Back in the Brumby's

Saturday morning was a cold morning, it was very hard to get out of bed and I was not sure if I was up to it. I had many chances and temptations to bag on my idea of trying to make Saturday morning the day I would come out of recovery and join the Brumby's. The route they selected was not as much climbing as other routes they had and with my Mountain biking on Thursday I figured the knee was good for it. I must confess though that I had hopes I would be able to go all the way around but wasn't sure about it.



To be at Val Vista and Hermosa Vista by 6:30 I had to be on the road at 6 which of course meant a 5:30 am wakeup. It was pretty early and it was cold, very hard to get out of bed but I did it. I got on the road at 6:05 and even though I mistakenly got on Greenfield and overshot Hermosa Vista I pulled up right as they were leaving so I didn't even have to cool down. I hung out at the back figuring I would be able to fall off if my knee complained. We had around 20-30 cyclists and as we made out way out to the beeline people rotated back I I moved up the line. Gilbert road was a pain as a sidewind means everyone works as hard as the guy pulling so it was pretty ruthless for a few miles. Back on the Beeline though things got a bit easier until we were climbing. by the time we hit the hills I was the 6th or 7th cyclist back in the line. We almost got gapped once but pulled it together. I had to keep telling myself I would hold on until the next hill with every hill. I was extremely pleased to find that although I had not ridden with them for nearly 3 months I was still holding on. In fact, aerobically I faired better than my muscles which started to burn as we got further along. On the last hill my knee twinged slightly but we were within a quarter mile of the hilltop and I was so close I determined I would hold the mob over th hill.



Going down the other side a cyclist near me observed her thermometer said 31 degrees. Consulting my own I found it at 28 degrees. That's pretty cold. I had been working hard enough I hadn't noticed other than numb fingertips. They did not stop at the gas station so after we crossed the verde I had a short conversation with Chris (the other guy at the back) about bike commuting and then I dropped off.

7 miles.

When is 7 miles not 7 miles? When it is on single track. I decided to mix it up today since I was working at home and headed up the road over lunch hour to soak up some succulent single track in the hawes trail area. This area is a real gem, especially if you have an old bike that predates the days of suspension. I am fortunate to live near some of the best road biking and Mtn. Biking in the valley. Admittedly the mountain biking is slightly less good than the road biking but I am happy with it.

The first part of the trail has a lot of dips and whoopdy doos which are a lot of fun, but then you hit the section that is directly over a cliff and requires a bit of caution. Soon I am gasping for air and the first burn has begun. Soon I am at the trail junction though and enjoy a flat area with smooth descents into washes and I get my high speed for the day of 17 mph. Scorching I know, still, I would be riding some fairly rough and steep trails today.

Turning up onto some of the trails higher up on the mountain my lungs are burning and I can hear my heartbeat in my ears. I am working hard and for the most part I nail every ascent getting tripped up on only one. It never ceases to amaze me how you can work so hard and spend so much time and yet not have ridden many miles when you are riding single track. Of course many of the grades go up over 20% at times and hopping over piles of rocks and crags can slow you down as well, especially without suspension.

I want to ride the saddle trail today but I take a wrong turn and take the long way up to it. I remember this trail from many years ago when I first rode out here. I am happy to report I made it up the hill that gave me trouble last time. This time I also decided to ride the mine trail on my way back.

Of all the trails I near had a cactus lunch more times on this trail than any of the others. The trail switchbacked up over the hill and the back side was steep with switchbacks and the trail though steep had a funny habit of launching you off knee sized cliffs so you had to sit way back to avoid doing an endo. Many time I was unseated but there was only once I had to stop and walk down one spot. If I had had suspension I might have been able to pull it off. Anyway, that's another topic entirely. At the end of the mine trail I looked up and saw I had to climb all the way back up to the car. The bright side was that some of the hills I had never climbed without putting a foot down I was able to pull off today. It was a good ride. 7 miles, 950 feet of climbing.

On a side note, I am happy to report that I have gotten my weekly mileage up above 100 miles and the knee is holding out. Saturday I want to ride a 40+ mile ride. I am being careful to follow the 10% rule even if it is annoying. I want to be all set for the 300k they are doing in May from Miami to Payson and back.

