Training Log Archive: veinbuster

Ride your age session 6

4C and moderate winds to start, but the weather channel expected winds to build to 30 mph. I didn't want to fight that for 25km straight so stayed on the thin line of beach road in Surfside and Garden City. By the time I was finishing, the head wind versus Tailwind differential was 7 km/hr - so I started slacking off into the wind and even went a block inland to try to get a bit of a break.

I think I've now done rides of 61, 62, 63, 64, 65, and 66km, so I might feel compelled to finish off with 67, 68 and 69.

Nutrition: 1 fruit Buddy, 1 Strop Waffle, 1/2 eload

C • I like the way you think! 2

Bare minimum today in hopes of missing the rain on my bike ride.

Ride your age session 5 part a

16C with light 15km/hr winds to start. I headed out at dawn because radar showed a pretty big storm at what I guessed to be 3-4 hours away. I headed north up my favourite beach route feeling strong with a little help from the wind. I opted to take advantage of it and pushed a pace that might have let me stay ahead of Flight next week with a 12-13 minute head start. Second interval had no lights or traffic involvement and came in at 8:29, which is among my quickest without any descending.

Just before 20km my battery warned of being low so I noted a land mark for 20km planning to shut the Garmin off when I got back there. I also noted a 25km marker in case the battery didn't last as long as I hoped - its good for about an hour after the first warning.

I looped around the giant beach golf course homes for a bit, trading off head wind and tailwind before making the final turn back hoping to hit my 20km marker at 41+ km to be able to claim riding my age. I ended up getting there spot on 41km. I'll load the Garmin in a bit to see exactly where I stopped relative to my marker.

Ride your age session 5 part b

After a 3 minute stop to let Mrs. know where I was, guzzle my drink and eat a couple of chews, I set off without the heart monitor for 20km back mostly into the wind. About a third of the way back, the wind had picked up to about 30km/hr with some fierce chanelling around the bigger hotels. One of those channeled gusts tried very hard to shove my bike off the road. A few minutes later the rain started and was light, but fairly steady for the second half of my return.

A took a short detour to pick up bagels (I'm not adding that to my distance count). When I stoppped I notice one clear was quite loose so I snugged that up before getting breakfast to go.

The rain stopped while I was in the shop.

Ride your age session 5 part c

Just a cool down over run on the end of the Garmin battery. It was too nice to stop. I probably could have done my dad's age today, which is fitting because it is his birthday.

A bit of a tourist ride today to find the music stores. Offering are pretty thin around here, but there is one left to visit. I think it is geared primarily to keyboards and school band instruments but we'll see.

The Tour put me in much more traffic than I like, but only two drivers were noteably disrespectful. It is definitely much more civilized getting out a couple of hours earlier.

Mrs. is offering Cold Stone for lunch, so I had best put real clothes on.

Yesterday's rest day ended up having a couple of hours of walking around so I decided to take another shot at an easy day.

I headed south on the beach to see how far I could go. About half way through Garden City I ran into dune reconstruction that extended for about 3km. The new dunes will be quite wide. The sand was quite soft so it was a bit of work in spots - this is where my heart rate went up for a short bit. I took a few photos which I'll add later - and, of course, forgot to turn the timer back on for a bit. About a kilometre in the soft sand and maybe close to five minutes.

It was interesting to see the contrast in damage from last fall's hurricane. Garden City which hadn't enforced dune preservation as strongly as Surfside Beach has far more homes that still have extensive damage. They also have many public access locations where the boardwalk is smashed to bits. The new dunes should make a big difference in future years.

Coming off the beach I explored a bit to see if there were any new shops of interest. I found one coffee shop that Flight and I may have to try out. I bailed on that part of the ride at 3Ave S figuring that 90 minutes on a 'rest' day was probably enough.

C • You're a lousy "rester" 2

Photos from today's ride.

This is the north end of construction. That big black ball behind the bull dozer is gushing water. Really fowl looking water.


This smelly pump is a relatively new addition. It is unclear if it is permanent. It seems to be trying to help the tide maintain a balance in the inlet. There is a very large hose across the road. This is one of the narrowest points in the peninsula.


This is from the top of the new man made dunes. The top is quite wide. The break in the rock is where the ocean flows in and out of the inlet. When I looked at tide charts last night I wondered how high tide (and low tide) could be almost an hour later in the inlet than on the beach 50-200 m away. It made a lot more sense seeing this.


Low tide from the bridge over the inlet. The ugly blue box in the lower right is my reference point to compare high tide.

C • Gusher 2

Sunrise beach ride with Mrs. We had to keep it short because the city was threatening to cut the water between 9am and 3pm.
South along the beach to the pier, then inland to the wetlands. Mrs had to walk her bike through the soft sand above the tide line, but the fattie gobbled it up. Mrs bike was fine on the packed wet sand, and she thought she was going full speed until she hit the pavement.