Adventures in Urban Bicycling – Past and Future

Still catching up on the year that was.  While I continue to plan the year to come.

My goal for this year on the bicycle was 1,000 miles.  It was a bet with a friend and an ambitious one.  I don’t think I’ve put half that many miles on the bike in a given year.  The advantage (I thought) was that the biking season here in RVA was much longer than I’m accustomed to, so I had more days to pile on the miles.

I was kind of right.

What I hadn’t anticipated was how the much hotter summer days would effect my riding.  Very quickly through the middle of the summer, the day simply became too hot to ride safely.  Which meant I didn’t ride as much as I had hoped for when I set my goal.

The other thing I learned was that being a Type 2 diabetic changes the equation on the bike as well.  My plan had been to ride the Capitol Trail multiple times.  On my first attempt, I got my snacks wrong which meant my blood sugar did unpleasant things.  Forty miles into the ride I was toast and had to call for a ride.  I think I have a much better grip on the concepts I need now.

So what did I manage?

38 rides

614.95 miles

Two one way trips on the Capitol Trail.

That’s not half bad.  Not half bad at all.

I also did almost all of it on the streets of Richmond.  Urban cycling is a whole different experience than what I did in western New York.  With only a couple of exceptions, the experience was positive.  Drivers were aware and polite. I tried to make sure that I was predictable and obeyed the rules of the road as much as possible and practicable.  As a result, I had nothing worse than a couple of modestly close calls.  The worst was when a door was flung open in front of me from a parked car!

I’m looking forward to riding in 2018.  While I hope I don’t have nearly as much free time to toss the bike on the back of the car, I still should have plenty of time to top the 2017 total.  Add in a couple more Cap2Cap rides and look toward doing a round trip.  That’s 100+ miles, which is pretty daunting. I have been wiped out by the one way rides, so there’s a lot more training to be done for there and back again.  I’d also like to go a little further afield.  Maybe bike along Virginia Beach or on the DelMarVa peninsula.

The other consideration is that not only is the rider getting old, so is the ride.  Barney is going to need some TLC this year.  But I think we’ve both got at least one more hard year of riding in us.

I track my riding using MapMyRide.

 

Let’s roll.