Latern Rouge

Head Games

2010-06-29T12:02:00.000-07:00

What goes through my head on a long ride? Good question. Before I started doing these rides, and I tried to imagine myself alone on a 12, 18 or 24 hour ride one of my main questions was "what will I do during that time? Won't it be boring?" I assumed that it was a lot like a road trip in a car, and for me, 10 hours in a car is forever.

On my first few long distance bike rides I took my Ipod and listened to music. I still have my Ipod stuck away in my bag, but it's been a long time, and many rides, since I listened to it. The reason is that there is just so much to see and do. Stuff is happening all around me when I ride and I don't want to miss any of it - and the Ipod is too distracting.

Imagine standing at a picture window in your house: you see the trees move in the wind and you see the sun on the grass. But it's one dimensional. You're in a climate controlled environment that you can make warmer or cooler with the touch of a button. You can see the trees move, but you can't hear them because of the TV or the music you have playing in the background.

Now go outside. You're no longer watching the world through a portal, you're surrounded by it. 360 degrees around you as well as above you and below you. You hear the trees moving - not just in front of you, but behind you as well as on either side of you. And you hear the chirping of the birds, and the buzzing of the bees and the high pitched whine that only humming birds make. You feel the sun and the wind on your skin, and you can smell the grass and the honey suckle.

When you ride a bike, you're a participant in life, rather than a mere observer. The minute I put the ear bud in (I only wear the one in the right ear so I can hear cars coming with the left) I've destroyed the experience - in the same way you would if you listened to your Ipod while you watched a movie.

And while life is happening around me, I'm constantly checking the body gauges, like you do in the car. Am I too hot (do I need to unzip my jersey some more)? or am I too cold and need to zip it up? Am I thirsty? or hungry? How far to the next check point? What kind of food and drink will be there? How's my time? Do I have enough in my time bank to get me through what's ahead of me, or do I have time to burn? How's my bike? Tires still look firm? What's causing the squeak from hell? How's my body feel - any unusual aches or pains?

Checking the body gauges takes only a moment, and every thing's fine. What kind of bird is making that strange warble? Where is it? - I can hear it but I can't see it. That's an unusual wild flower - I'll have to remember to look that up when I get home. Grandson Jack's nose was running yesterday - allergies or is he getting a cold? I'm hungry for french fries - gotta watch for a McDonald's. How much water do I have? Is it enough? There's a sprinkler on in the garden up ahead - make a decision on the water, quick!

How's my cadence? Do I need to shift to an easier gear and pick up the pace? Tushie break - time to stand a pedal for a moment. Middle of the afternoon. Podium girl I've been married to for 23 years, and my fan club of assorted grand kids should all be nose deep in the swimming pool by now. Probably playing their 1,000th game of Marco Polo. Check the body gauges again. Unzip the jersey to bit more to help get me up and over the Horsetooth hills. Swimming pool would sure be fun right now. Marco. . . .

Saddles and Saddle Sores

2010-06-28T11:20:00.000-07:00

I've read that if you ride a bike long distance, you'll have saddle discomfort issues. Makes sense since the saddle is the primary point of contact you have with the bike. Your hands and feet also contact the bike, but if your fit is proper, neither will bother you much.

All your weight is on the saddle and with your legs rubbing against it, you have the potential for sit bone issues and/or chafing issues on the inside of your thighs. Saddle sore is a general term used to describe any form of discomfort involving your butt, but there actually are 4 different types of saddle sores.

Sit bone bruising or chafing is apparently very common, although it hasn't been a problem for me, at least not yet. The sit bones are the two bones in your butt when you sit down that all your weight is on. The skin between the sit bones and the saddle gets pinched, which makes that area tender.

In the best of the two saddle sore issues that arise from this, you'll have bruising and soreness in the sit bone area. In the worst the two scenarios, this area can actually develop open sores or blisters, and I've read stories of bikers riding long distances standing up because of the discomfort. The best advice for handling this problem is donut shaped sponge pads like the ones my grandmother used to wear around the "corns" on her feet.

The third type of saddle sore involves infection in the hair follicle area of hairs on your butt; the infection is apparently like an ingrown hair. I would assume that it would take some amount of time for this to develop, so I would imagine that it wouldn't impact your immediate ride, but it would make the two or three days after the ride uncomfortable to some degree. This is alson apparently a common form of discomfort for people who ride multi day events, so I would expect it more on a 1200K than on a 400K or 600K.

The fourth type of saddle sore involves chafing on the inside of the thighs or crotch caused by your legs rubbing against the side of the saddle as they go up and down while you pedal. This was my problem on a recent 400K and it's caused by the friction of your skin against your saddle. It's especially a problem when it's hot (which it was during the 400K) because sweating makes the skin tacky, which then catchs or pulls each time it goes past the saddle. If you average a cadence of 70 pedal strokes per minute, and you're in the saddle for 21 1/2 hours, each thigh is going past the saddle something like 90,000 times.

I've never had much of a chafing problem. Sure, I'm a little tender after the first ride or two of the season, and I was a little more tender after the 300K than normal, but not enough to give it more than a passing thought. But then it was cold during the 300K. Before a ride I'd apply a layer of Lantiseptic to my skin, with a layer of Chamois Butt'r over the top of that, and this was adequate to get me through the entire ride.

What I've learned from my 400K experience is that for the longer distances, or when it's hot, that I need to start early and lubricate every chance I get to keep the skin from pulling as it rubs against the side of the saddle. Chamois Butt'r comes in single serving packs that you can buy at the checkout counter of your local bike shop. A more economical way to buy a 10-pack from Amazon.com: Chamois-Buttr-10-Pack-Skin-Lubricant. Lube from the big tube before your ride, and throw a handful of the single servings into your pack or a back pocket.

