54.89-Mile (86.90 Km) Belated Birthday Ride. Boom! Still Got It.

No clip in shoes. No shorts (well, no padded shorts; I may do my small part to Keep Austin Weird, but my mother didn’t raise no idiot). Just started doing errands and since conditions were perfect I Just. Kept. Pedaling. I had several extended stops as is obvious from the elapsed time, including getting refreshments, soaking up the sun (sitting on a park bench) sending emails, two short meetings plus a stop at home to recharge my lights and Garmin vivoactiv hr watch.

Still, I was pretty happy to meet my goal, even if I was a week late due to the rain, wind and cold on my actual birthday. And it was pretty good for a 9-speed heavy steel bike with non-skinny tires. I didn’t even have to get out of the saddle and stand up on the pedals on the very steep Highland Hills Drive, either. I probably could have kept going, but as the farmer said to the pig in the movie Babe, “That’ll do. That’ll do.”

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Lazily Leaning Lightly Into the Low Lulls

As mentioned in the recent post Car-Free Dude Drives Borrowed Auto, Doesn’t Die, I’m working a lot and having to drive a car to do it. Since I’m in Austin, Texas (at least that’s where everyone keeps telling me I am), and it’s only mid-September, it’s still hitting 100 degrees many days. That’s true even if it’s not actual temperature because of the heat index (aka real feel) or humidity.

Point is, I ain’t biking much at all. It’s either miles or money, and since I’ve done plenty of the latter, it’s high time for the former. And that got me to thinking: What do you do when choice or circumstance keep you from your routine and goals? Come on inside this cozy post and A Dude’ll tell ya how he rolls. Or doesn’t.

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4 Rides, 40 Miles: An Anatomy of A Dude Abikes’ Day

Strava is handy for tracking my progress, or lack thereof.

I wasn’t planning that much bicycling. Yet there were places to go, things to do. I had no car to use, and a dislike of the bus. It was yet another in a string of 100-degree plus day. However, I knew I could stop in air conditioned places. Most importantly, I felt I had good legs. With that confidence, I headed out into the swamp that is Austin, Texas in August.

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Minor Mishaps, Major Moments and Medical Mysteries

From the things that make you go mmmmmm department: 

Mishap #1: Trash Cans, Trash Talk

Riding down a sidewalk of a busy four-lane road without bike lanes, I swerve to avoid recycling bins, miscalculate, and Sophie the Fairdale’s very wide handlebars catch them.  I go down like a Christian thrown into the gladiator ring trying to save the lion with talk of Jesus.  (Translation:  Quickly.)  But unlike those unlucky folks, I bounced right back up, apparently unharmed.

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Random Thoughts from the Life of a Car-Free Bicyclist in Austin, Texas

Sometimes there’s no one unifying theme to a blog post, but even then, there is still a framework. Today, it’s that many factors affect my cycling, and also that there’s more to life than cycling. (Impossible, I can hear some of you saying!) Here are a few of those thoughts. As to whether they’re Deep Thoughts, you’d have to ask Jack Handy, which is an old Saturday Night Live skit. Basically he had short quotes that were inane, so I’m not claiming any wisdom. I am just sharing my experience in hopes it educates, inspires or at least amuses you as one of my millions of followers (any day now). Read on, it’ll be good, you’ll see. After all, I’m not The Dude, I’m just A Dude. And A Dude would never steer you wrong. That would be very un-Dude-like.

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How I Biked 167 Miles in One Week and You Can, Too

Does 167 miles seem like a long distance to ride your bicycle in a week? If not, and you can easily rattle off that distance in a single day, then this post (and blog) will probably bore you. Good on you! Thanks for stopping by and not being all judgy. (Like Rootchopper, currently doing 300+ miles per week on his big ass No Name Tour.) Does 167 miles in a week seem impossible? Well, if so, this may also not be for you. Of course you’re welcome to come along for the virtual ride.

But what if you’re in between those extremes and have ridden 100 miles in a week before? Maybe you’re thinking, “Hmm, if this middle-aged fathlete (who isn’t the typical skinny cyclist stereotype) can put up some pretty big numbers, then I wonder if I can, too?” Well, this is for you.

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I Eliminated 99% of Flour Products from My Diet for 18 Months, and Guess What Happened?

Nothing. That’s right: bupkis, nada, niente, zero, zilch. I lost 0 pounds of weight. In fact, I’ve gained a little lately, more from knee pain caused by biking my ass off (metaphorically — see my post coming up Wednesday). But after foregoing all the tasty treats, delicious delights and amazing amuse bouches out there for an entire effing year and a half, I really have nothing to show for it. It’s really quite unfair. Perhaps there are other health markers that are a better gauge, but the point was to reduce simple carbs to virtually nothing and eat whole grains. Of course I wasn’t perfect with it, and still have a major problem with sugar, but it’s no where near enough to make up for all the bread and stuff I used to eat. So, I’m gonna kvetch about this.

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Brahmacharya: The Yogic Practice of Moderation

The philosophy of yoga as handed down over thousands of years continues to be valuable and available to those who wish to study it. It may be lost on some if not most modern-day, lycra-clad, booty-tightening students and teachers alike. Yours truly does not often crack open the ancient texts for some light reading. But I did spend a summer at a yoga center, and after over five years of daily (well, nightly) practice, I still consider myself essentially a beginner. Lately, I find myself struggling with one of the branches of the practice in particular. Surely I’m not alone, so here’s a little post about brahmacharya.

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