Happy trails!

I am Spam, Spam I am

I am back! They shut my blog down for a bit because they thought it was a spam blog. I can't figure out that one. Biking to work and randonneuring just doesn't seem like the subject of spam somehow. Also as Bruce's work has done, mine has blocked blogspot.com too so it is a little harder to post now but stay tuned! I will be updating it still.

First off let me post the commute I had last week which was a follow up to the dog commute-

This morning's commute was much better than Monday's. I discovered the tire I had patched last night was flat when I entered the garage at 6AM. I figured it had to be a slow leak though as I thoroughly listened to the tube and only heard one hole. That last hole (which was indeed slow) will have to be discovered in a wash basin full of water I am afraid. I had the tire pumped up and after I reset my bike computer to mph instead of kph (I don't know how that happened) I was off into the night with a brief adjustment of my hub light.

It was not too cold this morning with a temperature of 50 degrees and a wind out of the NE. It would be a pain on the northbound parts of the route but nice for the eastbound. I kept up a good speed but not as good as I was before the knee thing. It will take time. In the meantime I am just happy I can do 2 40 mile commutes within a week plus a Saturday ride. I am not too broken up that the ride across Mesa is in the dark. The stretch on Val Vista is unusually warm in the Orange groves for some reason.

On the reservation I turned on Oak street instead of going North on Extension. It was not devoid of dogs, neither was it as bad as Extensiont though. I ran into 3 dogs working together on Oak but they weren't very fast and gave up quickly. On Dobson I ran into another set of dogs and a large old white dog that was pretty slow and gave up quickly. I did not run into any pitbulls or feral packs of dogs so I think this might be the better route. The parts without dogs are wide open smooth pavement so It is definitely a keeper I think. Perhaps I'll take up Bruce's suggestion on Doggy Treats (I wonder how they make your jersey pocket smell?). I could also use them as opportunities for Interval training as well I guess.

I still can't get over the fact I get to commute through the mountains in Paradise Valley to get to work. This is just cool even if I have to put up with some traffic on Lincoln. I realized this morning that this section is the middle of the GABA mummy mountain saturday cycling route I used to ride in yesteryear. On top of the beautiful scenery I cut 7 minutes off my ride time from Monday.



I missed the bus by seconds so I decided to ride downtown and catch the next bus there. Here are some photos I took while I waited and before I realized I had sat down in somebody's yogurt they had left out.

Two eras collide. The small building is a 1950's era diner building and it is surrounded by skyscrapers now.

I wonder how they built that skywalk.

Pitbulls and Goatheads and Flats Oh My!......

Dogs. Lots of dogs. No, I mean LOTS of dogs. How many dogs can you imagine? You say you can imagine a lot of dogs? No you can't. I have found perhaps the doggiest doggy road in the Southwest. Did I mention I found some dogs? I found enough dogs for a cheap imitation of Hitchcocks "the Birds"! Ok, well perhaps not that many dogs. Nevertheless I count my dogs encountered this morning by dozens.

This morning was the new commute. The first time I had got up the gumption to do an honest to goodness door to door commute by bike. My route has been in the making for some time while my knee has been healing. I had experimented with the bike path north of the airport but gang activity discouraged that route. My next idea was to take Gilbert north and ride the canal road acrossed the reservation to Chaparral road and then across Scottsdale and Paradise Valley. This option included some dirt road and I was a bit leary. I discovered in my perusal of this route though that Country Club, Alma Schoole and Dobson, are all paved acrossed the reservation up to Chaparral. The route was set. I would take Country Club north to Chaparral and end up at 31.5 miles. The best laid plans of Mice and men are often laid to waste though.

I managed to get out of the driveway at 6:10. I figured I needed roughly 2 hours to make the trip with some wiggle room. Ha. My trip acrossed Mesa was the usual fair. My new axle generator light saved me from hitting several potholes. Fairly quickly I was dropping off the Mesa on McKellips road and then I turned onto Country Club. Acrossed the bridge I turned too early. I ended up getting onto Extension instead of Country Club. This would eventually save me some mileage incidentally but cost me a lot of extra time.

