Good weekend of rides

I got two good days of rides in this weekend.  Saturday I did 65 miles, riding east to Bethlehem, then across the Saucon Valley area then over South Mountain into Macungie.  This time I had the good sense to climb up Indian Creek Rd. to Heistand Rd. up to St. Peters Rd. avoiding Salem Bible Church Rd. which was my undoing last weekend.  The weather was nice, not very sunny, but after a cool morning temperatures rose to the mid-60s by noon.

Me and my bike in front of a lilac bush alongside Saucon Creek.

This morning was much cooler, but I got in a nice 42 mile ride.  The weather forecast all week was predicting morning rains, but after rain overnight there was a nice break this morning.  I started out at 7:00am and only got caught in a light sprinkle the last 3 miles.  It has rained pretty much the rest of the day, so I was fortunate to get my ride in before that.  Hope we can be so lucky on our TranAm ride.

A classic Pennsylvania Dutch style barn in southwestern Lehigh County.

A view of the Pennsylvania countryside.

Training and equipment checking

Now that the days are a bit longer and it's warming up I've been able to get in some rides in the evening after work.  This week I did 12 miles on Tuesday and 15 tonight.  It's so much nicer to be outdoors on my "real" bike instead of stuck indoors on my stationary bike.  Plus, I think it's helpful to ride as many days as possible even if the mileage is small - just to get in the habit of what we'll be doing come May.

Over the weekend I was able to set my tent up in the back yard and check it out.  It took way too long to put up since I was still figuring out what goes where and especially how the guy lines get tied.  I expect after doing it a few dozen times I'll be pretty good at it by the end of the trip.

My wife actually bought the tent for me as a Christmas present, but I picked it out and told her exactly what I wanted.  My tent is a Kelty Gunnison 2.1.  It's supposed to be a 2-person tent.  It would be pretty cramped with two, but it would work, I guess.  As a one-person tent it should provide lots of space for me and all of my things.  It's roughly 5 ft. by 8 ft. and there is extra storage space outside the tent under the fly extensions.  I also got the "footprint" ground cover which is made to clip on at the tent corners and protect the floor of the tent.  The weight of the tent is about 5 lbs., so it's designed to be suitable for backpacking.  I'm sure I could have found a 1-person tent which would be lighter and smaller, but I think this will be much more comfortable.

Here are a few pictures:

The tent without the fly.  It is suspended from the crossed fiberglass poles.  There are identical doors on each side.

With the fly over top, but the extended vestibule flaps rolled up out of the way.

The interior. My sleeping bag is stretched out across the left side.  Those are my feet on the right.

The full tent with fly extended out from the door.  The fly creates identical vestibules outside the tent on each side.

A better training ride

Today was a better riding day.  I didn't take on any big climbs today, but still got in a nice 56 mile ride.  No lingering effects from yesterday's ride.  That's good news, my training continues to pay off.  I did a big loop to Bethlehem, across Saucon Valley then across St. Peters Rd. to Berks County and past Bear Creek Resort.

The other thing I did this weekend was set up and check out my tent in the backyard. I've got a brand new tent, new sleeping bag and lots of other odds 'n ends which I've accumulated over the past ~6 months to prepare for this trip. I'll post some pictures and describe some of my equipment for the ride later this week.

Here are some pictures from today's ride:

The Saucon Valley countryside.  The DeSales University athletic fields are at the bottom of the valley.  Far in the distance to the left is where I-78 drops down the south side of South Mountain and heads east towards Hellertown.

Flowering trees along St. Peters Rd. in southern Lehigh County.

The junction of Salem Bible Church Rd. (yesterday's nemesis) with St. Peters Rd.  St. Peters Rd. reaches the same elevation, but does so in a series of rises and dips over 4.6 miles instead of 2.6 miles.  You can be sure I'll remember this in the future.

Cranking up the training

It's been two weeks since I posted anything.  Last weekend I didn't ride at all.  Instead, my brothers and I flew to Indianapolis to throw a surprise birthday party for my Mom's 80th birthday.  We had 29 family members including her children, grandchildren, sister, nieces and nephews.  We caught her completely by surprise.  Congratulations, Mom! 

With only 5 weeks remaining until our ride starts it's time to crank up the distance and difficulty of my training.  I got in a short ride yesterday and then rode a 50-miler today.  I started at 7:00am this morning - that's more like the schedule I expect we'll be on during the ride.  Temperature was a brisk 40F when I started, but warmed up and turned into a very nice, warm day.

To raise the degree of difficulty, I decided to do some real climbs.  When I want real climbs I head to South Mountain, south of Emmaus, PA.  There are three routes out of Emmaus over the mountain, 10th St., 5th St. and 2nd St.  None of them are very long, only about 1 mile, but they're a quite respectable grade.

I rode up 10th St., which is the hardest, first.  Then down 5th St. back into town - I hit 39.4mph coasting down the smooth straight descent.  Then over 2nd St. including the side route over Oak Hill Rd. near the top.  Down the south side then back up Chestnut Hill Rd. north into Emmaus, Finally, out of Emmaus on 5th St. over the mountain.  These little loops were a nice challenge and left me feeling pretty good about my climbing ability.  The biggest concern I have about the TransAm route is that many of the climbs are significantly longer than anything I can do around here.

