Thursday, March 30, 2006

The Boys Are Back

Mostly sunny skies and temperatures hovering around 60 degrees made the perfect day for Barry (The Boss), Darin, Russ and I to go out for our first group ride of the season. I met up with the Boss a bit early and we caught up on recent happenings in each others lives. He just got back from a week of vacationing in Florida. Me? Same ol, same ol.

By the time we met up with Darin and Russ the skies had turned cloudy. As the wind was a stiff 20mph it was a bit brisk as we headed east out of Germantown. Man, was it nice to be riding together after a long and cold winter! Dancing on our pedals in two-by-two fashion we sped through the countryside. Taking turns in the wind kept the pace pretty high.

The weather may have changed from a bright sunny afternoon into a blustery early spring day, but who cares? Wind? Bah! Hills? Nothing to it. The beauty of cycling is that it's basically a carefree activity. Just like when we were kids. Telling jokes, talking about nothing in particular, it was magical.

By the time we were done 56 miles had passed. Not bad for March 30th, eh?

Thanks for the great ride fellas. I'm looking foward to a long season of great rides.

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Wednesday, March 29, 2006

Spring Cycling

I've been trying to get outside on my bike whenever I can but Wisconsin's spring weather sucks! Usually by the end of March we've had at least a couple of random 50-70 degree days. Not this year. 30's and 40's have been the rule.

But signs of spring abound. The birds are back and singing and road kill is everywhere. Doesn't Darwin impact modern animals? I mean really, it doesn't take much brain power to get across a road safely but the raccoons and opossums just can't get it figured out. I would have thought that by 2006, with almost 100 years of automobile traffic, all of the raccoons with limited brain activity would have been eliminated by now. Oh well, with the temperatures hovering around the freezing point at least the road kill doesn't stink.

Riding along a beautiful country road late today I round a bend and see the surest sign of spring yet; a maple grove ablaze in bright blue. The bright blue plastic bags hanging from the hollow spikes from which the sap flows. And the sap only flows in springtime. That's right folks, fresh maple syrup!

The other thing you notice is that the smells have returned. The nose seems to work again after the long, deep freeze. Unfortunately, the most prevalent smell is freshly spread manure. The farmers like to take advantage of the plowed fields by fertilizing them with a mixture of cow manure and water. This is the perfect time to spread the goo because the ground is still firm enough to get the tractor around the back forty without getting bogged down in mud, which would be the case if they waited just a week or two. Honestly, I don't mind the smell, it reminds me to appreciate the fact that I'm out in the country, riding my bike and not in a cubicle somewhere.

I ran across this article about bicycle chain-rings today. This is the latest reincarnation of the biopace, or elliptical chain-ring. The basic idea is this; as your legs spin around in circles there are sections along the circle where you naturally can apply more pressure and other areas where you can't. These oval, elliptical or otherwise out-of-round rings are designed so that the circle is in effect larger in the areas where you can apply more pressure and smaller where you can't.
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Many cyclists spend years trying to perfect what is called 'spinning in circles', which is a training technique to try to keep power even throughout the 360 degrees. But for me, this is unnatural. You can apply more power as you step down than you can when you pull up. Just look at your leg muscles for proof; big thigh muscles designed to push down, walk, climb, jump and relatively small hamstrings because humans don't naturally pull up with their legs or feet.

So I'm thinking that an out-of-round ring would work with your natural musculature instead of against it. However, these types of things have been marketed before and other than the odd professional racer 99% of all cyclists have round rings. Still, it's seems so obvious to me that it should work. Unfortunately, the latest company offering these things seem to think that $200.00 is a fair price for two small pieces of aluminum. If any of you have any experience with these things it would be great if you could share them in the comments area. Thanks.

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