If you are prone to one of these type saddle sores, also take a look at your shorts and your saddle. If you're going to ride long, you should really buy the most expensive shorts you can afford. I've heard, and firmly believe, that shorts are more important than the saddle. You want a short with as little padding as possible, and without ridges and seams in the areas that are your personal trouble hot spots. And no, you don't wear underwear under your biking shorts.

Saddles are a personal preference. I ride a Brooks B-17 that I love: Brooks Saddles. Brooks has been making saddles since around the turn of the (last) century. The one on my Legnano I've had for about 4 years and I have one on my commuting and kick around bike that I bought used 35 years ago - it's still super comfortable. The more you ride a Brooks saddle, the more comfortable it is. It's made of leather, without a platform underneath it, so as you ride it, it stretches to form to the contours of your body. I'm not pushing Brooks, although that is the saddle I see the most often among Brevet riders, but you do want a saddle that is a bit wider in the back to support your sit bones because you'll spend long hours sitting on that saddle. What I almost never see among Brevet riders are the skinny, butt-floss type racing saddles that they push in the bike shops. Just because you see it in the Tour de France doesn't mean that you'll love it in hour 20 of a long ride.

St. Vrain 400K

2010-06-23T11:40:00.000-07:00

I rode the 400K leg of the St. Vrain 600K on Saturday, and finished as the sole caboose of the 400K leg of either train. If you look at my finishing time compared to everyone else, it would be embarrassing except for the fact that it doesn't embarrass me (why should it, I finished 4 hours ahead of the cut-off) and my time was respectable in light of the finishing times of the Lefthand 400K a couple of weeks ago (and my ugly DNF).

A view up-canyon:

The route for the Lefthand and St. Vrain 400k's are similar - the difference is the climb. Lefthand Canyon climbs 4,000 feet in about 15 miles and then you immediately come back down. St. Vrain climbs 3,500 feet in about 15 miles, and then climbs the remaining 500 feet over the next 20 miles in a series of steep rollers that are made tougher by the fact that you're at 9,250 feet which is almost 2 miles above sea level - the air is noticeably thinner, even for those of us who live in Denver and are use to altitude.

To summarize the difference: Lefthand is short and very painful, while St. Vrain is less painful, but the pain goes on and on. Either way there is a lot of pain, but the nice thing about hills is that what goes up must come down, and there are two ways to come down: you can shift to your big ring and your 11T cog and push it, or you can sit back and admire the miracle of gravity. Mostly I sit, conserve my energy and enjoy the view.

At the top of one of the rollers:

Now, the good and bad points of the ride:

The bad (I like to deal with the bad first - I don't want to dwell on it so let's get it out of the way): the squeak from hell was back. Not as bad as before, and not constant, but noticeable and embarrassing none-the-less. Of course it was loudest and most noticeable when someone was around. With 250 miles to think about it, I noticed that it always does it in the same spot of my pedal rotation and it most definitely is coming from the bottom bracket; I tried bouncing in my saddle while coasting and can not make it squeak.

I spent about 2/3's of this event riding by myself. This is actually a good thing/bad thing. I like other people and riding with others makes the time and the miles go by faster, but by myself I have quiet time to think my thoughts. I also notice things that I wouldn't notice if I'm with others. I don't have a preference either way - alone or with someone - and am comfortable accepting "what ever is".

The old stone church at the top of Wind River Pass (9,100'):

Now the Good: my plan to go back to basics and just drink water and eat mostly road kill and gels worked great. Only problem I had was at the Meeker check point - they didn't have any real food, so I bought a bag of chips and a Gatorade. The Gatorade upset my stomach - too sugary. I'll try Powerade next time and see what impact that has.

I had no problems going up St. Vrain Canyon. I left the Lyons check point with 3 riders from California and one RMCC rider I'd not met before. We dropped the RMCC rider after awhile, and I never saw him again. The 3 Californian's were an older man about 10 years younger than me, and 2 college age kids. The kids went to school at sea level and they were struggling; the older guy lived at 6,000 feet and he was fine.

He and I nursed the kids up the mountain stopping frequently so they could catch their breath and let their heart rates return to normal. I made sure they drank during these stops - I didn't want them going through the same thing I went through on Lefthand Canyon. We got them to the Meeker check point in time, and when the kids started talking about abandoning I pushed on and never saw any of them again. As I write this, not all of the results are in so I don't know if they made it or not, but if they were going to abandon, that was the perfect place to do it - pushing on would have made it much more difficult to get back if they abandoned later.

The older guy was about my speed and ability and confirmed that he was far from the slowest person in his club, which confirms my belief that I'm a normal rider in a super fast club. That's OK - we'll see how fast they are when they get my age.

Another Good: I had swapped out the cog set and rear derailleur last week and kept my triple front chainring. My cog set is now a 9 spd. 11-36 and it worked great; in the small chain ring and 36T cog I was able to climb while mostly sitting. It wasn't fast, but nothing I do is.

We've got a 600K coming up in a month that climbs Lefthand Canyon, so the weekend of July 4th I plan to ride the Lefthand Lark Permanent. I want another shot at Lefthand so that I don't have to worry about it when I'm trying to plan the 400 mile ride. A Permanent is the perfect way to test every system without worrying about it screwing up the rest of the ride.

