90km goal achieved

Around the time I started cycling this year, I set two goals:

1. at least 2000kms for the summer
2. 90kms in one day

I was fairly confident that I'd achieve the first goal. I did it two summers ago, and then failed last summer's 3000km goal when my shoulder acted up. (I'm at 90% of the 2000kms already)

The second goal was more of a challenge. I've never biked more than around 80kms (I think) in a day.

This past Monday had perfect cycling weather. Sunny, not too hot, and not too windy. I headed out with no intention of going for my goal. I decided to ride up to Pink Lake in Gatineau Park. I've done it a few times in the past. It's just over 25kms one-way and almost all uphill. The ride down is a blast.

When I got to the top and checked RunKeeper, I realized that I could hit 50kms by the time I got home, I decided that if there was a day that I could reach goal #2, this would be the day. (Yeh, ~20kms downhill is kinda cheating... but the effort going up makes up for it, I think) :) When I got back down to the Ottawa River, I rode along the Gatineau side, stopping periodically to check my distance. I rode pretty much every route I've ever done downtown, trying to add to my total. The Rideau Canal. The Rideau River. I even back-tracked through the Byward Market to scraped up a few extra kms. On my way home I checked one more time and realized that I might just fall short of the 90kms, so decided to continue along the entire eastward stretch of the Rockliffe Parkway. I was positive that it would push me past the 90kms.

My legs were beginning to hurt a little. In fact, they were bothering me at least 15kms earlier. When I got to the end of the parkway, I checked my total. 92.5kms. I did it. With still a few kms to go before getting home, I thought that it would really suck if I got close to 100kms and didn't try for it. :)

I detoured back down toward the parkway and rode along until I got to my usual exit up towards home. I wasn't sure if it would be enough, but since I was so tired I decided that if it wasn't, then so be it. At least I tried.

Upon arriving home, I checked Runkeeper.

99.12kms.

My wife and son told me to ride around the neighbourhood to break 100kms. I didn't want to. I was done. Besides, RunKeeper isn't always pinpoint accurate in tracking my route. I could already be over 100kms. Or if I rode around the block, who's to say I wasn't still under?

As far as I'm concerned, that was close enough.

Yay me. :)

Oops...

The results of my annual blood work came in for my annual physical.

It looks like I screwed up over the last year and my cholesterol is a little higher than it should be.

Apparently the LDL is supposed to be 2.0 or less. Mine was 2.09.

I've been given a few months to get it back down through exercise and diet changes before my doctor is ready to up my med dosage.

I've already got the exercise covered, but I've put on about 10-15lbs since last year, and I haven't been too careful about what I eat. So I'm going back to calorie counting.

I'm pretty confident I can get it back under control before November when I got back for more blood work. This little wake-up is the incentive kick I needed. :)

Passed the half way mark

At some point in the last week, I passed the 50% mark of my 2000km summer goal. If the weather cooperates I may be able to beat it before the end of the month. If it's anything like June's weather I'd have to say that the odds are against me.

June update

It's been a while and I thought I'd post an update.

The good: My "bad" (left) shoulder is doing fantastic. Much better than I expected. Weather permitting, I bike to work on a regular basis. Unfortunately, due to the weather, that hasn't been as often as I would like. I have a goal of riding 90kms in one outing before the end of the summer. I managed to do 68.8kms once without even trying so I think I should be fine. I've already reached 40% of my 2000km overall summer goal.

The bad: My good (right) shoulder is bothering me. I think I have a pinched nerve in there somewhere. I didn't do anything to injure it, as I did with my left shoulder, but it really hurts if I move it in certain ways. Thankfully, cycling isn't affecting it. Sleeping on it seems to have the most adverse affect on it. It's been like this for a couple of months, but I've decided to give it more time before becoming too concerned with it. Besides, I'm almost due for my annual physical so I'll bring it up then, but I suspect my doctor won't be too concerned about it and may just refer me to physio or something.

The weather for the rest of the summer is supposed to be much better than it has been for June, so I'm hoping to get in a lot more cycling. Despite my goal for 2000kms, I think I might push for 3000kms. :)

An so it begins...

I've gone cycling four days now. Once last weekend (40kms), once this past weekend (33kms), yesterday to and from work (42kms), and now today (21kms so far, until I ride home).

My shoulder and neck feel pretty good (knock on wood). There have been a few times that I felt my bicep tingle, as a result of my neck, but pulling my shoulders back seems to alleviate that.

The morning rides to work are still a little on the chilly side at 10c.

I'm finding it a little difficult to motivate myself to ride. In past years, I wouldn't hesitate to go, but now I have to guilt myself into doing it. :) I haven't done any Nike+ workouts in weeks, so this is my one and only major physical activity.

Pebble: E-Paper Watch

After almost a year of waiting, my Pebble E-Paper Watch finally arrived yesterday!

