Machka 

Last weekend of April! And one third of the way through the year.

Tell us how you're doing so far this year.

Tell us about your cycling this weekend.

Machka 

April Highlight -- another 1000 km month! This is our second 1000 km month in a row.

We're at 1009 km as of tonight's 23.6 km ride.

After work, we went to the last night of the local street food market. Yummy. And then we set off into the dark up the Cycleway.

bikecrate

I finally got to do my Davis Is. evening ride this Thursday. It has already gotten very hot. Good ride however for 33 miles.

TedC

Yesterday was not the weekend - but I decided to take the day off and get some miles in after my weekend ride was cut short due to rain.

Biked from Brooklyn to Bear Mountain, climbing the mountain, then onto Beacon for some beers before catching the train back. On my way up, I took a detour from the usual 9W to go through Blauvelt State Park to climb Clausand Mountain / Tweed roads, as well as Overlook Road and Gate Hill road. I will be riding in the GFNY next month, and a number of these climbs are included in that ride as well - so a little training session.

I also followed a detour which heads into a bike trail a bit too long, to then realize it was a mountain biking trail - so my road bike with 25mm tires had a bit of a gravel adventure - no issues though, and now I have even more confidence in my Gatorskins!

gsindela

2.5 inches of rain forecasted here for the weekend.

Machka 

Today is a 2-part Anniversary.

1) On April 29, 1990, I started cycling "seriously" and specifically, I started logging all my cycling distances. Yes, I have kept track of every single kilometre I have cycled since April 29, 1990. On that day, I rode 2 miles and had to take a break at the end of the first mile because it was that difficult. I've built up strength since then!

2) On April 29, 2016, I became an Australian citizen.

Machka 

Saturday -- Bit of an explore of a possible 50 km route we might make "official" at some point.

Chilly day. It did hit 17C early on in the ride, but then quickly dropped to 12C with a stiff sea breeze.

Distance: 52.1 km
Elevation: 584 m
Moving Time: 3:03:59
Elapsed Time 3:17:17
Speed: Avg: 17.0 km/h | Max: 43.6 km/h

kbarch

Very, very nice!
Beacon seems like a great town to end just such a ride. One of these days I'll head further north, too. Always figured the trip home from GCT would be a huge chore, but maybe it wouldn't be so bad to get off at 125th to head back over the GWB....
Of course you'll want to take Overlook and Gate Hill the other way to familiarize yourself with the GFNY course - by the way, do you go on their Sunday training rides?
Looks like your off-road adventure was an attempt to get around Baby Bear. Funny thing; going over it from the south is not so great, but it's a BLAST going over the top from the north.
Meanwhile, I going up Clausland! It's not very long, but it is so rewarding.

As for my own weekend, here it is 10 am already and I'm being very lazy. My excuse is a long work week, and a little workout of a "commute" yesterday evening. Normally I just take Citibike for a 10 minute ride from the office to Port Authority, but yesterday I decided to take it up for a ride in Central Park. At first I thought I'd have to keep it short taking the 72nd street traverse, but soon realized that wouldn't do. Got to the 'lazy loop' cut-off, but stubbornly kept going, eager to climb Harlem Hill. Of course, most of the "serious cyclists" do their training laps in the morning, so since it was evening, I got to have a bit of fun dropping the more casual riders there and the rest of the way down the West drive. Unfortunately, I was on one of the older bikes, which don't have gearing as nice as the newer ones, so it quickly spun out on the downhills. Guys on road bikes in their cycling kit would pass me on the downhills, then I'd ride past them on the uphills, upright on the 45-lb step-through in my sweater and khakis, over and over again for 40 blocks. It was exercise, but nothing crazy - just a lot of fun. A beer was had at the little pub by my gate at Port Authority. Not as half cool as Beacon.

Jakedatc

Sat: tried out a new shop ride this morning that started this year. 32mi w/ 2200' climbing we had 4 of us in the group and did our own thing on the bigger hills and regrouped. Nice group that i'd go and do again. GF is doing a 30-35mi gravel ride up in VT, can't wait to hear how she liked it and if she'll be coming to the one I want to sign up for in June.

JamesB722

Nothing big, just pleasant ride to the Delaware River.

kbarch

Well done!
Thanks for the note. By the way, I didn't figure you meant to avoid Baby Bear, just that I was interested in where you might have gone off-road. Couldn't tell from the map image, but then I noticed the lesser peak before Bear missing from the elevation profile

Meanwhile, an excellent fine gravel/dirt path detour off the main road to Bear is Nyack Beach from Nyack to Haverstraw. Have you tried that? The park entrance is a couple of miles north of downtown Nyack and it puts you out just south of the helix where you can pick up Bike Route 9 again. Was shown the way last week and now I'm thinking of returning tomorrow.

jamesdak 

Saturday - Finally got out in the afternoon after spending most of the day helping a friend move. Went out tired and still managed to get in a little over 25 miles. Used the Paramount again, first time out since sorting it totally out. The bike is now 19 lbs even as pictured below. Not bad for a 30 year steel American made bike.

Machka 

Sunday -- Beautiful sunny day, clear blue skies, light winds. Good day for a ride! We did a bit of exploration and checked out roads we hadn't ridden before.

We found another road that would make a good interval road.


