I did. 56 miles, 4300 feet of climbing, close to 100 degree heat. I lost four pounds on the ride, and bonked near the top of the longest, steepest climb (7 miles of climb, the last two miles averaged 11%). I also had the pleasure of being stung by a yellow jacket on the climb. Grrr.. On the descent, the road was really rough, and my Garmin conked out from all the vibration. When I revived it, the data was totally scrambled, completely useless.

Not my finest ride, for sure. And, I feel like crap right now...

Well, I'm getting back on the bike after a long infatuation with my motorcycle. I found out that I'm really out of shape. I rode 8.5 miles on a hilly route. This was my 4th ride in a couple of weeks. I'm trying to get back into it slowly without over doing it. I actually felt a lot better on today's ride than I did yesterday on the same route. That's encouraging. It just takes time to get the rear end accustomed to time on the saddle and the on-bike position. At 58, it's not as easy as it used to be. But, I'm feeling better since getting started again.

Yesterday, July 4th, my touring partner Sanford and I bicycled 110 km from Broken Hill (NSW, Australia) to Lake Menindee - if you don't know where these places are use Google earth and ... We had a tail wind and the road was paved. Today we rest and then start tomorrow towards Pooncarie which is 120 km away with about 110 km of dirt. In reasoonable weather it should take 2 days with (perhaps) a bush camp at a cattle property. Trouble is ... a wind forcast of almost 40 km/hr directly into our faces. Sigh! No matter, there will be traffic on the road and we have 4 days of food. The adventure will continue, and life is full of surprises - even this free acess broadband connection here in Menindee. By this week end we will be back in "civilization" and in Mildura. The rest of the tour from Mildura will be on pavement, with towns at most 100 km apart.

Happy Independence Day to you Yanks - apologies for being a day late, but yesterday we were "on the road" ;-)

That's a tough ride.

Funny coincidence, I had a hard hilly ride yesterday and my Garmin also crapped out. In my case, I think it's because the ANT sensor got knocked out of place by a leaf or a small stick on a downhill.....

Sunspots? ;~)

It was a tough ride! Here's a shot of a portion of the long climb. The Tour of California needs to climb THIS.

http://i1111.photobucket.com/albums/...remontPeak.jpg

I don't post here because I ride every day, so, from now on, just assume i posted "yes" right there. That is all.

I haven't ridden all month... Just got back from vacation yesterday. Going to get started today; planning to ride at least 350 miles for the month of July.

Really nice pic!!

About 35 miles along the Chicago lakefront. Ideal weather, but yesterdays holiday diet & beer could be felt the entire ride.

Today’s ride:

Very good ride today to the horse farms with my daughter and friend Dick Davidson.

Ride statistics for: 07/05/2011

 Miles today: 52.5
 Mileage this month May: 193+
 Mileage this year: 5272 (65.9 % of my 2011 goal)
 Over/under riding days 2011 vs. 2010: +11
 Over/under riding days June 2011 vs. June 2010: +1
 Over/under miles 2011 vs. 2010: +1714 miles
 Average miles per ride this month: 48
 Average miles per ride this year: 42
 Number of rides over 50 miles this month/total ride days this mo. 3/4
 Metric Centuries this month: 1
 Miles needed to hit my 2011 goal of 8,000: 2727 miles,
 A 9/10 thousand mile year is not out of reach. I should reach my goal about mid October.

Tomorrows plan: Normal ride to the horse farms weather permitting, with my daughter.

Thanks! For perspective, that's the town of Hollister (The Wild Ones) in the distance - looking northeast.

Sarals, which climb was that picture taken from? I'll take your word regarding Hollister in the background, but the climb must be a bit up-valley. All the good climbs around here are dead ends ranch roads and most are in extremely poor condition. Freemont Peak is in pretty good condition, but can get very warm on the way up

Rode easy 32 mi. yesterday on the tandem with only a bit of climbing. Did an out and back climb today on my single: 22 miles with 2500', but almost all the climbing is in a 9 mile stretch. The road is in terrible condition (Lone Tree in Hollister, CA) with pot holes, loose asphalt from repairs, loose rocks, alligator pavement, ..... Coming down with some sections as steep as 16 percent is not a lot of fun on my Al frame Giant, but the climb is an accomplishment for an oldster. I'm going to do this once a week if it kills me.