Best Part of the Ride: approaching Masonville I came across a young girl (maybe 19 or 20) on the side of the road in a bike that could have been an 3 wheeled recumbent, or it could of been some type of traveling wheel chair - the wheels were in the back where she could reach them with her hands. My initial impression is that it was some type of sleek wheelchair, but if she had a disability, it wasn't obvious. She was just sitting there on the side of the road staring off across the lake, so I slowed down almost to a stop to see if she were OK and she assured me that she was fine. I sensed that she was wasn't and pressed the issue, but she was firm that she was OK. Our encounter lasted 30 to 45 seconds at the most, yet I liked her vibe and she sticks out in my mind as the nicest person I met that day, so she gets the Best of the Ride Award, and I truly hope she was OK. I'd been on the road about 12 hours at that point and it was hot out, so I don't think I would have talked to me either if I were her, so I don't blame her.

Best Road Kill: Glen Haven Store - it's known for it's cinnamon rolls so I was looking forward to one of those for about 30 miles. Pulled up in front and there were two elderly (which means older than me) ladies sitting on the bench eating cherry cobbler and making little happy moaning sounds. When I chatted them up while I parked my bike, they said the cobbler was great, but that they'd taken the last two. When I got in the store the clerk was just pulling a new batch out of the oven, and for an extra $1 (bringing the total to whopping $3.90) she put a scoop of ice cream on it. Got outside and the ladies were gone so I sat on the bench next to my bike and made little happy moaning sounds while I ate it. Should have had another!

Time Bank: there were 6 check points plus the final stop on this ride, and my time bank was 1:08 (one hour and 8 minutes), 2:21, 0:58, 0:46, 2:39, 3:22 and 3:55 at the finish. The 58 minute bank was the Meeker check point at the top of the Canyon and indicates that I'd lost 1:23 on the climb up the Canyon - partly from the climb, but mostly from helping the kids, and the 46 minute bank was the Glen Haven check point which was mostly a descent from Meeker, indicating that I spend a lot of time with the kids at Meeker while they decided what to do. I could have added a lot of time to my bank if I would have let them be, but that's not my style, and it's not what Randonneuring is really about - the stronger ones help the weaker ones which makes them stronger so that they can help weaker ones. People have helped me, so I pay it forward.

Mistakes/Lessons Learned: none really on the ride, but had trouble staying awake on the way home. Next time I'll take a nap before I leave the finish parking lot. Also, for the first time ever I had saddle chafing issues on the upper inside of my thighs; probably due to dampness caused by the heat.

The sun sets on my first 400K:

Changes for the Next Ride: my next big ride will be the 600K in mid-July. I'm only going to make small adjustments to my food and hydration. Given my speed, I'm projecting a 35 or 36 hour finishing time, so I'll arrange to have Mrs. Rouge pick me up and take me home since I'll be asleep before we're out of the parking lot. And I'll have to apply lubrication frequently so that I don't chafe again.

Do You Wear A Helmet?

2010-06-13T19:45:00.000-07:00

Last week while I was climbing Lefthand Canyon on my way to an ugly DNF, I noticed that perhaps 20% of the guys who passed me were not wearing helmets. I didn't notice any women who weren't wearing one, and I don't remember any one headed down hill that didn't have one on. Apparently they don't wear them on the climb because their speed is so slow, and it's so hot, that they don't think they need it. I've had two really nasty, helmet destroying, falls in my life. One involved a dropped brake on a screaming down hill curve, but the fall that's made the most impression on me happened when I was standing totally still. It happened on the first day that I rode with clip-in pedals.

Many people fall when they first switch to clip-ins, but the fact that I wasn't moving, and that the fall caved in the side of my helmet is what has made me a believer in helmets. It was early in the Spring several years ago. The roads were clear, but there was still snow on the ground and the air was cold. I'd gone several miles at a fast clip and my nose was running. I was having trouble reaching the Kleenex in my back pocket. Up ahead was a bench directly off the road with no snow and a nice patch of gravel in front of it. Perfect. I'd pull off the road onto the gravel, un-clip my right foot, and put it on the bench to steady myself while I took care of my nose. I slowed down and pulled off the road onto the gravel, expertly slowing my speed so that I'd be at a full stop when I got the the bench. The problem was that the thin layer of gravel covered what was probably 4 or 5 inches of soft mud. I was almost to a stop when I hit it, and my right foot was un=clipped and raised slightly off the pedal in readiness for the bench. When my skinny tires hit the soft mud, with me solidly in the saddle, they promptly sank through the mud bring my bike to a complete halt.

My first instinct was to jerk the handle bars to the left - back towards the road - in a vain attempt to get the bike back on asphalt. This brought my weight from the right side to the left; not expecting this, and with my left foot clipped to the pedal, I slowly did an Arte Johnson to the left while my brain tried to understand why my foot was stuck to the pedal. (If you're not old enough to remember Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In show from the '70's - Arte Johnson played an adult on a kid's tricycle who would fall over in slow motion). All very funny - especially to anyone watching who remembered Arte Johnson - except that the side of my helmet came down on the back side of the curb - hard enough to make me see stars and to cave in the side of my helmet. Had I not been wearing the helmet I'm sure that I might have suffered a serious skull injury (the side of the skull is much thinner than the front or the back), and had I hit the curb I would have broken several ribs (which is what apparently happened to Colorado Governor Ritter when he touched wheels with the bike in front of him and went down last winter).

The people I've talked too who don't wear helmets, even if they have them with them, tell me that they're too experienced, or going too slow, or both, to have any real risk. Bully for them, but that fall gave me helmet religion. Stupid things happen in a hurry (even if it's in slow motion); you don't always see it coming in time to react, and the effects of a brain damage could be life altering. Protect your melon - wear your helmet.

