Mileage, winter and plans for the future

Last week was a big week for me, mileage-wise.Train cancellations meant that I elected to cycle the whole route home twice, resulting in a total for the week of 132 miles.This is not huge by some standards – it is only a small part of a single randonneuring event – but compared to where I was at this point last year (barely riding a bike ever) I feel a real sense of achievement.  The long and short of it is that I have now topped 2,500 miles on my Dahon and over 3,000 miles for the year!  I've also managed to insert a text box on the right hand tool-bar so "Mileage to Date" can sit at the top of the blog! 

It is testament to the effect of regular, short to medium mileage rides that I felt absolutely fine at the end of the week too.Todd Fahrner of Clever Cycles in the US also observed as much in this article.He tackled a 700 mile ride down the US West coast on a Brompton with only commuting mileage as “training”.It’s a very inspiring and well-written piece which is worth a read. It is also fine testament to the capability of my Dahon Vitesse D3HG that these high mileages were as easy on a folding bike as on my 21-speed hybrid.Yes, on those small wheels and yes, with only three gears!*

On longer rides, my thoughts often turn to future cycling plans and high on that list is to do some longer distance things on my Dahon.To that end, I have been looking at some cyclo-sportive events in the spring with distances of 40, 60 and 100+ miles.I love the thought of rocking up on my “shopping bike” and going the distance with the lycra-clad, middle aged, Bradley Wiggins wannabes.Maybe not quite as quickly, but equally as far.But then again, you never know.One of my favourite inspirational articles is this one by Kent Peterson who rode the 1999 Paris-Brest-Paris (in all of its 1200km glory) on a Bike Friday folding bike!And in a damn good time too – an awesome achievement!**Thusly inspired, there is a small part of me that is starting to believe that Lands End to John O’Groats on the Dahon is a practical possibility…

The mornings round here are bitterly cold (by British standards at least) at the moment.So cold in fact that my back brake froze up this morning!I tried to pull the brakes at a junction and found the rear lever to be solid – totally immovable!I had stripped, cleaned and lubricated the calipers on the weekend so I knew that they were mechanically fine.A quick exploratory wiggle showed that the capiers were indeed mving as they should, just not the lever.Once I reached the train station I was able to free it all up - there must have been some moisture in the cable which had then frozen.I will dose it liberally with WD40 this evening – that stuff sorts any sticky mechanism out.

I also went shopping on the weekend and bought a nice hi-viz cycling jacket and winter gloves (both bargains from Decathlon) Even so, with the temperatures as low as they were this morning, it takes a little while to warm up and some bits never quite do!However, I know that when I get round to riding longer events, these hard winter miles will pay back dividends in terms of physical and mental development.

As the saying goes, “The soft iron thinks itself harshly treated in the heat of the forge.The tempered steel blade looks back and knows differently.”


*To answer the two most commonly asked questions from non-folding bike riders!

** Incidentally, Kent’s write up of his 2005 Tour Divide race (on a single-speed, rigid MTB!) is also an excellent and inspiring read.

2,000 miles and counting!

Well, well, well, another mileage milestone rolls beneath my wheels!

If I managed to update my blog more regularly, I could've bee closer to real-time with this post but sometime during last week, I topped 2,000 miles on the Dahon.  OK that's over several months of riding and not a few weeks touring but I never thought that my experiment in cycle commuting would go this far.

Although the nights are drawing in and the mornings are darker, I'm still enjoying it and wouldn't go back to the car out of choice.  Not that I have that choice as I don't own a personal car any longer, just the family one my wife needs.

If you'd told the overweight me a year ago (who was worrying about how best to keep his old car running againsta rising repair bill) that I'd be cycling everyday and lighter, fitter and happier as a result, I wouldn't have believed you.

I used to arrive home having battled traffic for an hour or more in a foul mood and literally buzzing from stress hormones and other such undesirables.  I can't have been too pleasant to welcome home or be around to be honest!

