jppe

Between needing to go out of town for a funeral, another day to a Bowl Game and another day for golf, I might have ridden my last mile for 2005.

So, here's my highlights/review for 2005:

4th full year riding a road bike
5500+ miles (1500 more miles than 2004)
13 English Centuries
28 Metric Centuries
Longest ride was 117 miles doing the Assault on Mt Mitchell
New frame/fork in February-Trek Madone 5.2
Established a new PR in 10 mile Time Trials at Lowes Motor Speedway
Improved my time on Bridge to Bridge (Grandfather Mtn-102 mi) by almost 45 mins
Finished in the top 100 in the Cheaha Challenge Century
Made a number of new acquantices on the road and the web!!

Still have a few days to figure out some new targets for 2006.

What are your highlights for 2005?

DnvrFox

Jeez!

After that, what else is there to say for us mere mortals?

Anyway, good job.

oldguy52

"What are your highlights for 2005?"

Well I guess this is a highlight for me..... I realised after 35 years of sitting on my butt in cars that I was missing all the fun (and good exercise) that I'd gotten in those bazzillion miles I rode in the first 18 years of of my life.

Broke down and bought three bikes + one for the wife since October. Hope it warms up pretty soon so I can start fighting off this darn spare tire I'm starting to get around the middle.

BlazingPedals

Mine aren't as impressive as yours, but I had a few.
1. 4226 miles, 2nd-highest mileage year ever for me. (In 2000 I had 4574)
2. New PR for the 'Assenmacher 100' (a flat century ride) set at 4:38, done solo.

Looking forward to continued improvements next year,especially if I can get rid of a bit of this extra ballast!

Digital Gee

My biggest accomplishment (bike-wise) in 2005 was actually buying and bringing home a bike, on June 5, 2005.

My second accomplishment was riding five miles the first day, which I thought was VERY long, and NOT returning the bike then and there.

My third accomplishment was getting into the habit of riding as often as possible, without getting so wrapped up in "shoulds" that I would give up cycling.

My fourth accomplishment was riding my age (and then some) when I rode my first metric century, alone, on my MTB with knobbies, going 'round and 'round Coronado 11 times.

My fifth accomplishment was reaching 1,300 miles for the year as of yesterday. My unofficial goal, set sometime along one of the rides, was 1,400 and I have three days to go, but I don't think I'll have time for three 33 mile rides. So I'm going to be happy -- delighted, in fact, with whatever the final number is, which is WAY over how much I cycled in the past twenty years.

My sixth accomplishment was getting my 14 year old daughter kind of interested in cycling and taking a few rides with her.

My seventh accomplishment was learning to fix a flat tire.

Not a bad year!

Trsnrtr

Good job, but I have to take exception with #2. Everyone knows that recumbents are slow.

Seriously, great job.

-Dennis

Trsnrtr

MY biggest highlight of 2005 was retiring. I just wish somebody would have told me how little time I would have after I retired! Still, I managed to ride 7,604 miles to date and got away for a few short cycling trips.

1. For 2006, I'm dropping my mileage goal a little in favor of higher quality miles.

2. I also intend to ride our tandem more next year. we had the lowest tandem miles (~1000) that we've ever had since 1988 due to my wife's hectic job. She's retiring in June so that goal should be easily attained.

3. I hope to get away more this year with my wife for some extended cycling.

4. My average weight for 2005 has been the lowest since 1999, but I intend to lose another 20# or so.

5. I may get my Dutch recumbent to the velodrome this year for some bent racing. I retired from USCF racing in 1991 and it may be time to have fun with the lowracer.

-Dennis

stapfam

To be quite honest- Other than finding this forum- nothing spectacular has happened this year. Had to Bail out of a few rides days before we were doing them thanks to illness on the part of my Tandem partner, but he is now over that and we are going strong again. The nightriding has been exiting, but did take around 3 months to perfect. Didn't help that we had a big off downhill just before we started night riding, which made us a little bit cautious, and the weather broke at around the same time. After a summer of rock hard terrain, we had mud- mud- mud and more than our fair share of rain.

Highlight for me was when my Tandem Partner climbed on his solo for a 40miler and regretted it. He is still fit and was the first one up the hills and flew along the flat, but he paid me the biggest compliment when he said the Thing did not handle, and when he wanted power- The Turbo was not there. I always felt that I relied on him to get me through the rides, but as he kindly put it- He missed the power going uphill, on the flat he had to work hard, and the downhills were not as comfortable as he wanted. Seems I am not just there for ballast.

Roll on 2006

JavaMan

My 2005:

4005 road miles, over half of which was commuting to work.
Influenced two friends (and my wife) to buy bikes and get into cycling.
Rode up Palomar Mountain for the first time.
Hit a new downhill top speed of 48.6 mph.
Had a safe year with no crashes or injuries.

shankton

2005 was an awesome year for riding up to Oct 16 when my wife was struck by a car that blew a stop sign. She is still recovering from a broken tibia, broken fibula, torn ACL, and torn MCL. Three days later, I was hit by a drunk, unlicensed driver who ran the stop sign right in front of my house. I am too evil to hurt, but my singlespeed MTB was totalled. My confidence was shattered, and I rode only early in the AM for a while.
I needed to shake things up a little, so I bought my first fixed gear bike right around Thanksgiving. That bike is so much fun it should be illegal.
I look forward to next spring, when my wife should be able to ride with me again.
Happy New Year to all.

tedward

2005 was a memorable year.
Cycling got me fit and well again - I had been previously crippled with PMR.
Acheived 5400 miles total including 156,000 ft of altitude gain.
Still resisting the call of time trialling.
Did 4200 road bike , 875 MTB, and 325 unicycle miles.

Oh - and also spent a lot of time reading this forum.

Cheers

Bud Bent

I'm going fishing tomorrow, so today was my last ride of 2005, my first full year of cycling. I ended up with 5013.7 miles. Miles on my different bikes was:

Tsunami T-1 --- 2768.5
EZ Tandem ---- 2212.3
EZ Rider ------- 32.9

5.9 miles into today's ride, crossing a bridge over Joe Pool Lake, with a big smile on my face, I hit my 5000 mile goal for the year. Happy New Year, everyone!

Digital Gee

Bud, that's just terrific! Happy New Year to you as well.