So after all that climbing I figured I couldn't possibly encounter anything worse than what I'd done and I'd just log some miles in the area southwest of Emmaus.  Unfortunately, I was wrong.  The route I chose included a little stretch of road named "Salem Bible Church Rd."  I'd never done this before and it looked like a nice road to take from the Zionsville, PA area over to Bear Creek Resort.  Boy was I in for a surprise.  It turns out that stretch of road is at least as bad as the 10th St. climb out of Emmaus.  I managed to make it up with only one several minute long rest stop, but it left me completely gassed and lacking in confidence.  I'm hoping the TransAm climbs will be slightly lower grade and more manageable.  I'm also hoping several more weekends of longer rides will build my strength and get me better prepared.  I'll let you know after I've finished the TransAm.  :-)

Whenever I ride locally, I map my route using the website www.mapmyride.com.  I especially like how easy it is to draw out my routes with its "Follow Roads" feature and I also like the elevation data it shows.  It's valuable enough to me that I pay for an annual subscription - which eliminates pop-up ads on the maps and makes it much nicer to use.

So I mapped a portion of today's ride to see how it looks:

The color coded elevation data shows the climb, descent, climb loops over South Mountain.  Then near the end is the little "kicker" that is Salem Bible Church Rd.  I should have mapped this and checked the elevation profile BEFORE I set out on this ride.

The portion of my route mapped above stops after the nice descent down from Bear Creek Mountain Resort.  Here's a view of the Allentown area from near the top of that descent:

A view towards Allentown, PA.  The large building to the right on the horizon is the PP&L (Pennsylvania Power & Light) building - Allentown's tallest building and an area landmark.

The goal over the next few weekends is to do 50-60 miles every Saturday and Sunday.  It will be interesting to see how well I recover overnight and whether I feel up to doing another long ride tomorrow.  Certainly by the time my TransAm ride starts I'd better be ready for that.

Bike shorts and short sleeves - WooHoo!

For the first time this year I was able to ride in bike shorts and short sleeves.  It feels so much nicer that way than being bundled up against the chill.  With longer and warmer days I was able to do a short ride this evening after work.  Just over an hour's ride, but it was very nice.

Ready to ride one a beautiful spring evening.

The very observant will notice my bike is without fenders at the moment.  I've been taking a class in bicycle mechanics and repair.  Unfortunately my work schedule and the class schedule don't allow me to ride my bike to class so I load my bike in the car.  That's much easier to do without the fenders.  I figure this is also good practice since I'll need to take the fenders off to box my bike and ship it back home from Portland in August.  When the class wraps up next week the fenders will go back on.

Welcome aboard!

I'm new to the blogosphere, so I don't fully understand the way this works, but suddenly in the last few days my pageviews have taken a big jump.  I assume this is because some search engine(s) found my blog and made it more widely known.  Whatever the reason, let me say to all the new readers and followers - "Welcome Aboard".  The more readers I've got the more motivated I am to post frequently.

Although the activity will be a bit slow for the next couple of weeks, I hope to begin posting daily once the ride begins.  I hope you'll all enjoy following along as I go.  Part of what convinced me to do this trip were the blogs of others who made the same ride in 2010.  I hope maybe my blog will inspire others to do the same.

I especially enjoy the comments and questions from the readers out there.  Sharing your own experiences, reminiscing about your own rides, offering words of advice or encouragement or seeking additional information are all appreciated.  Keep the comments coming.

If you've got questions or comments which you prefer not to share on my public blog, feel free to e-mail them to me at mikesbikeride2012@gmail.com.

For now it's a bit daunting thinking of all the details I must tend to before the ride begins.  I'm sure I'll get it done, though, and be ready to ride when May 19th rolls around.

Enjoy the ride with me!

A good training ride

The weather was a bit better today.  No rain and a bit warmer.  Still pretty cloudy and cool.  So far this season I haven't worn shorts or a short-sleeve jersey.  I also haven't needed sunscreen yet.  I put it on one day a few weeks ago when it was supposed to become sunny later in the day, but it never did.

Although the weather wasn't great it was very comfortable and the ride was good.  I did 49 miles which keeps me on track to meet my pre-ride goal.  I still avoided any major climbs, but took on a lot more hills today than yesterday.  I didn't feel any effects from my surgery.  I'd say that's behind me now.  I just need to keep up my mileage and I'll be ready in May.

My route today went east to Bethlehem then south into the Saucon Valley area, back to the west in the area south of the Lehigh Valley's South Mountain, then down the north side of South Mountain into Macungie.  This route doesn't really climb directly over the mountain.  Instead it meanders along the south side gradually climbing to the top in smaller segments.  Then it drops directly down the north side.  It would be much more challenging in the opposite direction.

According to www.mapmyride.com, today's ride covered an elevation range of ~250ft. to 1025 ft. with a total ascent of 1388 ft.  That compares to yesterday's flat ride which covered a range from ~375 ft. to 545ft. with a total ascent of 492 ft.  I'm not sure how much I trust their route data, but it's probably in the ballpark and gives a good idea how various routes and climbs compare.  I use this site a lot to map my rides and check out potential rides.

Here are a few photos from today's ride:

The Lehigh University football stadium - on Lehigh's south campus, south of Bethlehem, PA

A short portion of my ride was on the Saucon Rail Trail, a very nicely done rails-to-trails conversion south of Bethlehem, from Hellertown to near DeSales University.  The open portion of the trail is currently about 4.5 miles.

When I ride in this area I usually pass by the Promenade Shops at Saucon Valley.  It's a lovely shopping area, but also a commentary on the evolution of the American business world.  America's downtowns have mostly been put out of business by the interstate highway system and suburban sprawl.  So now we build these "lifestyle centers" to resemble old-time Main Street America, but they're squeaky clean and built on vacant land far removed from any population center.  Everyone drives their cars to get there.