Average speed

I have a spaces in my bike log for distance, average speed and comments. Most often early in the season I am so woefully slow that I just go ahead and leave the average speed space vacant. The problem gets a little worse every year (duh!). This year started out that way again. I have been so slow that the two hour ride has been taking way too much time more than two hours. The rides have been just too dang long.

Well, today I wrote down an average speed.

After days of riding in "too windy" today featured light breezes. I started out feeling pretty strong and quickly found that winds were light enough to not discourage an attempt to try a little harder.

The northern ride, today's route, features relatively flat terrain for the first five miles. I managed to stay almost exclusively in the big ring while still keeping up a nice spinning rhythm. The sixth mile features the first of a series of hills requiring the small ring but I was able to maintain the spin and my pace slowed only slightly. I got all the way to the turn around point while being able to continue pushing the pace. As we know, at the turn around point I lose the headwind and start riding in the direction where I feel really strong, even on the worst of days.

This is a little past the turn around. This is the John H. Allison Forest on the north side of Lake Vadnais.Those who visit regularly will no doubt notice that considerable work has been done in the forest since last fall. It could have been very late last fall or possibly during our exceptionally mild winter but there has been some selective logging and a considerable amount of clearing of the understory.

The effect is to render the area open and airy in a way in which it just wasn't before the clearing.

Here is evidence of why the road through Vadnais is going to be closed after this year to be replaced by a multi-use trail (sidewalk).Those pot holes are both deep and look like they would be pretty pricey to repair. It looks to be pretty obviously true that keeping the big trucks out of there will greatly reduce maintenance costs.

The ride home is pretty hilly, lots of up and down but with the help of the breeze I felt strong all the way to my driveway.

I wrote down an average speed.

What does this mean? Well, I think it means that something resembling fitness may be sneaking its way back into my daily life. It also means that the two hour ride took only a bit over two hours and fit itself back into a time slot that seems once again reasonable.

Here for the TOPWLH is a reminder that lots of people store their boats and trailers SOMEWHERE during the winter.I know you haven't seen that thing since last fall. I also know that it will be a regularly viewed item from now until just before the snow flies again.

And finally, just a little bit of idle musing. We have seen a couple of stories recently about the rash of Tide thefts affecting big box retailers.I wonder if Tide Free is as attractive to the thieves as the regular orange Tide.