Update - Almost a week after I wrote this Blog, there was a massive crash at the finish of Stage 4 of the Tour of Switzerland. Watch the slow motion replay of the crash at about the :55 second mark and focus on the lead riders helmets hitting the pavement: Every rider you can see going down in the replay hits their head hard. Now imagine how this would have turned out had they not been wearing helmets. I can not imagine why people still ride without them.

Tour de Switzlerland - 2010 Stage 4 Crash

Ugly DNF - Lefthand Canyon 400K

2010-06-09T08:22:00.000-07:00

I DNF'd (did not finish) Saturday's Lefthand Canyon 400K. Not only did I DNF, but it was an ugly DNF - it was disappointing, humiliating and embarrassing.

It was disappointing because I made the check point at the top of the Canyon which is the highest, and hardest, part of the ride. From that check point there are only a few smaller climbs, at Carter Lake and the south end of Horsetooth Reservoir, and the rest of the ride was on fairly flat, good, roads.

And it was disappointing because I'd put all that work into Lefthand Canyon. For those of you not familiar with the Canyon, it climbs about 4,500 feet (from one mile above sea level to almost two miles above sea level) in about 15 miles. The last mile or so is very steep.

In every ride there is one check point that I know if I can clear in regulation, the rest of the ride will fall into place. The check point at the top of that canyon was that point for me on this ride. Knowing that the climb would be tough, I'd built a good time bank by the time I got to the bottom of the hill. Brevet time limits are based upon the distance from point A to point B, and no adjustment is made if the road goes up, down or level.

For this reason, you want to pad your bank going into a big climb with a check point at the top because you'll loose a chunk of your bank on the climb (but you'll make it back up on the decent). If the check point is on the other side of the decent, your time bank isn't as important because you should end up even by making up the time lost on the climb with the time gained on the decent.

My time bank at the first check point was 1:36 (an hour and 36 minutes), and 2:03 at the second check point. Even with all my problems, I still had :26 left in the bank at the top of Lefthand. The rest of the ride, on paper then, should have been a piece of cake. Hence the disappointment.

The humiliation came as a result of the SQUEAK FROM HELL, and I wrote a separate blog on that.

The embarrassment came from the fact that, as far as I can tell from my symptoms on the Internet, I was probably suffering from heat exhaustion when I got to the top of the Canyon; for sure I was suffering from sever dehydration. I was dizzy, I couldn't stop throwing up, I couldn't turn the pedals - I simply had no power, and I couldn't control the handle bars - I was weaving all over the road. I was with Larry Bergen and Tammie Nakamura at the time and being that sick in front of them was very, very embarrassing.

From the check point at the top of the Canyon to the Diamond Shamrock station in Lyons is only 27 miles - almost all of it downhill. Those 27 miles took me about an hour and a half, because I had to keep stopping - even on the downhills because I couldn't control the bike. I know that I was in seriously bad shape because I tried to call 911 (I've never felt the urge to do that before - even after bad falls), but I couldn't get a dial tone.

So I DNF'd. A MAJOR disappointment because I was doing so well. And it was a result of a number of mistakes that I made. I want to be a better rider, so I'm serious about learning from my mistakes (I wrote a separate Blog about the Power of Mistakes).

Mistake #1 - too much body clothing. We started in the cool of the morning and I knew that I would finish in the cool of the next morning, plus it would be 10 to 15 degrees cooler at the top of the Lefthand, so I wore a short sleeved base layer under my short sleeved jersey. That's not a problem, but I should have shed it at the check point in Niwot.

I remember thinking that I should, but the pro's in the Tour de France wear base layers even when the temperature tops 100 degrees. Well, I'm not a pro and now I know what it feels like to over-heat; next time I'll shed the base first chance I get.

Mistake #2 - wearing arm sun protectors. I had a large spot of basal cell carcinoma removed a couple of weeks ago. My third bout of basal cell and my 5th bout with cancer. The doctor suggested that I get a pair of the new white UV sun protectors for my arms. They look like arm warmers but they're suppose to breath, keep you cool and keep the sun off your arms. So I bought a pair.

It was starting to get warm a few miles from the turn onto Lefthand Canyon so I stopped and put them on. For me, I don't think they let the heat dissipate from my arms, or at least they don't let it dissipate fast enough on a slow climb. I'm ditching the sun protectors - I didn't like them anyway - and I'll continue to rely on multiple layers of sun screen.

By the way - I don't have much hair left on my head, so I wear a dew rag; it keeps me from getting these weird patterns of sun tan on my head because of the holes in my helmet. I'll continue to wear the dew rag; a quick squirt from my water bottle will cool me down when it gets hot. That would have worked here, except for Mistake #3.

Mistake #3 - nutrition/hydration blunders. I was living off of a Perpeteum type product during the ride. Because it was going to be hot, I had it thinner than normal so that it had more water, and I had it in both bottles. The problem is that when it gets hot out, or I get hot, I don't like the taste of it, so as I was climbing the Canyon, I was not ingesting enough food or liquid - especially liquid because I couldn't force myself to drink it.

I knew I was in trouble because my lips and my mouth were dry. When my lips get dry it's an early warning signal, and when my mouth's dry, the dehydration lights and buzzers are flashing! I didn't have any water with me, just 2 bottles of liquid food. Very stupid!.

I was with Larry Bergen at that point. We knew that we were rapidly eating into our time bank, and we were worried about the last couple of miles because we both knew those were going to be really steep miles. So, I didn't stop, although without any spare water, the only thing stopping would have done is cool me off.

The other problem with my nutrition plan is that carrying enough powdered Perpeteum for a 20+ hour ride, packaged into individual zip lock bags to add to my water bottles meant that I was carrying a lot more weight than normal. That wasn't helping my climb up the Canyon.

