sick. She's feeling better and is riding a bit, but now the issue is becoming the inability to lean over due to bulging belly and sore back. I'm trying to find a more upright hybrid we can use for a while, and a trainer.

I entered the Winters Road Race 2 weeks ago and found out that not only am I still off top form but my strategy sucks. There is a small hill, I decided to wait until the start and then go to the front and try to slow it down and then lag climb the hill. Thing is, the hill starts shallow enough that all I did was give a lead out to the strong men before they attacked at the steeper part. The hill has several saddles in it and had I sat in and not used my bullets I probably could have made it to more saddles and then maybe reconnected on the descent. Instead I was worked and got not much more than an entertaining training ride.

I am thinking of doing the Mt Tam Hill Climb just because it's nearby (if the aforementioned stressors don't render that impossible) but hopefully I will be able to get the training to tune things up a bit. The most important component should be diet, hopefully with the fresh produce coming from the garden/trees and us watching Jill's diet, I can make some headway there.

Blog split

I have decided to make a new blog. This one was supposed to be about cycling training and the places to ride in the Bay Area, but my hippie holier than thou stuff started seeping in, and there was some stuff that was just way off topic.

So I have started The Holier Than You Blog

holierthanthou was taken by someone who isn't blogging. Peak Everything indeed.