Christmas

I was able to pool together the money I got from various relatives to buy myself a nice little christmas present. I wasn’t able to afford the bundle that included the heart rate strap, but since they go for $30 on amazon I figured this would be a good start. The plan with this is to add in heart rate zone specific interval training to my normal riding. To be honest December has been a sad month for me riding wise. I have probably only logged 200 miles, which is pitiful since my goal is to 200-300 a week.

Introductions.

This is not a new years blog. This process is one that started in september of 2009, It has just taken until now for me to start writing about it.

At that point I weighed 250 lbs, wore size 40 pants, and hadn’t ridden a bike since before high school. In an attempt to get healthier I decided to buy a bike and start riding to school. I scoured craigslist, and got some advice from friends who are cyclists before settling on a black 1986ish Bianchi Sport SX, which at $250 seemed like a ridiculously expensive bike.

That first ride seemed like it would never end, and after the 3 mile ride I wasn’t sure I would be able to make it home. But after that ride I did it again, and soon I was riding further and just for fun rather then to go anywhere specific. By the time I moved from Sacramento to Portland I considered myself a pretty good rider, with an average speed of around 18mph, and regularly riding about 90 miles a week. Then I met hills, and the process began all over again. Once again i embarked on a first ride that seemed to never end, but again no matter what excuses I could come up with I would find myself out on the bike crawling up hills at 9mph wondering how I got there.

Which brings us to now, 4 months from the start of Oregon’s racing season, needing to continue building speed and conditioning, and learn some pack riding skills so I don’t cause a crash the first time out. I have some plans (which I’ll discuss in more detail in the next post) and nothing else to do but try, and see what happens.