Nutrition's tough because every person is different. Be careful doing things a certain way because that's how someone else does it, or because you found a web site that says to do it that way. And how your body reacts to things changes day to day (at least mine does). It's the hardest part of this sport and you just have to figure it out on your own. Perpeteum works great for me when it's cool and when it's cold (I'll stick the bottle in my back pocket), but when it's hot I hate it.

Lessons Learned: First, I need to listen to my body more. My body was telling me it was hot, but I was so focused on getting to the top, I ignored it. Also, my body was telling me that it didn't want Perpeteum that day, but again, I was so focused on a particular course of action I didn't listen. I'm going to listen more and talk less (something Mrs. Rouge has been trying to teach me most of our married life) - this time to my own body.

Second, I need to drink a lot more water during the summer than I was doing during the winter. I can get away with not having a separate water bottle in the winter, but not in the summer.

Third, I need to modify my drive train. I had my bike set up with a triple chain ring and a 10 spd. 12-27 cassette. I can climb Left Hand Canyon with that, but the next time I'm up there I hope to be doing a 600K. That climb will burn too much of my glycogen batteries with that drive train, so I've rebuilt Miss Legnano with a 11-37 9 spd. cassette. It sure won't make me faster, but it will make the climb a whole lot easier on my body.

The Rest of The Story: After I got to Lyons and cooled off, I was able to start ingesting small amounts of water, eventually moving up to some diluted, then full strength sugared drinks. Overall I ingested more than 150 oz. of liquid before I finally peed 8 hours later. I continued to drink fluids and was able to keep some food down before I went to sleep. Slept great!

I honestly felt great when I woke up the next morning. Including the miles to Lyons, I had actually ridden 200K, climbed Lefthand Canyon towards the end, been violently sick, and yet had no sore muscles or hot spots. My emotion the next morning is that I can't wait for the St. Vrain 400K in a couple of weeks.

The Squeak From Hell

2010-06-07T19:08:00.000-07:00

Three rides ago my bike developed a squeak. I do all my own work on my bike - nobody touches it except for the bottom bracket (you can ruin a bike if you do something wrong, so I don't mess with it). A squeak wounds my pride; it's a pock on my wrenching ability. But in the middle of a ride there is not much you can do about it except finish the ride and fix it when you get home.

I'm thinking that there are three probable causes: a worn clip-in cleat, a worn pedal or a bottom bracket problem. When I got home I replaced the cleats in my shoe (they were well worn and needed to be replaced). Assuming that the problem was solved I rode out on the next ride.

The squeak was back and I was both embarrassed and mad. I felt like people were looking at me like I was riding a Walmart bike. This wasn't fun, in fact it was becoming war: me against the squeak.

First thing I did when I got home was get a new set of pedals. Good thing too because the old pair were on their last legs: still rideable but losing the spring in the release springs (if you know what I mean).

I'm not going to be embarrassed again, so I checked everything: the tightness of the pedals, the quick release mechanism, the fit of my cleats into the pedals. Everything seemed perfect so I took it out for a test ride. When you come out of my driveway you can take a right and go up hill, or a left and go down - I went left. Easy peddling to the bottom of the hill; testing the quick releases on all sides of the pedals. No squeak. At the bottom of the hill I climb out of the saddle and stood to pedal all the way home - wanted lots of weight on the pedals to make sure all was well. No problems, so with my bike back in my good graces, I put her on her hook ready for the next ride.

Saturday's ride was the Lefthand Canyon 400K. A mile into the ride THE SQUEAK FROM HELL WAS BACK! Worse than ever, and with every turn of the pedals. I'm so embarrassed! My wrenching abilities are shredded to tatters. My manhood has taken a major blow. How can I ever ride with these people again? We get to Lefthand Canyon and most of the non-Brevet riders on the hill are students from the nearby campus of the University in Boulder. Everyone who passes me (everyone passes me anyway) looks at me like I'm some old foggy who doesn't have the good sense to buy a plastic bike like theirs. Their looks say "put some grease on that squeak" - except I don't know where it's coming from. I'm insulted and humiliated - both for me and for my beloved Legnano.

It's got to be the bottom bracket, so first thing Sunday after church I took it to my LBS (the only one that I let touch it). I explain my problem and the wrench, who weighs maybe a buck ten dripping wet, takes it out for a test spin. Brings it back and says that he can't hear any squeak. I can't believe this!

I take him through all the symptoms and explain what I've done. He agrees with the cleats and pedals, which according to him leaves only the bottom bracket or the saddle.

The saddle? What?? He says that saddles "sometimes need the rails lubed or they squeak". I'm looking at him, and he's looking at me, and then we're both looking at the saddle. So he pushes down on the saddle with all of his buck ten power. Nothing. Since I haven't weighed a buck ten since middle school, I pushed down on the saddle - slight squeak! So I push down in the middle of the saddle with all my weight - MY SQUEAK!! Push some more and more squeaks. It's my squeak! - and every time I push, it squeaks - and the harder I push the louder it squeaks. So what was happening was that every pedal stroke pushed down on the seat, which caused the squeak, except when I stood to pedal.

I gave the wrench a $5 tip (always tip your wrench) and took my baby home and lubed her saddle rails. All is right with the world now, except that I can't wait to go back to Left Hand Canyon and show those co-eds what a real bike looks like.

The Power of Mistakes

2010-06-07T15:09:00.000-07:00

Most people hate to make mistakes and hate admitting them even worse. They pretend that it didn't happen, or if it did, it's not their fault, or it's "not fair".

