Thursday, January 06, 2011
Man is it dusty in here!
I totally need to update ye olde blog, but we all know that would require more effort than I am clearly putting in right now. So we'll deal.
Hello! It's been a while! Last post was, ah, June. Which means that I rode 25 miles in the Subaru Elephant Rock, which is a bicycle ride in Castle Rock, CO (That's the state code for Colorado if you ain't from 'round these parts). They have various lengths of rides from 25 miles to 100 miles (40.6 km - 160.9 km) and some friends, their family and I rode the 25 miler. It was a bright sunny day with the Colorado sun beating down on us, but a lovely breeze was blowing from the Rockies. I completely have no idea how long it took us, but at that point it was the longest I had ever ridden! I stuck around waaaaay too long to see if I would win a door prize. Nope! But I did get a vicious sunburn. On the tops of my legs. Oops, forgot about putting sunscreen there. They also served us a great barbeque lunch that was pretty decent.
Sunscreen is a year round thing in Colorado.
Since then I have been thoroughly exploring Denver's bike paths. I guess I was exploring them before that too. So my longest after the 25 miler was 30 miles from my house near Washington Park (the cool kids call it Wash Park) down to Dartmouth (St? Rd? Ave? Blvd? I don't know, and also does anyone call Dartmouth University D-Mouth cuz that would be incredible, but not if I actually went there) where I hit the Highline Canal Trail. This badboy runs pretty far from Aurora down to Littleton and I caught it somewhere sort of maybe near the middle. I rode it south to the C-470 Trail and then caught the lightrail home (for free(ish)! Thanks eco pass from my employer, my $40, and RTD). The RTD fare checker guy gave my school ID a double-take because my sticker was a different color from the students. I then explained that I taught the students and he left me alone. That's actually the only time I've ever had it truly scrutinized. Most other checkers recognize it as an eco pass instantly.
Let me add some links to the above paragraph real quick. Nice. Man I love all the bike paths and trails and lanes and how bike friendly Denver truly is!
Let's see here. Rode with the Denver Cruisers for Golf Pros and Tennis Hos night. Lots of fun and the "Circle of Death" mid-way was truly a sight to behold. They're mostly shut down for the winter but I know they're out there riding somewhere in (hopefully) very warm clothing.
What inspired this bicycle laced post was I compiled my bike riding stats for 2010 courtesy of my first (awesome) and second (barely counts as a) bicycle computers. The first one wasn't even that fancy but it recorded mileage, average speed, maximum speed and time ridden. #2 does mileage and fastest speed and that's it. So this isn't super accurate data for all you data nerds. Huge errors can be found in the following numbers:
Total miles ridden: 343.2 miles
Average max speed: 28.5 mph (Fast: 47.6! Slow: 19.3)
Average average speed: 10.67 (Highest: 12.7 over 49 miles Lowest: 8.59 over 13 miles)
Total time ridden: 22 hours, 58 minutes and 6 seconds
Very neat! That 47.6 mph was downhill (obviously) after a very long climb and was fantastic and very scary going that fast on some metal and rubber. (I guess motorcycles are bulkier and designed to go that fast which why they're slightly less scary, at least at 47.6 mph on a flat road after a downhill). Almost riding for a full 24 hours. My new longest ride is now 40 miles that took me about 4 hours.
I don't have any super serious road biker spandex except for a helmet and padded shorts of which I won both as door prizes during an cycling talk about training for the Elephant Rock at our flagship REI store near the Platte River in Denver.
I think I'll need a new chain and rear tire before next summer, not that I'm not riding now. Trust me. That 40 miles was on December 18th and I thought I was going to lose a toe or two. I don't really know the symptoms or pre-symptoms of frostbite but I was thinking alot about what they might be the last mile or two. It was in the mid-40's for the high and of course drops like a rock once the sun goes down. Thankfully I remembered my lights for the last mile on streets at dusk.
Also what inspired this was I wiped my computer. Completely factory restored it. It's a bit faster but I love not having all the stupid error messages from defunct programs and losing all the programs I never ever used. Yes I backed up my dissertation and my music first.