The first few miles of Extension heading north through the reservation were fairly calm with a school bus in the distance stopping to get kids. I would catch up a little bit at every stop until he turned. Around this time the dogs started. The first two (yes, there are no lonely dogs on the reservation, they all hang around in groups I discovered) were a Golden retriever and some other dog. They chased for a bit but after getting yelled at a few times they called off the chase. Many of the dogs I encountered did this. I figure I was chased by around 10 groups of 2-4 dogs. Two encounters gave me some pause.

The first one was passing an old abandoned house. Around 5 or 6 dogs came galloping out, fortunately there was a chainlink fence between us but had it not been there things could have gotten scary. Ferral dogs running in a pack are something you don't want to mess with unless you are armed with a semi-automatic weapon or have a sizeable club or are bruce lee or something like that. The other was two pitbulls that came after me.

The pitbull I have been told by some dog lovers is a misunderstood breed. Yeah right. I got chased by over 30 dogs this morning and only one breed gave me prolonged trouble despite repeated yelling and threats sworn. The pitbull is a dangerous breed as far as I am concerned. Yeah they can be cuddly and nice. So can Charles Manson when he wants to be. The two dogs specifed came after me and I yelled at them and they didn't even pause. I kept pedalling but noticed everytime I turned away from them they came in closer so I had to ride watching my back. We were cruising along at 18 mph and they were just running along. The one on the right came in close so I kicked at him. On the second kick I connected with his jaw. On second thought this could have been a bad move if he had bit my foot but luck was with me. He paused a minute and then came right on in chasing again. Approaching a half mile into the chase I could see them slowing down. I slowed with them. If these D*%#$# dogs were going to chase me I was going tempt them to over exert and possibly get lost. Maybe they would fall prey to a pack of rabid zombie coyotes out in the desert. I know it was perhaps rather low of me to wish ill upon these hounds of fury but I was ticked. So every time it seemed like they were about to give up, I slowed down just enough to tempt them into keeping up the chase. I got another few hundred yards or so on this. I should have turned around and chased their exhausted sorry behinds around the res a bit just for revenge but I had to get to work.

The hounds had the last laugh in the end. Having turned on to Chaparral I made the discovery that I had a flat tire on the back. The culprit was a goathead thorn which I had picked up the time I veered onto the shoulder while being chased by the hounds. In fact, after much patching and pumping it turned out to be many Goatheads. I spent around an hour patching one of my tubes and finally giving up on the front tube and putting a new tube in the front tire. I had more holes than I could count. I figure I patched 3 holes in the back tire and I gave up on the front after 4 or 5. Once I was finally on my way again, the sun was shining bright and I ran into my last set of dogs which gave up chase when a rather large automobile honked at them and scared them away. I guess cars are a lot scarier to a dog than a man in tights and a flourescent green jersey on a bicycle.

Extension is being taken off the commuting route. Searching satellite photos it appears that I would run into far fewer house if I head west on Oak and North on Dobson. Dobson has the added bonus of being not too far from the freeway so although slightly less rural, perhaps dog owners in the interest of keeping that $$$$ expensive dog from getting creamed on the freeway opt to keep them contained. We will see on Wednesday.

On with the journey! My guess that Pima road had little traffic on it these days due to the freeway was spot on. It didn't have wide shoulders but there was only an occasional car so it worked. McDonald had a nice bikelane for aways. As I got closer to Camelback Mountain and entered Paradise Valley it stopped. It still wasn't a bad road for riding though. I turned north On mockingbird which was a mistake as I should have held out to Tatum. It didn't turn out to be a critical error though as I didn't have any issues riding down Lincoln like I thought I might if I got onto it too soon.

There were some nice rollers through here and I was pleasantly surprised by the views as I rode alongside the Phoenix Mountain Preserve and Piestewa peak. I could look down on downtown Phoenix enshrouded in all it's brown cloud glory. I actually had some hills on this commute! No more am I to be jealous of Bruce for his scenic commutes! Much of this section reminds of pictures he has on his blog looking down the hills on his commute.

