This is for Aaron, because I know how much he loves it when people talk about biking. After this, maybe I’ll write something about patchouli and socialized medicine. Again, just for him.
So yesterday was my first day biking into the office after two weeks of out-of-town visitors, work trips, anniversary vacations, and Important People in the office. And yes, it kinda sucked. Was hard to get out of bed and onto the bike at 6am, hard not to just crawl into the car and drive to the Park-and-Ride…
But I knew I had to get back in the saddle ASAP, if for no other reason than some pending construction will soon cut off my train ride about half-way into the office each morning, so for three weeks I’ll either have to:
- Drive in. And pay $60/week just for parking? Fuck that.
- Take the train as far as it goes, then board the temporary shuttle buses across the Willamette. Again, fuck that. The train, I can handle, but the idea of packing all those train riders into buses makes me want to vomit. I’d rather get off there and walk the last couple miles in.
- Bike it.
I’m shooting for option 3. The only real hitch is that the construction is scheduled to last for three weeks, meaning I’ll need to huff in on two wheels for 15 straight work days. So far, on my best weeks I’ve only managed 2-3 trips, with a day of rest in between each. Needless to say, this’ll be a challenge for my fat ass.
And speaking of my fat ass…
Here’s a visual representation of what two weeks of bad-for-me eating and no exercise does to Our Hero:
Apparently the key to weight loss is to stay friend-, job-, and spouse-less.
I’d rather be fat.
Now don’t get me wrong, we planned for the vacation weight peak ahead of time and I don”t regret a single bite of the coconut-banana pancakes, Neapolitan pizza, wood-fired coconut chipotle cream clams, or sour cream lemon pie…
Mmm…. pie…
Still, I was a little worried that my stupid ass had gone and done some irreparable damage to the belt line right as I was starting to see some significant progress. Thankfully, though, a week of eating better, more reasonable portions back at the homestead has already paid dividends, and this morning I hit my lowest weight since before heading out.
Oh, and while biking in to the office yesterday sucked of the ass, the ride home came with a wonderfully pleasant surprise: a tailwind.
Every day that I’ve ridden in so far, I’ve had to push through a fucking nasty headwind on the way home. Maybe it’s not a big deal for someone used to it, but for a fat, outta shape dude like myself, riding 11 miles after a day at the office against a 10-15mph headwind (with gusts typically up to 20mph in spots, and uphill half the way) kills.
Many times I thought about “accidentally” swerving out into traffic just to make the pain stop… at least until I realized that my wife would find some way to kick my ass in the afterlife.
But yesterday? Lo and behold, a fucking tailwind all the way home. If I needed any evidence about the benefits of riding with a 10mph tailwind versus against a 10mph headwind, my Bike Log pretty well sums it up:
Headwind
- Average Speed: ~11.34 mph
- Average Time: 59 min, 21 seconds
Tailwind
- Speed: 13.71 mph
- Time: 48 min, 18 seconds
Unfortunately, yesterday’s weather around here was kind of a freak of nature for the middle of summer, so I’m pretty much guaranteed three straight weeks of shitty, difficult bike rides.
But I’ll have calves of fucking steel, so at least I’ve got that going for me.