However, if you think about it, you learn way more from your mistakes then you do from your successes. Think about the last ride you had that went great - perfect day; no wind (or better yet, tail-wind both ways). Not a single problem. When you got home did you stop and think "how could that have been better?", or "what could I have done differently that would have made it better?"; or "what did I do that made it such a great ride so that I can do that again"? No.

Now think about the last ride where things went wrong - you had a flat (or several flats); or you got caught in a rain storm without a coat; or you didn't get home before it got dark and you didn't have a light. When you got home, did you stop and think "that was stupid, I should have . . . ", or next time I'll take the time to . . ."? Probably - I do, and if you don't you have no one to blame but yourself (yes it's YOUR fault, and yes! that's fair).

Unless you're dumb enough to keep making the same mistakes over and over again, stupid mistakes are what make you smart.

If you're new to Randonneuring you're going to make mistakes. Deal with that fact and don't let it bother you. The object is to make every mistake in the book (but only once!), and to make them as quickly as possible so that you can move on to having fun.

My Ride Goals

2010-06-03T08:26:00.000-07:00

I have two major goals for my rides: one long-term and one ride specific. Yes, there are a lot of small goals (lose weight, get in shape, having quite time alone to think, etc.), but really, I do long rides because I like to ride my bike. Face it: if you don't enjoy, really enjoy, the feeling of being on your bike, you won't do this sport for long.

My long-term goal is to get to the point where I can do a 200K to 400K ride every weekend and be energised by the experience. I remember my first "long" ride - 75 miles. I rode the first half of an MS150 ride from Boulder to Ft. Collins 4 or 5 years ago. At that time the farthest I'd ridden was about 40 miles, and 75 miles seemed like forever. On the day of the event, the first 50 miles was awesome, and then it felt like I fell of a cliff. I didn't know it at the time, but I bonked and crawled to the finish. My body was trashed for about a week after.

Six months later I rode my first century. First 75 miles were great but by the end of the event I felt like I'd been beaten with a 2x4. Didn't bonk, but wasn't physically ready for the distance. Today I barely notice the first 100 miles, and then the physical discomfort starts to build. It never gets unbearable, but it would be great to get to the point where I could ride 300K or 400K, and finish tired but happy - and wake up the next morning and not be able to tell I'd ridden the day before. Similar, in other words, to a training ride. Right now it takes me until after lunch the next day before I start to feel normal - before that I just feel like I'm only hitting on 4 cylinders. Right now I'm doing long rides about every other weekend, but some day I'd like to be able to ride long once a week.

My ride specific goal is to increase my time bank at each check point throughout the ride. Being able to do that shows me that my power is consistent throughout the ride. It also shows me that I'm finishing strong. I believe that finishing strong is important both psychologically and physically; I have a tendency to think that every long ride is 5 miles too long. I don't want to give up on the ride before it's over.

At the beginning of this season, when the days were short, cold and rainy or sleety, I shifted into coast mode at the last check point. I knew that I had enough time in the bank to finish the ride in regulation, even if I had a major flat tire, so I just coasted through the last leg. In reviewing my times after the first 2 or 3 rides I noticed that my time banks were smaller at the finish then they were at the last check points. This is not good - you need to keep moving - it's not important so much for that ride as it is for the next ride.

I want to wake up the next morning and feel good about how I handled the ride. I don't want to feel like I was just holding on at the end - if you're just holding on at the end of a 200K, you're in trouble for the 300K. On the other hand, if you feel like you were still gaining speed at the end of the 200K, it gives you confidence for the 300K.

For example, several weeks ago I rode the Black Forest 300K. I signed in at the first check point one hour and three minutes before the cut-off, so my time bank at that point was 1:03 - this is my cushion in case something really bad happens on the way to the next check point. My time banks for the 4 check points, and the final finish, were 1:03, 1:26, 1:38 1:46 and 2:22. My obvious conclusion from these bank times is that I was continuing to accelerate through the ride. This is a huge confidence builder going into this weekends 400K.

The Psychology of Slow

2010-05-29T21:43:00.000-07:00

Coming to grips with SLOW in modern day America takes a fundamental shift in how you think. We're taught, from an early age to win. Being second is failure. You need to be the fastest; the best. You need to set records - if not for the event, then for yourself; a new record for this course, this distance, this point in the season. If you're not winning, or working on winning, or getting closer to winning, then why bother?

Most of you know who won the 2009 Tour de France (Alberto Contador), but most of you will have to stop and think about who was second (Andy Schleck), and everyone knows who was third. But probably none of you know who was last - the Latern Rouge of the 2009 Tour de France was Yauheni Hutarovich. Hutarovich is an accomplished Cat 1 racer, having won a number of stages of lesser known professional races since he became a pro in 2008, and was the Belarus National Road Race Champion in 2008 and 2009.

The guy's a loser right? - he has the single worst time of any professional cyclist to finish last year's Tour de France within the time limit. But he legally finished. How many of you could finish the Tour de France in regulation? How many of you even know someone who could finish the Tour in regulation? How many of you even know someone who could beat the Belarus National Champion? Yet the guy's a loser? Do you realize that even during the very worst uphill stages, a rider has to finish within 18% of the finishing time of the stage winner in order to avoid being disqualified and out of the race. So, Hutarovich had at least 82% of Contador's speed, yet the guy's a loser? (Hutarovich finished in 156th place approximately 5% - time wise - behind Contador). Approximately 2,200 miles in 21 days; 90 hours of racing, and he finished roughly 3 hours and 15 minutes behind Contador, yet he's the butt of the jokes in the pro cycling community.