I got into work late you might have guessed, but I think this commute route will work. I am going to expunge Extension. The rest of the route is primo though. The final section is extremely scenic skirting the bottoms of both Camelback mtn and Piestewa peak. I might invest in a set of Armidillos though, just in case I find a few more goatheads waiting for an unsuspecting traveler.

Misty Morning Commute

Although I have a long route selected to try for my one or two days a week I want my long ride, I opted for the shorter commute as it was a bit wet out. The fenders on my new bike worked wonderfully even though I have put a nice and skinny pair of 1.35 inch tires on (as opposed to those hefty 2" big apples I had on). The performance is a lot better with these tires.

Anyway, back to my wet commute. The only rain that really fell was when I was in the bus but the streets were wet and it was cloudy. One has to appreciate the cloudy days in the desert. Everything shines with a green radiance. You can smell the rain. In the city everything smells clean. It is a pleasure to ride up the roads in the beauty of a wet morning.

Heading up 3rd ave I see a mailbox statue off to the right that has a rather sizeable drop of water hanging off his nose and I am siezed by an uncontrollable urge to wipe mine. I feel sorry for the poor bronze lad, doomed to feel a drop of water on the end of his nose for hours and hours. It slowly begins to itch, the itch raises in intensity slowly. Soon all he can think about is his nose. How long will it hang there? How long until he descends into statue madness? Oh well, could be worse. I suppose he could have pidgeons pooping on his head.

Time with an old friend, and the 4 amigos.

Saturday morning and I am ready to try pushing my mileage up a little. Since I am laying off the hills, and since I am curious to see if it also affects my knee like the other bike, I have decided to pull the recumbent down from the ceiling and take it for a spin. I want to go to the Superstitions and back.

It is cold, but I have forgotten that the recumbent rides a little warmer than my other bike. I am not sure why, I am suspicious that a smoother airflow make for a warmer ride. In any case, University ave is not a ride in the country but it is a long almost imperceptible hill. No climbing involved, you just go a little slower than usual going the one way. As I get close to time to turn around I am close enough that I push forward to the edge of the Superstition wilderness and into the last houses in Apache Junction. I probably pushed my time limit a bit far as I was late getting to my rehearsal later. My knees acted up a little bit on the way back but not too badly. The great palisades of the flat iron are particularly impressive up close. I have not seen the half dome in Yosemite but I bet it is similar to this escarpment in grandeur.

I found out I don't have a lot of my bent muscles anymore and I needed to adjust the bicycle around to where it was comfortable again even if it wasn't quite so aero. I didn't have a bike computer on it so I didn't know how fast I was going but checking on mapmyride later I figure I went around 26-27 miles. That's the farthest I have gone since November.

In the afternoon I asked the kids if they wanted to go mountain biking or hiking and all but one voted for mountain biking. So I packed up the two 6 year old bikes, my 9 year old's bike and the trail a bike for my 4 year old. I really need to get a trailer or something to haul all these bikes around. The small bikes won't attach to racks because of their size so I end up having to strap them to the roof.

After fixing a flat on my bike at the trailhead we are off and raring to go. My boys and daughter have to walk the first hill, the first because their bikes don't have gears, and the second because she doesn't quite understand how to use her gears yet. From here though I am surprised as we take off up the trail through the cactus, creosote, and palo verdes. Large teddy bear cholla hold their arms far above my children's heads threatening to drop spiky balls as they weave in and out of the cacti and bushes.

As Joseph, Adela and I catch up to the other two at the first trail junction I am surprised that my daughter decides to go left up the moonrock trail. I haven't encouraged this in the past but I decide to let it ride and see what happens. The kids are caught in the thrill of explorations and tirelessly wander up the trail crossing creek after creek. I give tips to Joseph how to speed up down into the creeks so he can make it up the hills on the other side. I also remind him to use his brake instead of putting his feet down.

A few times Josh stops to walk a hill or two but I find Joseph has put my tips to great use and building speed before the hills manages to stay on the bike nearly all the way up to the blevins trail. I am astounded they have made it up here. Seeing as we are near the top I figure we should just go over to the upper parking lot and return on the Noso trail. I warn them to be careful though as there is a deep creek between here and the parking lot and I am sure Josh, being our little stuntman, would try and make it and hurt himself as the trail is steep and has trail bars across it. They follow directions (I know, I was surprised too!) and walk the creek and we have to stop again because they have sighted some playground equipment by one of the picnic tables now that we are up near the actual facilities of the park.

