Machka 

Happy August Long Weekend!! (or at least it is in Canada ... are you having a long weekend where you are?) Where are you riding this weekend? Are you involved in any cycling events? How about a long weekend cycling tour? How is the weather where you are? What's your terrain like? Got pics?



Saturday - we're getting ready to find the Rhine Route here in The Netherlands. Today, there won't be a lot of cycling, but we do have to ride to the train station, and when we arrive at our destination, we will have to cycle to find accommodation, tourist information, and maybe the Rhine Route itself. So who knows ... maybe there will be a lot of cycling.


The general outline of a plan is to ride the Rhine Route from The Netherlands to Switzerland over the next few weeks, although there may be detours and there may be trains ... it'll depend on how we feel.


Our touring bicycles, all set up ...

MarkThailand

Wow, it is also a long weekend here in Thailand - the start of Buddhist lent. The Buddhist holidays follow a lunar calendar so they fall on different days every year.

Asarnha Bucha day fell on August 2, 2012. This is the day the Buddha was borne, achieved enlightenment, and passed into Nirvana. I rode 60 km with my brother.

Khao Pansa day (start of Buddhist lent) then fell on August 3, 2012. It is the start of the eighth lunar month and starts the three month period when Thai monks are restricted to staying in temples. Tradition has it that this was the start of the rainy season and that the rice seedlings are being planted and monks may damage them - thus the start of Buddhist lent when monks are restricted to staying in temples. It is not a holiday and thus I could not ride.

On Saturday 4 August, I rode my usual 70 km Saturday morning ride. I started my ride early at 630 am under a slight sprinkling of rain. It was a cool ride - 78F when I started.

I plan to ride on Sunday 5 August with my brother - hopefully we will do another 70 km ride.

Thus, my long weekend total could be 200 km - a personal best. Last year, I was thrilled if I was able to ride 200 km in a month!

Mark

Machka 

Sounds good!!

Machka 

We are on the Rhine Route ... the Rhine Cycling Route. Well, OK, we're camping a little way off the Rhine Cycling Route, but we're not far from it (a few km), and plan to start riding the day after tomorrow. Another rest day tomorrow to try to give my right knee a chance to heal. All up today, we rode a grand total of 12.5 km.

As "luck" would have it, when we stopped at this campground to ask about accommodation, the manager asked Rowan what kind of cycling we were doing, Rowan mentioned the Rhine Cycling Route, and the manager gave us a book with detailed maps and information about it all the way to Mainz. Another cyclist dropped it off just recently, having finished with it, so it is ours now.

Between here and Mainz, a little over 400 km, there is an elevation gain of 100 metres. My kind of terrain!!

FPSDavid

https://app.strava.com/rides/16510077

Went on my first real group ride, thinking there was both an A Group and B Group. There was no B group.

I hung at the back of the pack for an easy 7.5 miles or so, ten they suddenly doubled the pace and within a minute, I could no longer see them! I figured I'd keep riding on my own until I hit 15 miles or so, or if they came back and passed me the other way, but ended up seeing 3 people on the side of the road from the group helping one fix a flat. Stopped with them, then we all turned back and attempted to wait to catch the main group on their way back, but we got bored of waiting and started heading back on our own.

The 3 of them were just cruising the whole time, so I didn't have to worry about being dropped yet again. Parted ways with them when they were heading home instead of back to the start point, where luckily the main group passed me shortly after, cruising through town, so I stuck on the back of them again until the start/finish point.

WAYYYYYYYYYY out of my league for that level of an A ride. Guess I'll be looking for more B rides so that doesn't happen again.

StephenH

Just finished a 300k brevet starting in Italy, Texas (pronounced "It-lee", two syllables), going to Gatesville, Texas, and back. There are a number of state prisons in Gatesville, so the route is the "Jailhouse Brevet" route. Six of us rode the 300k. One of the riders was having some issues, so part of the time my tandem partner and I were staying with that rider.

musicman1

44 miles yesterday and 32 miles today. Both rides were in excessive heat/humidity. Couldnt do my regular weekend 50 and 50; just too oppressive. Yestreday I lost almost 7 pounds from sweating. Slightly less today.

Machka 

Sunday - 6 km!! To the grocery store and back. We're taking a little bit of a break this weekend. Resting up for the weeks to come.

caloso

Saturday. 50-ish miles on the local hammerfest.
Sunday. 8 miles or so on a leisurely ride to dinner and back with my wife.

Balance is everything.

FPSDavid

Oh hey, me too! Except with gf and ~10mi.

Mondo734

On Aug. 4 I did a 30 mile route that had the most climbing I've done before something like 750ft and one cat 5 hill. Now I know thats not much but that was my first true cat 5 hill. I'm planing on a 30-50 mile ride for the 6th one that will hopefully give me more climb training.

Grim Ace

Every weekend I cycle about 100-150 km. This Weekend (4/5 August) I only did 60m because someone texted me they just got their new kittens, which made me take a detour and ended up staying there eating cake and BBQ (in my spandex lol) before heading home 5 hours later.

Kitties tore my bibs

The previous weekend me and a friend took vintage bikes 90 km to the beach.

Machka 

Monday - nothing yet today, but we might do the 6 km ride to the shops.

Machka 

From a couple weeks ago ... riding across the Isle of Skye ...





And from about a week ago ... a little south of Edinburgh ...

caloso

Monday: Mellow ride to work, tweaking the fit of my SSCX that I built up over the weekend. If I'm able to leave the office at a reasonable time this afternoon, I'll take the back roads home for some gravel.