Or is he? The finishing place of anyone in a bike event is relative. I'm the slowest rider in long distance road rides (Brevets) sponsored by the Rocky Mountain Cycling Club. I'm not just the slowest, I'm the club record holder for slow, and there are only a couple of riders in the club right now that can come within an hour of my slow speed in an event. I have such a lock on slow, that other club riders don't even try to be as slow as me.

I'm slow - but yet, if you look at other clubs, like Seattle, Portland, Davis, CA, San Francisco and San Diego, my times over a give distance are not as slow as many of their members. And in many of those cases, their rides of similar distances do not have to contend with the climbing that I do on a typical RMCC ride in the Colorado Rockies. In fact, I don't think that my record setting slow pace is due to so many fast riders being members of RMCC, I think it's due to a lack of slow riders because the slow riders are scared away by the fast riders - in other words, riders that are afraid of being humiliated by the fast riders.

I'm slow - but yet I finish within regulation time. In reality, there aren't many riders that can even ride a bike for 125, or 200, or 250 or more miles in one continuous event. I'm slower than anybody in my club, yet I'm faster than 99.9% of the guys my age (60), and I know many younger guys who aspire to be Cat 1 or 2 riders who think I'm a Super Man because I'm twice (or three times) their age and I can ride 250 miles without stopping - which is something they can't even imagine.

Two weeks ago I finished the Black Forest 300K in last place - 34th out of the 34 starters. I was roughly an hour slower than my closest competitor, yet I was able to ride 200 miles in roughly 17 and a half hours. How many bike riders are there in Colorado? One million? How many of those can ride 200 miles faster than me? 33!! So you see: it's all in perspective - I'm not a loser, I'm actually a winner. I'm 34th in the state at 200 mile Brevet rides and I'm 60 years old! Woo Hoo! Try and top that Hutarovich!

I don't know how much grief Hutarovich receives from other pros - but I'll bet he gets a lot of envy from all the Cat 2 riders he knows who'd give Juan Pelota to trade places with him so that they could say that they had a pro contract and rode, and finished, the Tour de France within 3 hours of Alberto Contador.

So, forget where you finish. Relax. It's not important. Every body you know thinks that your 300 or 400 or 600 kilometer event is an impossible undertaking, and the fact that you hit your check points in regulation makes you a god - even if your name is Yauheni Hutarovich. Being slow is a matter of perspective. It's all in your head. The only one who cares is you.

There are a number of lesser reasons why I'm slow (like - I came to bike riding late in life; I'm not a gifted athlete; I don't train to ride faster), but there are two primary reasons I'm not fast - 1) I seriously don't care; trying to go faster sucks too much energy - it hurts too much and that takes all the fun out of the ride, and 2) I'm very comfortable at the speed I ride -I enjoy the scenery and the people I meet along the way. Making my speed, and over all time the primary focus of the ride would take about 90% of the enjoyment out of it.

If you're afraid to ride Brevet's because you're afraid of having your time posted and the world knowing that you're that slow. Don't worry about it. Nobody cares except the other people who can pat themselves on their backs because they beat you. The rest of the millions of bicycle riders in this country are in awe of your abilities. Give a Brevet a shot - if you don't have a blast it's because you're trying to go to fast.

First Brevet - 300K Black Mountain Side (New Mexico) 10/09

2010-05-26T17:05:00.000-07:00

My first serious official Brevet was the 300K in New Mexico in October, 2009. This ride starts in Truth or Consequences, New Mexico and climbs to the west up and over the Continental Divide. That part of New Mexico is largely uninhabited, and so John & Liz Mazzola operate a ride that is different than what seems to be common - they move forward during the ride to the next check point taking your drop bag with them.

I entered this ride partly because there seemed to be a fair amount of climbing and my focus during 2009 was to improve my climbing skills. To be honest though, one of my primary motives for this ride was my plan to take Mrs. Rouge and the Red Latern Express (our motor home) south from Denver for a long weekend with a bit of riding thrown in.

In hind site, my ride was a total rookie move - I jumped into this without any idea what I was getting in to.

Mistake #1: The ride description didn't say anything about lights being required. I checked the charts and it seemed that the ride would start a half hour or so before it would be light enough to ride without lights. And although the last 40% of the ride was downhill, I'd have to have a spectacular ride to get home before dark. So, I took a heavy light and extra (and heavy) batteries. And rather than drop this weight in my drop bag at the first check point, I carried it all day (almost 200 miles!). Lesson learned: get better lights and ditch the weight.

Mistake #2: The advance weather report had the weather clear, with a low of 50 degrees, a high of 90, and little to no wind. The reality is that the starting temperature was about 45 degrees, and I doubt that it got above 80 all day (probably because we climbed up into the mountains). Thinking it would be warm, I dressed for the warmth - short sleeved jersey, no base layer, arm warmers, no leg warmers, and a light windbreaker. I knew I was in trouble at the start because it was cold and I hadn't even brought a warm kit and jacket down from Denver.

Lesson Learned: because you're moving through the air, the wind-chill temperature is at least 10 degrees colder than the actual air temperature. Add a headwind, and it's colder still. Another lesson learned: carry worst-case scenario gear to the start - if you don't need it you can leave it in the car, and if you need it you have it.

And no wind? Yea right - stiff headwind all the way up the mountain. Winds are a way of life when you ride a bike, so it shouldn't have done more than annoy me. In truth, I had my mind set on a warm, wind-free ride and the cold, stiff, head wind all day really demoralized me. It took me a long time to get over my funk. Lesson learned: Winds are going to be a part of your ride - assume that they'll be there and ignore them.