Only 25 miles today, temp a little over 100F. That's about my temp limit.

7 Riders: 81 Hot ones with Temps to 103*

http://i256.photobucket.com/albums/h...er2pics010.jpg

Bill going strong at 78 years.

http://i256.photobucket.com/albums/h...er2pics013.jpg

Today was predicted to be hot so I got up about 5 AM, got the bike ready, filled water bottles, got some food to go, got dressed and got going in the car to my start point 15 minutes away. I no sooner drove into the commuter car park than I realized I'd forgotten to bring socks. Back to the house for the socks and back to the car park and finally got riding about 7 AM. That is I almost got going. One mile up the road now I realize I've left the cycling gloves back at the car which meant another trip back followed by a restart.

It did turn into a quite hot day but first thing in the morning there is a delicious chill in the air. I love the feel of my body warming up and getting into the rhythm of the ride. Although I think of my principal riding area as essentially flat, there are some hills. I, in fact, traced a typical route in that area with 'Ride With GPS' and got over 2000 feet of elevation gain over 50 or so miles. I had three water bottles but needed to drink just two and stopped once for a 10 minute break and a bite to eat.

I would love to do a club century this year but the direct goal is to bring average speed up and get much better at hills. At present a long climb of 5 to 10 miles would do me in but I am getting better by seeking out hills and riding 'em harder.

So today was 48.97 miles. If I had only forgotten one more item I would have had a full 50 miles day.

50.5 today with the Tuesday group ride. We did a lot of hill work today.

Where did you ride? It felt as if it was hotter than yesterday.

Rode to and from work today in beeeautiful dry warm/hot-but-not-too-hot conditions. 19.5 miles.

2manybikes, yesterday I rode in the Tiverton, Little Compton, Westport area. About 10 AM the temperature was mid 80's. At that time I switched the computer display from temperature to read average speed because getting speed up higher is one of my principal goals. By early afternoon I've no doubt the temperature was in the 90's. I will say that I lived on the Mississippi Gulf Coast where 93 degrees F and 93 % humidity was a typical summer day. While living there I took up tennis and could play all afternoon and was fine although I needed to drink plenty of water. Interestingly, my Mississippi friends would barely perspire - just a sheen on their brow.

After returning to New England, I took up skiing and hiking in New Hampshire and am now well acclimated to winter temperatures also.

Nice place to be yesterday. I'm jealous.:)

The dog really does poorly in the heat, most of the time I need the house AC on for him. I think that keeps me from adapting to the heat as fast as I used to.

Today’s ride:

My daughter and I got a very late start today so we just did a short ride on the Seminole Wekiva Trail from end to end. The temp was getting around the 90 degree mark and we had no wind.

Ride statistics for: 07/06/2011
 Miles today: 33.0
 Mileage this month May: 226+
 Mileage this year: 5305 (66.3 % of my 2011 goal)
 Over/under riding days 2011 vs. 2010: +11
 Over/under riding days June 2011 vs. June 2010: +1
 Over/under miles 2011 vs. 2010: +1709 miles
 Average miles per ride this month: 45
 Average miles per ride this year: 42
 Number of rides over 50 miles this month/total ride days this mo. 3/5
 Metric Centuries this month: 1
 Miles needed to hit my 2011 goal of 8,000: 2294 miles,
 A 9/10 thousand mile year is not out of reach. I should reach my goal about mid October.

Tomorrows plan: Normal ride to the horse farms weather permitting.

It's the Park road. The lake in the distance, on the left, is the one next to the Teledyne facility. Hollister Hills SVRA is on the right, you can see some of the trails.

It must be the day for hard rides and breaking Garmins. Mine didn't completely scramble but it just stopped clocking the miles every once in a while. I had a clear view of the sky but it was nine miles short of my bike computer and I have no idea how much elevation it lost. I called my sweet wife o come get me as I was to dehydrated to continue. It was much hotter than usual and I didn't check the weather forecast. Glad you made it OK.

Compared to some of today's rides, mine isn't very impressive. Since my wife gets home around 6:30 pm, I only get around an hour to ride after work taking in to consideration the time it takes to get home and then go to the MUP. Was shooting for 15 miles so I could get home early and ended up doing 21. Very hot afternoon but the sun wasn't out and the entire ride had gray, overcast skies like it was getting ready to rain. I would have hated to see what it would have been like if the sun was out and no overcast.