Bad Detour, But Still a Nice Ride

Rob and I headed back to the Interurban Road to get in a 16 mile ride, or so we thought. We took a side road just to see where it went. Needless to say, it was a mistake! Okay, okay, it was my idea. Just wanted to add a little adventure to our ride. It started off innocent enough, but soon, very soon, we found ourselves riding down a very steep and gravely hill with lots of ruts we had to dodge. The gravel road finally leveled off and it was a fairly nice ride until we had to go back UP! We had to get off of our bikes, well, at least I did, in order to get up the hill. It was so steep I was spinning my wheels in the gravel.

Well, we finally made it up the hill onto a blacktop road. We had no idea where we were, but we had the good sense to pull a Horace Greeley. We kept riding and riding until we came to highway 92. No way could ride on 92 highway even if we knew which way to go. We kept heading straight ahead until we could head in a southwesterly direction. We finally hooked up with Interurban Road, but I think we may have gone through St. Joe to find it.

Everything worked out and we only traveled a couple miles over our planned route. Sure was a workout!............Mike

Only Three Miles But Enjoyable!

Okay, so it was only three miles, but it's three more miles than I ran yesterday, or the day before, or the day before, etc. I haven't ran or biked since a week ago yesterday when I rode 35 miles with Rob.

Gotta keep working at this! .......Mike

Little Blue Trace Trail

I was able to complete a 10 mile run on Saturday (7-24) along the Little Blue Trace Trail. This is my longest run since the fateful Hospital Hill disaster on June 5.

It was warm but I slowed down and averaged 10:40 per mile. I began drinking water and Gatorade on Friday and kept that up through the run and the rest of the day Saturday. I was wiped out and took a 3 hour nap Saturday afternoon.

It felt great to complete a long run. I will continue to be conservative while it is hot outside. The elliptical training inside an air conditioned gym has been a good and responsible alternative to running in the heat. - Ken

Oppressive

Whoo, boy, it was steamy out there this morning. 90 and very humid. Glad I wasn't running (and that's not a problem these days anyway). At least on the bike you are making your own breeze. All the runners I saw looked to be suffering.
I opted to ride the old trail at Smithville Lake this morning. It's hillier, winds more and, as it turns out, much more populated. I had to make my way through an entire running club between about the 5th and 8th miles, and that slowed me down quite a bit. Good thing, though, because if I'd kept up the pace I probably would have worn out early. I'd had enough by the time I hit the finish line anyway.
25.11 miles in 1:47 for a 14 mph average. -- Rob

Tempo ride

I wasn't too motivated for this ride on a hot and humid day, but it was a better option than doing nothing, so off I went. Once I got going I was glad to be getting some exercise, particularly after a frustrating day at work. The route is all residential streets, and there are a lot of hills and turns, so maintaining an average of over 14 mph is pushing it some. I felt like I'd had a good workout by the time I got back. 14.61 miles in 1:00:51. -- Rob

Yeah, What Rob Stated Below!......Mike

Riding long

This is the second longest ride we've taken, but it went real well. We were prepared for a real hot ride, but since we started early with the sun low, we rode out in the shade for the first hour, then some thin clouds blocked the direct rays the rest of the way out and back. It never got particularly hot.

Since we we expected a long hot ride, we didn't push it all that hard. We stopped at the turnaround point in Dearborn and had a home made sweet roll (effectively negating any positive calorie burn) at the cafe there. Total mileage: 35.03 in 2:43:59. Back home by 11. -- Rob