Mistake #3: not having refined my ride nutrition, I was using a Hammer Perpetuem type product. Because the check points were the only place with water and they were far apart, I had mixed my portions extra strong - about pancake batter consistency. My plan was that I would have the batter in one bottle, and then carry two other bottles of plain water to wash the batter down with. I hadn't tried this out ahead of time, and the batter upset my stomach. The result was that I really cut back on my nutrition which degraded my performance. Lesson learned: nutrition on a Brevet is one of the most important aspects of a ride, and everyone is different - concentrate in the beginning on figuring out what works and doesn't work for you. Turns out for me that I have to keep the concentrations of my liquid nutrition pretty regulation. And it also turns out that sugar upsets my stomach: I can eat hot dogs, burritos, pizza, etc. and I'm great. But Gatorade, gels or Power Bars have me puking in the ditch 5 miles down the road.

Biggest Lesson Learned: I'd been climbing against the headwind all day, and I had 3 hours and 5 minutes to make the turn around control. The control was 31 miles away, and with the climb and headwind I was averaging about 9 miles an hour. At that point I strongly considered packing it in, turning around and riding the tail wind home. But a couple of weeks before that I had read an article that said that most of the people that DNF on a Brevet could have made it - they just gave up too soon. So I pushed on and kept doing my best, even though I didn't see how I could possibly make it. With about 10 miles to go, I crested the Continental Divide and for the next 6 or 7 miles the road was more down than up, and the head wind had become a tail wind. I was flying, but it was going to be tight. And then I came over a rise and the remaining 3 miles to the control were almost straight down hill. I was flying! and slid into the control with about a minute to spare! I get it: don't ever, ever quit until you actually miss a check point cutoff.

End result: I ended up finishing the ride in regulation time (19:15) and the confidence I gained from overcoming my problems gave me a lot of emotional momentum going into the 2010 season.

Best Part of the Ride: it was about 1:00 a.m. and I was out in the middle of nowhere New Mexico. Bottom of a well dark; no lights except the stars. I'm tooling down the middle of the road when headlights come up from behind me. Beat up white pickup - it slowed down to my speed and pulled up next to me. A couple of drunk cowgirls were headed home from some where. They don't see many bikers in Lycra shorts in that part of the world, especially in the middle of the night. The cowgirls drove next to me for about a mile making drunk sexist remarks about my ass , before finally roaring off amidst giggles, whistles, hoots and cat calls. That brief, sexist, encounter made all the suffering worth while and will keep me riding my bike for the rest of my life!

Latern Rouge: You don't have to go fast to have fun!

2010-05-26T11:41:00.000-07:00

Latern Rouge - a french term which translated means "Red Latern", as in the light that hangs on the back of a Caboose - the last car of the train. In bicycle event terms, especially Randonneuring, or long-distance, marathon type rides, it means the last one to finish the event within the qualifying time. I seldom hear the term Latern Rouge, but I prefer it to the more common American term of "DFL", meaning "Dead Frigging Last".

When I started riding my bike again at the age of 56 as a way to get in shape following Prostate Cancer surgery, I started riding short organized events (typically fun raisers for some charity), and quickly progressed to riding organized "Century's" (100 mile events). I found that my friends would finish the event an hour or more ahead of me, but that when I finished I was still capable of riding further while they were still totally knackered from the event. From that I figured out that longer and slower was what I was best at.

At about that time I read a blog that mentioned the term Randonneuring in connection with a long-distance charity ride. After some basic research it became obvious that this was my sport. I live in Denver, and discovered that the Denver area is host to the Rocky Mountain Cycling Club (RMCC), which turns out to be one of the top Randonneuring clubs in the U.S.

I was already doing long rides, both organized and on my own, and so I did a couple of "Permanents" in 2008 to figure out how a Brevet (a Randonneuring ride) works and whether I liked it. I had just completed an extensive round of Chemo treatments in a battle with a recurrence of my Prostrate cancer, and so I chose Permanents that were relatively flat because I simply didn't have the energy to climb any of the numerous mountain passes we have in Colorado.

By 2009 I was getting my strength back. I'd been lurking on the RMCC site and was scared by the speed at which the club members were riding long events. I compared my average speed for a give distance against what I was seeing on the "results" page for their rides. The RMCC members were clearly much faster than me. That scared me, so I spent the 2009 season entering every organized event that included substantial climbing - events like the Triple By-pass.

But I was still lurking on the RMCC web site. I was getting faster, and was definitely stronger, but my times were even close to that of the participants showing up on the results page. I spent the off season between 2009 and 2010 strengthening my legs and increasing my normal cadence. My speed improved, but at the rate I was progressing I'd be dead before I ever got to what I considered an "acceptable" speed by RMCC standards.

Yet I really wanted to ride Brevets, and I wanted to earn medals - which I couldn't do if I only road Permanents, so I resigned myself to enduring the humiliation of being the Latern Rouge on RMCC rides. And then one day I was researching Brevets in some of the other areas and I noticed that in most of the other major clubs (Seattle, Oregon, Davis California, San Francisco and San Diego) that many of their riders were finishing Brevets with slower times than I post. On that day I quit worrying about my time. I'm slow. OK, I'm over it. The truth, I think, is that I ride with one of the physically strongest teams in the country. If I rode with any other club I wouldn't be the Latern Rouge, and I'd have lots of other mates to ride with.

The purpose of this blog is to convince other riders, wherever they are, to enjoy the benefits of long distance riding. If this is you, than I encourage you to change your mind set - forget the American need to "win"; to be first; to be the best. Relax and enjoy the ride! Remember - you get the same medal as the person who really does finish first.