Distance: 50.8 km
Elevation: 219 m
Moving Time: 2:40:30
Elapsed Time: 2:51:45
Speed: Avg: 19.0 km/h | Max: 39.2 km/h

jamesdak 

Sunday - Stinking wind. I've yet to have a single fun day this year. It's either go out while it's freezing but calm. Or go out in the crazy wind once it warms up. Did a little over 24 miles on the Paramount again. Wanted to do much, much more but am just so tired of every ride being a fight with the wind.

kbarch

Today I spent over nine hours out on the bike, seven of them actually riding. The other two hours were taken up by two on-road snack breaks, two inside snack breaks (not very long; it was a solo ride) but a LOT of stops for photos. And you'd think I'd get more than 92 miles and 4300' in all that time, but 13.0 mph average speed was attributable to much of it being on trails, with a little bit of portage required here and there. I was WAY more tired when I got home than I've been in a long time - since NYC Century on the fixed gear, probably.
I'm too tired to extract photos, upload, etc. etc., but you can see the photos on Strava here:
https://www.strava.com/activities/965134572
At about 18.5 miles in, check out the segment Loltrail (slash hike-a-bike) with grades in the 40s. That was stairs up the side of a cliff, of which there's a photo.

a1penguin

Saturday was my 228th blood product donation (the only way you can get that many donations is by donating platelets, which can be done 24 times per year).

It was rainy and cold CA winter and I wimped out and didn't bike. Walking doesn't really help much :-) After six weeks of commuting and a couple of longer rides, the weather was totally spring and I completed my 106km metric century. My legs aren't super happy.

I stopped at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pulgas_Water_Temple for delicious Hetch Hetchy water refill and walked the 100 meters to the Temple for the first time.

woodcraft

82 miles Saturday. Sweet Spring weather, about as many cyclists as cars on the road.

1st ride of the year in shorts.

After, 1st bike wash in 6 months. Riding buddy has been on my case.

I was thinking of going for a record for longest time with a dead worm on chainstay, but let it go.

JohnnyPedals

Looks like a great ride. Love the pictures! How do you like the bike? Was thinking about getting a bike like that so I can do some longer rides on gravel

JP

JohnnyPedals

Did a ride out of New Hope PA. called Fleche Buffoon put on by Kermesse Sport. This ride is all about steep climbs and beautiful roads. I have never ridden in this area before but all I can say is it has some of the best scenery I've ever seen on a ride.
We also did a nice little 20 mile warmup spin along the Delaware River before the start and a 5 mile cool down spin after to make it a century
https://www.strava.com/activities/963487675

JP

kbarch

Thanks. You know, last weekend, the trees were still bare. Yesterday, suddenly they were all green!

The TCX? It's nice. It gives one more options, and having the big 40mm tires is REALLY nice on the rough sections of trails. Have just under 300 miles on it, and yesterday was the first time I really put it through its paces, so it's just getting broken in. Need to have the derailleur cable re-set, I think. I really like the 1x, which I switched from a 40t chain ring to a 46t, since the cassette is 11-42 and I spend a lot of time on the road. It's worked well like that, but I may put the little ring back on for a really challenging ride in the fall.

Oh, I see you did the Fleche Buffoon! A bunch of friends did Hell of Hunterdon (which they also put on) and I kept getting notices about that and had considered it - need to get out more!

JohnnyPedals

Thanks for the review. One thing is I might want a 2x11 because I would be using it more as long range road with some gravel thrown in. Do you have any issue spinning out on the road?
Jp

mrodgers

Friday turned 45 years old. Ride 45 miles? Nope. Kids took me to Olive Garden for dinner over in Ohio. Lovely evening even with the ex. That could be cycling related as I started cycling to lose weight. I can't eat an entire dinner in a restaurant any more so I took half of it home. It's lunch today.

Saturday rain all day. Lot of rain.

Sunday checked my phone leaving church. "Going riding?" Indeed I am. Buddy rode up from where he is and I rode down from where I was. He had a half hour start on me so we met close to my living arrangements and it just happened to be at a road I was planning on starting my route with. Beautiful day. Started out hot and really muggy. Humidity dropped steadily through the day.

Still getting use to having places to stop and get a drink. I drink a lot. I'll down 3 gallons on a 60-70 mile ride. I don't have to carry 8 bottles of water with me much any more, it's nice.

Fresh blacktop is such a luxury. They pave the roads around here about every 10 years and you have 1 year of nice, smooth, quiet, and fast blacktop before they chip seal it. Had a couple miles of smooth blacktop they did last year. Won't be long til they chip seal it now.

I never look at the miles til I get home or back to the car. Ended up with 38 miles and 2850 feet. Felt like 50. Was disappointed when I saw it was only 38. Didn't even get my 45 I should have rode for the birthday.

Got on my favorite roads of the area. Fantastic ride.

bikecrate

Saturday I had to do family things so no riding. Sunday it was pretty windy out of the S.E. so I went back to Picnic and Davis Is. for 40 miles. A good ride in spite of the wind.

kbarch

No issue spinning out, really, since 46 over 11 is plenty. 40 that it came with would probably be fine on the road, too, for all but the longest descents. But as many folks will point out, the larger jumps between cogs can be an issue for some types of rides.

TedC

Your bike was a least a bit more appropriate for that path when I took it Thursday! I dont recommend climbing over those fallen trees in road shoes + look clips