I invested in this Kickstarter project at the $115 level a few weeks before it had ended. Because I'm in Canada, I paid an extra $10 for S&H.

What this got me was a black Pebble watch.

The box it arrived in was pretty cool. The unboxing was really uneventful  Pull the cardboard "zipper", flip open the top and voila.

A watch and a USB charging cable, with instructions on the inside telling me to go to go.getpebble.com to configure it.

I already had the iOS app installed, so the phone was paired via Bluetooth and running in no time, after it received a firmware update during this process. (I read messages after on the Pebble Facebook that some people's watches were bricked during firmware updates..)

Some of the watch faces I loaded,
displayed with the backlight on.
Even when off, it's still very readable.

Using the phone app, I can send a "ping" to the watch to verify that it is paired (it makes the watch vibrate), or I can choose from 11 additional watch faces to add to the 3 or 4 that came with the watch. You can't load them all at the same time. I tried and it told me I had to remove some before I could add more. I narrowed my choices down to 7 for now. I assume if I ever add an other functionality to the watch in the future, I may have to remove more to make room.

I don't think the app does much else that I can see. During the initial fundraising they talked about a cycling app to track stats in conjunction with your phone. I hope that's still coming because that's the main reason I invested.

The watch itself is plastic and seems quite durable and lightweight. The strap is some kind of rubber and I think it'll last as well. It supposedly a standard size strap so can be replaced by any watch strap if I wish.

One thing that I'm not particularly fond of is its size. Maybe my wrists are a little narrow for a 6'3" 230lb man, but as you can see in the photo, it's fairly large.

You can also see how readable it is without the backlight
in this photo.

On top of that, I haven't worn a watch in a long time so this will take some getting used to.

There's a grand total of four buttons on the watch. One on the left, beside the magnetic charging... err... nubs? This is basically the "home/back" button. On the right, there's an "up", "select/menu", and "down" button.

The watch can be turned on by holding down any of the buttons for 2 seconds. Pressing the middle (select/menu) button opens the menu where you can choose the music feature (to control your phone's default music player), set an alarm, choose from the installed watch faces, or go into settings where there are some very basic configuration settings, and an option to shutdown the watch.

What exactly does the watch DO?

Well, I can only speak for the iPhone pairing, but when your SMS/iMessages are configured to display notifications on the home screen, they will also appear on the watch. The watch will also vibrate to let you know. That's pretty handy if your phone in your pocket or bag. Not that you can only read the message while it's displayed. If you press the home/back button, it's gone and you'll need to read it from your phone. I know that's by design, and probably not such a big deal to most people. I just think it would have been cool if it cached a few messages to read later. It also does the same thing for emails. If the message is long, the up/down buttons will let you scroll to read it all.

It can also control the iPhone's default music player. Play/pause and skip fwd/rev. It seems to play your music list in shuffle mode.

That's about it. For now?

The battery life is supposed to be 2-7 days. That seems like quite a varied range. The last firmware update supposedly improved it after some were complaining it was less. We'll see how this goes.

The charger cable is kinda cool. It connects via two small magnets and plugs into any 5v USB port/charger. This also makes the watch waterproof up to 5ATM.

Because it is waterproof, there is no way to replace the battery when the watch finally dies. That's it, that's all, it's dead.

The watch now sells for $150 USD from the Pebble web site. They're still fulfilling Kickstarter backers and then the pre-orders, so expect a very long wait if you decide to order one. Many backers are becoming irate.

Is this watch worth $150 USD? I'm somewhat undecided, at least with its existing functionality. If apps start coming out for it, then may I'd lean more toward yes. I'm still hoping for the cycling stats app.

But then again, if you're the extremely geeky "must have" type, you might want one anyway.

Almost time

Today I was thinking that it's almost time to start cycling again. I checked my saved GPS logs to see what day I started last year and it's actually 1 year ago tomorrow.

There's still a little bit of snow on the ground due to a surprise snow storm over the last two days, but I think next weekend will be the first time out for this year. I hope so anyway.

My shoulder has been feeling pretty good, overall. I've had a few days where it didn't feel quite right, but I can associate those days with not doing any workouts in the days prior.

Whenever I go for a couple of days without any workouts, I can feel my arm and my shoulder begin to stiffen up, and then I also feel it in my neck.

Ever since I pull my calf muscle, my workouts have been very sporadic. I'm sure there's some laziness thrown in there, but mostly it's because of a fear that it's going to happen again. A few times last week, I felt the calf muscle tighten up just from walking up stairs. It's been ok for the last week though.

I have to make more of an effort to do something. Anything, to keep them loosened up, or I'm going to be in the same situation as last year.

For such a lazy bastard that I can be, I sure love cycling. Without it... I don't know what I'd do. I don't think of it as exercise as some people might. A motorcyclist could probably relate to the same feeling that it gives me. Except this is under my own power.

A 360 degree sight and sound freedom experience.