Soon we are off again needing to get back to the car so I can pick up the evening babysitter. The kids enjoy the next few miles of downhill enjoying the fruit of their spoils. I continue to be amazed that we have made it up here. There are a lot more trails open to us now that I know the kids can handle this stuff. as we enter an open space my four year old exclaims "Dad! I can see the whole town!". She was the one we had to kind of force out the door so this is good. I didn't even get any whining from the kids until we were about a quarter mile from the end and our little stuntman finding a straightway ahead of him as we ride along the levy, has suddenly become aware that he has not complained about the hard work to this point.

Taking a picture at the car I am amused by the poses of the kids. Kids find desert sticks while you are tying the bicycles to the roof and suddenly they are some sort of bicycling jedi kids. I am so pleased with them that a suggestion of dairy queen is pondered, and even granted. They have ridden 4 miles, most of it single track. That is probably the equivalent of 7 or 8 road miles. It has been a good day with the kids. Next week will be a hike since we have to make the one that didn't vote for biking this week happy.

Back in the Saddle

I have decided to do at least one longer commute per week. Next week I am planning on doing the full 30 miles into work and then seeing if I want to take the bus home. Today, not wanting to overdo it with my knee and not willing to stake being late on forging an unknown route of that length, I went to the park and ride at main and the 101 to cut my distance down to 18 miles. This way I would still be traversing 13 or so miles of unknown territory but I would have a little extra time worked in to figure things out.

I had the route in my head mostly as I had forgotten to bring a map. I knew that once I got off the frontage road for the 101 onto the Rio Salado Parkway I would get to Mill and then we would be onto unridden streets until we got up to the 51 when I had ridden the bike path a long long time ago to get home from some training I had ridden out to. The Park and ride lot had an attendant and I hoped he wouldn't have me towed when he saw I was biking, but then I thought he would probably just assume I was getting on the train with it.



So on arrival I put on my gear, turned on the hub light, and I took off, excepting a short wait at a light I gave up on near the train station. The frontage road had some traffic but not too much. The trip down the Rio Salado was pleasant. A few more businesses had forced some of the industrial properties out in the first part and so it was actually a bit prettier than last time I remembered it. I was amused to see construction at rural as the last time I road this there always seemed to be construction around here. That was around 3-4 years ago.



Crossing mill I turned left onto Washington after having gone under the 202. Washington had a really nice bike lane and was a really pleasant ride all the way to sky harbor where I turned right onto the canal which would take me to the bike path next to the 51/Piestewa/Squaw Peak freeway. The path had a lot of glass on it. It also did not have any underpasses but I found that I could usually find breaks in traffic in less time than a traffic light would have made me wait. The kevlar tires held up and I was amused to realize that I used to walk a portion of this path over lunches when I had worked at Inter-Tel's 44th street offices back in the day. The old neighborhood was about the same. Same old gang graffiti, same old private airport parking lots and sketchy used car dealers.

I was pleased to find the 51 bike path stretched all the way down to the canal and I didn't need to do any neighborhood scouting to get on it. That being said the bike path hops on streets sometimes, sometimes goes through park like areas next to the freeways, and sometimes it jogs right to another street. I must say I made 2 wrong turns which cost me probably all of 5 minutes but I won't make those again. It is a pretty good route as far as bike routes go. There weren't an excessive amount of lights thanks to it's proximity with the freeway but there were a lot of little annoying turns and jog right jog left kind of things. I think it could use better signage but oh well.

The last little bit of my journey takes place on a canal with underpasses at streets and eventually I hop on 16th street and ride for about 3/4 of a mile without a bike path but most traffic is going the other way. I arrived a little late but only a little bit. It was a good route and I think I am going to keep it.

Addendum-
On the way home I ran into moderate gang activity along the canal so I think the route is a good morning route but I will likely be taking the train/bus home after a full commute.
My knee started telling to back off about 5 miles from the car so I hopped the light rail for the last bit too. Glad it is there.