Starting Slow
 

Had a great ride today. Took a ten mile loop out to the lake. Averaged 10mph with an 800 foot elevation change. I know that sounds like a wimpy ride for most of you but it is challenging for me. I am just getting started bicycling again and enjoying it a bunch. I can tell this is going to make a big difference in me if I keep it up.

I don't know about the calorie computer in the B.iCycle app on my iPhone though (yeah, I'm a Fred), it says that the ride to the lake used 1068 calories. It is supposed to take elevation changes and wind into account. If the count is true I'm gonna go get an ice cream bar.. lol

I commute to work every day, but that is a whole .3 (yes, point three) miles. I try to maximize that by sprinting home. On the way home today I hit a personal best flat land top speed of 25.6mph. That's spinning for this old fart.

Good for you. Bicycling is a great activity for many reasons. Ten miles is better than sitting on the couch watching TV.
Overdoing it invites injury and lessens fun. Having fun and being un-injured encourages you to keep at it.

The calorie counters vary tremendously for me. I don't trust them a bit.
On a given ride, some calorie counters will figure 500 vs 1000 for others.
During my loop ride tonight, apparently the parking lot sank 60 feet.
Other rides, the GPS craps out and the maps show that I traveled 200mph average for 6 extra miles climbing cell towers on my bike.

Bicycling is great for improving your physical fitness. Eating healthy is great for losing pounds. Combine exercise and healthy eating for best results.

Sounds like a really nice ride! My guess is that you burned somewhere between 25 and 35 calories per mile.

10 miles is a nice ride, especially if you are just getting back on the bike. Keep it up and 10 will soon feel like nothing. My advice would be to make sure to keep having fun, sometimes speed and distance don't matter. I found it real easy to start thinking of every ride as a workout and get down if my avg. speed was down or I didn't go for as long as I thought. Sometimes you just ride for fun.

As long as you're riding :)

That's not really a bad average. I have a 50 mile loop that starts with a mile of warm-up, then an 800 foot climb over the next 4 miles. It's rare I can cover over 13.5 miles in the first hour, and that's with the help of an 800 foot descent. After that, my average speed usually increases (unless there's a stiff headwind!).

Actually that's not a bad speed at all considering the amount of rise. I've been known to do 30 miles on a carbon road bike with 2,500 feet of climbing, and not average much better than 10 mph while I'm moving.

Ditto on what the others have said:thumb: I go on climbing rides every weekend and I seem to always have average speeds around 10 mph. The rides are usually between 20-40 miles and 2,400-3,500 feet of climbing. I ride in the flatlands around here every day but I don't have a computer on any of my bikes so I have no idea what my flatland speeds are. They probably suck because I usually ride adult trikes, which are slow. Sometimes I'll ride my hybrid or recumbent tadpole trike. Those are faster. I use my Garmin on the climbing rides only.

You don't have to be ashamed to let your Fred flag fly here. We don't practice snobbery. I know I'm probably considered a Fredette on other forums and I'm damn proud of it!:D Function before form.;)

Okay, pardon the ignorance, but what, exactly, is a "Fred?"

From what I've seen so far surfing other sections of BF, a Fred is anyone who has practical, functional bikes and accessories. That includes commuters, utility cyclists, people who use mirrors and large seat bags, etc.

Hopefully others will chime in if I forgot anything, which I probably did;)

That's great! We all have to start somewhere. I'm semi in the same boat as you. I don't have a lot of miles yet and just did my longest of 35 miles last weekend in an organized ride. I have another 30 that I'm doing this Saturday. I'm excited and can't wait!

You don't have to go straight to work or straight home. You can lengthen those rides as you wish. Congrats on getting back in the saddle.

It's an achievement for you and that's what matters. If others here are doing 100 miles and not breaking a sweat or collapsing in sweat and sighs after 100 yards doesn't change the achievement for you.

I find that figure hard to believe, although it would depend on just how much you weigh. I'm somewhere marginally over 250 and reckon on 40 calories per mile as a rough guide (in the interests of openness that figure comes from two sources that roughly agree, even though I remember the precise source for neither). 106 calories per mile seems too much - even if you're going up some monstrous hills to get there you come down them on the way back and burn next to nothing.

I have a Garmin Fr60 system. It gives a Calorie figure. I call them Garmin Calories. I kinda use that figure to quantify the total work I did. I find it somewhat useful to compare a slow long ride to a faster shorter ride. I don't use it to allow myself to eat more especially when losing weight was the main focus. I like performance measurement devices when they motivate me but i realize the infomation they supply has limitations.