Nowadays, the only buzzing I do is on endorphines and so even after the toughest ride home, I feel great!

Getting rid of my car was out of necessity to be honest.  The repair bill had got to the point where it was more than the value of the car and so it had to go.  However, as I was already cycling at the time and hadn't used it for a while, it was pretty easy to let it go.  No borrowing money for a new one for me, either.

What being (sort of) car-free has done for me is reduce and almost remove entirely the crutch that a car provides.  On those cold, windy mornings or tired days when one just can't be bothered, it would have been easy to jump back in the car.  That would've gone from a day per week, to two days, to three and so on...

But I don't cycle simply because I have no other option.  I do it because I love being out in the fresh air on my bike immersed in my surroundings.  I love travelling cheaply and not harming the environment with my actions. 

I do it because I love cycling.

And so, here's to the next two thousand miles.  I hope they are as fun, inspiring and eventful as the first two thousand have been.


Mileage to date:

Week 30 - 102 miles
Week 31 - 92 miles


Total mileage so far - 2,186.5 miles

Mileage to date

It was another monster day of traffic on the way through the city today.  I have no idea what the problem was that caused it all (it never seems to take much to be honest) but it didn’t slow me down one tiny bit.  Having just checked on Google maps, one of the queues was a full mile long!  I simple cruised down the outside of it, to the front of the queue and turned right at the traffic junction as usual.  No fuss and no delays – lovely!

OK, so it wasn't quite this bad but you get the picture!

As predicted, the week before last was a big week on the bike for me and certainly the longest to date since buying the Dahon.  Five full days in the office plus a bit of to-ing and fro-ing from a clients resulted in a total of 117.5 miles for the week.  Last week was much shorter though, in large part because I worked from home for a couple of days.  Not so good from the point of view of exercise but very restful and my legs thanked me for the time to recuperate!  As a result, Thursday and Friday last week were (almost) effortless blasts of cycling fun in beautiful Autumn weather. 

Mileage to date:

Week 28 – 117.5 miles

Week 29 – 48.5 miles

Grand total so far:  1,992.5 miles

So I’m only a whisker away from the 2,000 mile mark.  I think I’ll allow myself a small moment of self-congratulation and a celebratory cup of tea!

Mileage to date

I am planning to do a decent review of my Dahon Vitesse D3HG at some point along with a host of other blog posts. Time, the old enemy...

Anyway, just time to do a mileage update:

Week 24 - 116 miles
Week 25 - 64 miles
Week 26 - 69 miles
Week 27 - 81.5 miles

Total mileage - 1,826.5 miles

So the next big milestone of 2,000 miles cycled edges near. This week looks like being a big one as well so that barrier should be broken shortly.

Also worth noting is that I've passed the six-month mark and in all that time, only used a car on a handful of occasions. This time last year that would have seemed laughable. Now, anything is possible. The cold, dark half of the year has yet to come though I'm sure I'll cope. At least there might be more room for bikes on the train!

Olympic-cycle-mania!

Well since the opening ceremony of the Olympics the other week, it’s gone absolutely sport-mad over here in the UK!  The atmosphere is fantastic – helped in no small part by our impressive medal haul.  I’ve been so inspired to see how many of our medals have been won by our cyclists and in particular the track team in the velodrome.

The road race on the first Saturday was a bit of a disaster – I think the team just picked the wrong strategy and let the breakaway group get too far ahead.  It has to be remembered though that several of them had just completed the Tour de France little more than a week earlier (including Bradley Wiggins and Chris Froome – first and second respectively in the Tour) which puts their enormous effort into even sharper perspective.  Most mortals would be forgiven for spending months recovering after such an endeavour, not racing a 250km world-class road race so soon afterwards!

The men and women in the velodrome have been truly awesome.  Years and years of planning and preparation have gone into our success but ultimately it comes down to the person on the bike.  To see how much sheer power they are able to turn on in an instant for a sprint to the finish is stunning!

