The year in riding

Just like last year I did a fair amount of riding this year.  I wasn't as successful in losing weight by riding this year, but I did enjoy myself.  This year I rode a bit further than last year, but only had 2 rides of 50+ miles (and neither were over 53) and 5 organized rides again (same number as last year).  I mostly rode 2 days a week (usually Tue & Sat), next year, maybe I'll try for 3 (add Thu).

• BikeMS Central Ohio Challenge 50 miler - 52.74mi, 03:41:22, avg = 14.29mph, some rain and thunder in the middle of the course
• Pedal with Pete 47 mile route - 47.47mi, 02:57:01, avg = 16.09mph, rain for the first hour of the ride, but beat last year's time
• Tour de Donut "Full Donut" - 30.71mi, 01:43:43, avg = 17.77mph, a race where 5 minutes gets deducted for every donut eaten, I finished 2nd in raw time in the recumbent division (4th in donut-adjusted time)
• CHA Pedal for Pets - 45.00mi, 02:56:42, avg = 15.28mph, very chilly 45°F at the start
• Ride for Reason Alzheimer's ride - 47.93mi, 02:59:48, avg = 15.99mph, very poorly marked route

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• Total # of rides = 43
• Total mileage = 1115.10 miles
• Total time = 73:16:41
• Avg. speed = 15.29mph
• Avg. time of ride = 01:42:15
• Avg. length of ride = 25.93mi
• Rides over 20 miles = 28
• Rides over 29.75 miles = 18
• Rides over 01:30:00 = 24
• Rides over 02:00:00 = 10
• Rides over 03:00:00 = 3

Ride for Reason 2013

I rode my last organized ride of the season this morning.  It was called the Ride for Reason, a fundraiser for Alzheimer's research (if you want to contribute to my effort, you can do so at http://act.alz.org/goto/jclausing).  It was chilly at the start, but nowhere near as cold as the CHA ride last month.  Temp 54-75°F, light wind from the ESE which meant headwind relatively early in the ride.  I have to say, the folks at the Trek store didn't do a very good job marking the roads for this one.  If I hadn't uploaded the route onto my GPS, I'm not sure I would have been able to find the route.  I think I can count all the arrows I actually saw on the rode on 1 hand (certainly on both).  They were purple and very difficult to see.  Having said that, it was a great day for a ride and a relatively nice route.  The distance was supposed to be 47 miles because the original ride 25 years ago was 4700 miles, I missed one turn (added less than 0.1) and ended up riding 47.93.  See the details here or below.

Flight Log - 2013-10-04

I had every intention of a making a much longer flight, but by the time the plane was free and I got to the airport, there were showers and possible embedded thunderstorms moving in our direction, so I decided to just do the requisite 3 trips around the pattern to be current and go back for the previously planned flight another time.  Temp 28°C, winds 270@04, alt 30.05, few at 4500, overcast at 6500 when I started, lower than that when I finished, just 25 minutes later.

 

 

Takeoffs & landings: 3
Time: 0.4
Total time: 223.4

2013 Pedal for Pets

I had registered to ride this one last year since this is for the shelter where Shane & Jen volunteered at the time, but something came up late and I wasn't able to ride it.  This year, it was pretty darn cold at the start (especially considering that we reached 92°F earlier this week).  Temp at the start was 45°F and got up to 66°F by the end of the ride.  There was a light wind out of the SW.  45.0mi in 2:56:42 (15.28mph).

http://ridewithgps.com/trips/1798136

Tour de Donut 2013

Rode the Tour De Donut Ohio on Saturday. It was perfect weather and a very nice course. This is why I love these organized rides (or, in this case, race), I was able to ride with/draft off some other riders (especially nice when I hit the headwind the last 5 miles). Temp 64-84F, wind from W. 30.71mi in 1:43:38 (17.8mph), my fastest ride of the season. I was 2nd in the recumbent division in raw time (1:54:47 including donut stops, 9:50 behind the winner in the division, scroll clear to bottom of this page) which put me in the top 90 overall out of over 1000, but only ate 3 donuts (5 riders in the division ate 12 or more which knocked an hour off their times), so didn't finish in the top 3 (I was 4th, scroll down to bottom of this page) in donut-adjusted time in the division. :-(

http://ridewithgps.com/trips/1766618 

Flight Log - 2013-08-15

Got a little cross-country flying in on Thursday.  Temp 22°C, winds calm (at surface, a little bumpy at altitude), alt. 30.14, clear.  Added 2 new airports, I10 (Noble County) & 4G5 (Monroe County).  Hand flew most of the flight, the auto-pilot still seemed a little squirrelly (it couldn't hold a course at all when I last flew --in June-- with Harold).

Pedal with Pete 2013

And my second organized ride of the season was the Pedal with Pete Cerebral Palsy ride.  Despite rain for the first hour, going 0.6 miles further than last year (due to where I parked) and weighing 10 pounds more than last year, I managed to cut 3 minutes off my time.  It was a fun ride.

http://ridewithgps.com/trips/1558867

Bike MS Central OH Challenge 2013

Erin and I rode the Bike MS Central OH Challenge a couple of weeks ago. I just found the pix online today, so I'm going to put some of them up here along with a link to the ride info itself.  Erin had a mechanical problem just past 15 miles, but still managed to make it to the 2nd rest stop at 30.8 miles before calling Sherry to come get her.

http://ridewithgps.com/trips/1516040

Flight log - 2013-06-12

Finally after almost 11 months, I finally went flying again.  It was a pretty nice day, though it got rather warm toward the end.  Temp 30°C, wind calm, alt 29.92, very hazy, 1.6 on the Hobbs.  Hold at APE, followed by 3 approaches VOR-A@KVTA, GPS28@KLHQ, GPS27@KVTA, with 2 landings at KLHQ and 2 landings at KVTA. Happy to be back in the air.  Hand flew nearly all of it, the auto-pilot appears to be on the fritz.  IPC completed, so I'm legal to rent, legal to carry passengers, and legal to fly IFR.  KVTA is in the top middle with the red, yellow, and green (landings and trips around the pattern).  The hold is the purple loop at the top left.  KLHQ is at the bottom left (landing and trip around the pattern).  That little bump in the middle was when I turned on the autopilot heading back to do the GPS28@KVTA and it tried to do S-turns around the actual GPS track.  Harold is going to have the auto-pilot looked at by the maintenance people.

Yup, I'm still alive

As I commented last year, I don't tend to post here much lately, but I am still alive.  As you can see from the sidebar, I've started riding again this year (about a month earlier than last year, though I have no plans at present for a century this year), but have not flown in far too long, I hope to rectify that this week.  I still do plan to start posting more stuff here, but have had some issues with motivation that I hope to explain shortly.