Back in the saddle again...

Thursday, September 23, 2010

I don’t know exactly why, but I’ve been overly fatigued for a couple of days. Maybe it was all the sleep I missed in the mountains or the amount of activity we had while there, but my energy levels have been way down. Still…I had to get back on the horse, or in my case…the bike.

I drove to the park at the end of the day with the bike in the car. I’ll do this sometimes…not start my rides from home…because I know I can’t get distracted by the things there that distract me and might give me an excuse not to work out. I also get to skip the busy roads closer to my home that I hate to ride. It does force me to start with the Rogers Road climb right away, but there’s always some give and take. I had only been on the bike about 5 minutes when I noticed my rear brakes were not completely releasing. This can be a slight problem…making it feel like you’re riding uphill all the time. Not what I had in mind for my first ride back and already feeling fatigued. I stopped to adjust it and had one kind cyclist stop and ask if I needed help. That’s the way it’s supposed to be, but isn’t always. For a while, I thought I wouldn’t get it fixed and, in fact had started to return to the car when I decided I’d just ride without brakes. They’re way overrated anyway and I HAD to do something!

My bike complained on the ride up Rogers…I’ve broken chains on this hill before…and so did my thighs. I spent the entire first half of the ride feeling like crap and riding more slowly than normal. I figured ‘so what?’ I wasn’t trying to impress anyone and I had nothing to train for at the moment. Just put in some riding time, burn some calories and break a good sweat. By the time I reached my turnaround, I was starting to feel more than a little guilty and decided to ratchet it up for the return trip…and I did.

I stopped by Mimi’s place on the return trip. She and I had spoken after Bob’s death and decided this would be the weekend I’d come over and do all the work to winterize the house. It felt strange riding up the drive knowing Bob was no longer there…this being the first time since he’d died in July…but I needed to get past it and help her. She gave me a Snapple Diet Peach Iced Tea, which I always told Bob I’d work for and after figuring out a time for Saturday, I was back on the bike for the conclusion of the ride.

Something isn’t quite right with the body and the ride demonstrated it to me more clearly. Maybe a couple of workouts will have me grooving again…we’ll just have to wait and see. For now at least, I moving forward again.

Bike duration: One hour and 30 minutes.
Training Heart Rate: 120 bpm.
Calories burned during workout: 1,350.