It seems like there are more cyclists out on the roads at the moment, no doubt inspired by Team GB.  Personally speaking, there has been more than one occasion that I'm sure I’ve dug deeper than usual – spurred on by our efforts on the road and track.

Team GB you have been simply amazing and I salute you!

On a considerably more human note, my mileage to date:

Week 21 - 95 miles

Total to date - 1,333 miles

Mileage to date

Well last week was a pretty big week for me, mileage wise.  I was already up to four full days commuting to the office before choosing to cycling all the way home on Friday night and then popped out for a short spin through the lanes on Saturday with my eldest daughter.

That was a lovely 8.5 miles actually, fairly short but at a reasonable pace.  It wasn't so long ago that she had to climb the hills with me pushing her for help - on Saturday we bombed down one at 35.1 mph! :-)

I haven't done a mileage post for a while so here are the stats:


Week 17 - 64 miles
Week 18 - 64 miles
Week 19 - 1 mile (ish.  On holiday - bike only used for odd trips to the campsite shop or toilets)
Week 20 - 111 miles (That's more like it!)

Total to date:  1,238 miles

It was only the other week I'd topped 1,000 miles, now I'm rocking on towards another 1,000!

On another note, it's always a pleasure to find another folding bike related website or blog.  Dahon popped a link up to this one on Facebook this morning:

http://www.foldingbiketravels.com/

It looks really good and hopefully full of information for others like me who want to do some big miles and over-nighters on out "little" bikes

1,000 miles and counting!

Well on Wednesday morning, somewhere on my way to work (I know roughly where), I passed the 1,000 mile mark on my Dahon!  It's mad how the miles start racking up once you make the commitment to cycle regularly.  It did feel a little weird to be back on my folding bike after having used my hybrid for a week, but not for very long and no more so than when switching to any other new bike.

I had Monday off work and so I took the bike back to City Cycles in Leicester to have the broken spokes replaced and a general service.  When I went back to pick it up, they'd serviced the bike, sorted my back wheel and fitted new brake pads as well - all at no charge!  What a great bike shop. :-)

I reckon with 1,000 miles on the clock and counting, it's about time I did a proper review of my experience with the Dahon so far.  I'll get around to it in a few days or so.

And so I'm back commuting by Dahon and train.  Whizzing through the lanes dreaming of all of the lovely upgrades I'd like to do to it, if only I had the money...

And just to add the icing on the cake, when I got to the station this morning, my usual train was cancelled.  They only go once an hour and I had an important meeting to get to, so waiting for the next one was not an option.  To address the problem, the train company had arranged for a fleet of executive minibuses to take us all to our destination.  Popping the Dahon into the boot of one of them was no problem at all - on a full-sized bike, I'd have been left high and dry!

There's no doubt about it, folding bikes rule!

Mileage to date and a bit of a disaster

Last week was a much shorter one than usual owing to my staying in a hotel all week.  However, I managed to clock up a few miles as mentioned earlier.  This week I'm back on the cycle commute but on my hybrid and not the Dahon.

On Monday morning, I set off as usual but felt my rear brakes rubbing slightly as though the wheel was out of true.  I couldn't figure out why until, about a mile and a half from home at the bottom of a hill, I braked and heard a "ping" from my back wheel.  Stopping to investigate the matter revealed this:

Broken spoke(n) - not one, but two!

Well I had a little bit of time in hand and didn't think it was wise to proceed all the way to work on a damaged back wheel.  I turned around, limped home and grabbed my hybrid out of the garage.  It's going to be at least the weekend before I can get it to the bike shop, although it's due a service and so needed to go in anyway. 

Therefore, the mileage tally on my Dahon stands as follows:

Week 15 - 34.5 miles
Week 16 - 3 miles

Total to date - 998 miles!!!

So tantalisingly close to the 1,000 mile mark but that's not going to happen for a week or so.  Shame.