Posts to come:
Denver Restaurants
Seth's Bike Riding Tips
Hello! It's been a while! Last post was, ah, June. Which means that I rode 25 miles in the Subaru Elephant Rock, which is a bicycle ride in Castle Rock, CO (That's the state code for Colorado if you ain't from 'round these parts). They have various lengths of rides from 25 miles to 100 miles (40.6 km - 160.9 km) and some friends, their family and I rode the 25 miler. It was a bright sunny day with the Colorado sun beating down on us, but a lovely breeze was blowing from the Rockies. I completely have no idea how long it took us, but at that point it was the longest I had ever ridden! I stuck around waaaaay too long to see if I would win a door prize. Nope! But I did get a vicious sunburn. On the tops of my legs. Oops, forgot about putting sunscreen there. They also served us a great barbeque lunch that was pretty decent.
Sunscreen is a year round thing in Colorado.
Since then I have been thoroughly exploring Denver's bike paths. I guess I was exploring them before that too. So my longest after the 25 miler was 30 miles from my house near Washington Park (the cool kids call it Wash Park) down to Dartmouth (St? Rd? Ave? Blvd? I don't know, and also does anyone call Dartmouth University D-Mouth cuz that would be incredible, but not if I actually went there) where I hit the Highline Canal Trail. This badboy runs pretty far from Aurora down to Littleton and I caught it somewhere sort of maybe near the middle. I rode it south to the C-470 Trail and then caught the lightrail home (for free(ish)! Thanks eco pass from my employer, my $40, and RTD). The RTD fare checker guy gave my school ID a double-take because my sticker was a different color from the students. I then explained that I taught the students and he left me alone. That's actually the only time I've ever had it truly scrutinized. Most other checkers recognize it as an eco pass instantly.
Let me add some links to the above paragraph real quick. Nice. Man I love all the bike paths and trails and lanes and how bike friendly Denver truly is!
Let's see here. Rode with the Denver Cruisers for Golf Pros and Tennis Hos night. Lots of fun and the "Circle of Death" mid-way was truly a sight to behold. They're mostly shut down for the winter but I know they're out there riding somewhere in (hopefully) very warm clothing.
What inspired this bicycle laced post was I compiled my bike riding stats for 2010 courtesy of my first (awesome) and second (barely counts as a) bicycle computers. The first one wasn't even that fancy but it recorded mileage, average speed, maximum speed and time ridden. #2 does mileage and fastest speed and that's it. So this isn't super accurate data for all you data nerds. Huge errors can be found in the following numbers:
Total miles ridden: 343.2 miles
Average max speed: 28.5 mph (Fast: 47.6! Slow: 19.3)
Average average speed: 10.67 (Highest: 12.7 over 49 miles Lowest: 8.59 over 13 miles)
Total time ridden: 22 hours, 58 minutes and 6 seconds
Very neat! That 47.6 mph was downhill (obviously) after a very long climb and was fantastic and very scary going that fast on some metal and rubber. (I guess motorcycles are bulkier and designed to go that fast which why they're slightly less scary, at least at 47.6 mph on a flat road after a downhill). Almost riding for a full 24 hours. My new longest ride is now 40 miles that took me about 4 hours.
I don't have any super serious road biker spandex except for a helmet and padded shorts of which I won both as door prizes during an cycling talk about training for the Elephant Rock at our flagship REI store near the Platte River in Denver.
I think I'll need a new chain and rear tire before next summer, not that I'm not riding now. Trust me. That 40 miles was on December 18th and I thought I was going to lose a toe or two. I don't really know the symptoms or pre-symptoms of frostbite but I was thinking alot about what they might be the last mile or two. It was in the mid-40's for the high and of course drops like a rock once the sun goes down. Thankfully I remembered my lights for the last mile on streets at dusk.
Also what inspired this was I wiped my computer. Completely factory restored it. It's a bit faster but I love not having all the stupid error messages from defunct programs and losing all the programs I never ever used. Yes I backed up my dissertation and my music first.
Posts to come:
Denver Restaurants
Seth's Bike Riding Tips
Labels: bicycle, Cruisers, Denver, Elephant Rock, Subaru, Wash Park
# posted by Seth @ 4:54 PM 
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