Blog Y » bicycle

And training is on

vidurgupta — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 17:02:00 +0000

Last post about the training rides, I had mentioned about the Mountain View to Portola Valley. The ride was on 11/17/2007 and 26.7 miles in all. It was a fun ride (except when climbing the hills) but I was glad that I made back to starting point within the designated ride speed. The lessons learned was climb more hills.

I took advantage of the long Thanksgiving weekend and knocked up another 50 miles. On the thanksgiving day I went on 24.2 mile ride from home on to Coyote hills (yes, the good old Alameda Creek trail). I have some snaps for you think time.

To start with this the bike I am training on & plan to ride the Aids LifeCycle.

A couple of pictures of the bay from a rest spot on the Coyote Hills. This is an interesting spot as you can see the Dumbarton Bridge and The San Mateo-Hayward Bridge + the planes making their approach towards SFO, all from one place. It is quite beautiful on a clear morning.

The ride to cap of the long weekend was a 31.6 miler, starting from the Union City bart station, across the Dumbarton Bridge in to Menlo Park and back to the bart station. I decided to ride on home from there instead of taking the bart. Plus I should mention the lunch at Mexico Tortilla Factory & Delicatessen in Newark. One of the best Burritos I ever had It was small, fun group for the training ride.

(TOTAL MILES: 314)

First Official Training Ride

vidurgupta — Mon, 12 Nov 2007 15:07:00 +0000

I did my first official ALC training ride on 11/10. We started in Mt. View and went through Sunnyvale, Santa Clara, Palo Alto and back. As I work in Sunnyvale I have driven through many of the streets we rode through but this was a new experience. Anyone interested in the route can take a peek @ Mtn-View-flat-ride. It was a good pace too, 22 miles @ about 13 mph.

I also want to mention that the speeds are not important (remember ALC is a ride, not a race) but its for my record. My blog is my cycling log

I am thinking of doing Mountain View to Portola Valley ride this weekend.

(TOTAL MILES: 232)

Bike Hackers Get Whimsical With Two-Wheelers

vidurgupta — Sat, 03 Nov 2007 20:22:00 +0000

Check out some real bike innovation at Wired

The last 3 rides

vidurgupta — Mon, 22 Oct 2007 00:51:00 +0000

Last Saturday, we went on a renegade ALC training ride. Renegade because Russ didn’t have his TRL(training ride leader) training done & for the ride to be an official training ride you need at least 2 TRLs. A bit more on TRL later and now back to the ride. We started at the Union City bart station (we are a group of about 10 riders) and rode on the Alameda Creek Trail to the Coyote hills & back. We also did the Coyote hills loop & it offers, probably, the best view of the east bay. (20 miles)

Yesterday, I started from Fremont Bart instead of Union City station & did the Alameda Creek Trail (this time was on my own). I didn’t the Coyote Hill loop but the interesting thing was that while going towards the Bay & against the wind I was doing about 10 mph & on the way back (with the same wind behind me) about 17 mph. Respect the power of mother nature. (18.2 miles)

Today, I did a 6.1 mile ride around the streets on Fremont.

(TOTAL MILES: 187)

Last week: More miles, Russ and some books

vidurgupta — Mon, 08 Oct 2007 00:56:00 +0000

I did the longest ride yet on my bike, 16.8 miler to the dumbarton bridge from where I live. It was a good ride, mostly flat through the city of Fremont, Newark & to Coyote Hills Regional Park.
On the way back, I stopped at Russ’s house. He is a ALC veteran and has written a book, The Ride: How to Ride Your Bike From San Francisco to Los Angeles Without Even Dying, which is a good read for those who know more about ALC. He sure has a bunch of ride stories and jokes to tell.

Another thing I did this week was read “Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman!“. This is a great book, a must read. The part I love the most is the that he asks people to give real life examples to understand problems. And of course, all the fun he has the bars & clubs

Keep tuned for weekly updates.

Last week: ALC’07 update, iPhone and a great movie

vidurgupta — Sun, 30 Sep 2007 02:59:00 +0000

Over the last week I reached (and passed) 100 mile mark on my ALC* training with over 70 of those coming in last 3 weeks, so the training is really picking up. For those interested in knowing more about ALC, please feel to free my ALC homepage (and donate some too )
I also got clipless pedals system in which you have clip into Basically using cleats now and I don’t if it just psychological but I really helped me. I was able to do a little more of a distance in less time.

Now, coming to the iPhone. I love Apple products and all but what happened this week is kind of not making me happy. I am sure you have heard about the lasted iPhone upgrade turning them into bricks. I understand that company has to look out for profits but I think this Apple and AT&T thing is ridiculous as people are paying the full price for the phone, thus there should be no restrictions. If AT&T is subsiding the phone, then by all means they have a right to impose contract restricts. I am sure Apple has pissed off some followers with this move.

I saw ‘In the Valley of Elah’ yesterday and w/o getting into the politics of the Iraq war I think anyone who decides to start a war must watch this movie first. It is a sad tale of an army unit which survives the war but it ruined within a couple of weeks of coming back to US due the ways their stint in Iraq changed them. A must watch movie.

That’s all for this week, more next weekend.

* Aids LifeCycle

My longest ride & wind

vidurgupta — Sun, 12 Aug 2007 03:20:00 +0000

Today I went for my longest ride yet, a grand distance of 10.2 miles. Not long by most standards but 2 mile improvement on my last max. The average speed was 12.1 mph and took a little over an hour including stops. More importantly I met the weekly training goal of 16.2.

The other thing I learned today was about wind and biking. I was riding merrily down the road when I turned into the wind. I suddenly felt it was much more difficult to pedal. I checked that the wind was 10 mph, so I wonder how worse can it get with higher wind speeds. On the flip side, how much easier would it be to have wind behind you

A flat tire

vidurgupta — Sun, 05 Aug 2007 20:41:00 +0000

I had my first flat since I started riding last month. I learned a couple about the Presta valve today. You need to open the little valve on the top to fill in air. This link tells a bit more (http://www.sheldonbrown.com/gloss_p.html#presta).

In my previous riding life (more than 10 years ago) I always had the Woods type valve. So I even though I assume the entire biking world already knows this, thought might be useful to publish it here.

Also, a note about Bicycle Garage. I bought the bike from here and the folks are really helpful. You go there with any question and they are willing to answer it.