However, having the "luxury" of 21 gears at my disposal has allowed me a little leeway to experiment.  I have a long-held plan to build a single-speed, fixed gear road bike.  I love the simplicity of a fixie and one or two sites I've seen recently have featured riders doing really long tours/randonee on such machines.  Rugged, simple and capable. 

So last night I tried to find one gear ratio that worked pretty well for all situations.  Such a gear needs to :

• Be comfortable for pressing along at reasonable speed on the flat
• Be low enough (but still have something to "push" against) when climbing hills
• Enable me to spin down hills without running my legs round at a crazy cadence

And I found one.  It works out to about 65 gear inches but bearing in mind I was fully laden with a heavy rucksack, a slightly higher gear should also do the trick nicely.  I have a Shimano crank-set to fit to the fixie project and so by using its 39T chainring and fitting a 16T rear sprocket (commonly available)  I'll hit my perfect ratio pretty much dead on.  Happy times. 

I have an old but barely used early 80's Raleigh donor bike in the garage just waiting for a new wheelset and fixed gearing.  Maybe a summer project if I can free up a bit of spare cash!

The scores so far

Well last week was a big week.  For the second time since I've been using my bike to commute to work I did over 100 miles during the week.  Amazingly, the first time I got into three figures was only my second week of cycle commuting - no wonder my legs ached!  Last week was a harder week though.  Back in week two, I managed to leave all of my heavy kit in the office for the whole duration and cycle two and fro with a basically empty rucksack.  Last week, at least half the time, I had a full load and by Friday really felt it.  Not in aching, dead legs or anything like that, more just in being generally run down and looking forward to a lie in and a good feed on Saturday.

I have also somehow managed to miss a week the other week so there are another 82 miles to add into the total on top of last week's figures:

Total week 12 - 82 miles
Total week 14 - 102 miles

Total mileage so far - 960.5 miles

Should hopefully top the 1,000 mile mark this week! 

The scores so far (and other rambling)

We're having a bit of a wet spell round here at the moment and it really doesn't feel much like Summer.  Last Thursday, I took a look at the weather in the morning and judged the liklihood of rain to be minimal and so didn't bother looking around for my waterproof.  Wrong.  I got rained on most of the way there and all of the way back.  I've observed as much before but once you're out in it, rain isn't as bad as it looks to be from inside a house or car.  I think we've grown used to the fact that rain is something to avoid as we cower hastily from house or office to car. 
 In my martial arts days I read a book called the "Hagakure" which was penned centuries ago by some samurai or other.  It's intended as a bit of manual for samurai living and is full of nice little snippets of wisdom.  Some are not immediately useful, for instance the one about taking boys to the execution grounds to practice beheading condemned criminals, but others still stand true.  Once that I always remember on a wet day goes something like:

"When it's raining, you can either walk cowering from it or walk tall.  You'll get wet just the same and this thinking applies to all things." 

I paraphrase but it's true enough and that sense of relaxed acceptance of things you can't change does make for a less stressful life.  When I can remember to, that is!

In other news, I notice via Facebook and Twitter that the IG Markets London Nocturne race was won by a guy in a Dahon.  There's a link and photos here:

http://raleighuk.wordpress.com/2012/06/11/raleigh-gac-rider-wins-folding-bike-race-on-a-limed-edition-carbon-dahon/

And blimey - what a Dahon!  Just have a look at the photos.  I like that a lot and have almost started wanting one more than a Vector X27!  I noticed via a tweet from NYCE wheels in the US that theVector X27 is now available after quite a long wait.  Hopefully they'll be releasing it in the UK intime for my next cycle0scheme purchase.  I'm sure a bike like that would shave ages off my commuting time because obviously it's all down to the bike and not the guy riding it...

So the scores so far for my Dahon Vitesses D3HG and I are:

Week 12 – 18 miles

Total to date – 776.5 miles

A really short cycling week (bank holidays etc.) but rendered even shorter by the fact that I used the family car on Friday.  The weather was truly awful (howling gales) and my wife didn't need it.  She offered and, after a short internal battle, I sucumbed.  The thing is, I think that going most places by bike has affected my spacial awareness.  The phot below shows why I should not have driven on Friday and why I must take greater care parking next to small brick walls in future.

Ouch!!! :-(

The scores so far

Seems I've fallen behind a bit with keeping this up to date but hey-ho.  The scores so far are as follows:

Week 9 – 64 miles
Week 10 – 67.5 miles (plus 100 mile weekender on my other bike)

Total to date – 679.5 miles

So the total on the Dahon is certainly racking up and the total on my legs is even higher.  In just ten weeks of bike commuting I'm slimmer, fitter and a lot happier.  I should add wealthier as my weekly travel costs are lower than they used to be but for some reason saving money rarely manifests itself as a pile of casj in my pocket.  However at least what I do spend isn't going to some big oil company.

On a side note, the weather is bloody lovely in the UK today.  Blue skies and bright sunshine so it'll be a hot one going home tonight.  Long may it continue because I'll be praying for days like this in the middle of December! 

The scores so far

Last week was a bit of an odd one.  I had two separate days with cars in the garage and one day where work necessitated the use of a hire car.  Never the less, I still managed plenty of time on the bike bringing the results to date as follows:

Week 8 – 79.5 miles

Total to date – 548 miles

In other news I now have a Twitter account too (as if I didn't have enough ways to waste the day on the internet.)  It is @foldingbikeuk though I haven't really figured it out what it does yet.  It seemed like a good idea at the time.

Lastly, this blog has a follower!  Stand up and be counted Naz Scott - a mate of mine from church and an all round good-egg.  The first of many I hope.  Naz's own blog is here:

http://nathanielscott93.blogspot.co.uk/

The scores so far

I had a fantastic ride in to the office this morning.  Lovely and fresh out and the hedgerows are bursting with (mainly bird) life!

So the scores on the doors thus far for my folding bike and I are as follows:

Week 6 - 88.5 miles (includes short day after puncture on one day and full ride home on another)

Total to date - 422.5 miles

There are a few of us at work who are into cycling and we're planning a weekend away in May.  We're going to do a 100 mile route with an over night stop though for convenience (i.e. not having to carry everything on the bikes) it'll most likely be a "figure-of eight" route.  In other words, out from and back to a base location on both days.  I'd always though that I'd use my hybrid for the weekend with it's wider gear range, but I'm growing so accustomed to my Dahon folder that I may just use that instead.

The story so far - parte the seconde

The first week that I had my shiny new Dahon folder, I was blighted with illness.  I don’t get that ill very often (my wife would beg to differ, but I don’t) but the net effect was that I wasn’t up to trying out the cycle commute until the Thursday.

Like a good boy Scout I got all of my kit ready the night before and got up nice and early on Thursday.  It was very, very foggy but I made it to the station in surprisingly quick time and in one, slightly sweaty, piece.  By coincidence, my wife was taking the kids to a party across the city from where I work so rather than train-commute home, I cycled the 9 miles across town to meet them and get a lift home.  On the whole, I have to say, I felt brilliant and ready to rock the following day.

The scores so far are:

Week 1 – 42 miles (Includes a preliminary, lunchtime “pootle” round the block)

Week 2 – 115 miles (The full, five-day commute – although Thursday was a huge psychological effort!)

Week 3 – 46 miles

Week 4 – 47 miles (Bottled it and used the car one day, also a Bank Holiday hence the short week.)

Week 5 – 81 miles (Also a short week but used it for transport on the weekend too.)

Which brings us up to date.  Circumstances and holiday have conspired against doing more than one “five-dayer” but the miles are certainly racking up.  In an uncharacteristic burst of attention to detail, I started a log of weekly miles from the outset – mainly to keep a record of repairs and maintenance.

So including miles to date this week, I’m up to a total of 384 miles on my new bike.  Not bad for little over a calendar month.