Wednesday, July 28, 2021

My Longest Unassisted Ride Yet

Last weekend I got in a couple of nice bike rides.

On Saturday a friend and I did about 13 miles. He has a Trek hybrid bike while I rode my Trek 820. Prior to the ride I raised the stem a bit and it's more comfortable to ride with a more upright posture. It puts less pressure on my hands so I don't get tingling.




Sunday morning I woke up and got it into my head that I was going to do 20 miles. When I was into cycling in my teens and early 1920s I did 20+ miles plenty of times but the only time I've done so recently was on my Lectric XP e-bike. This time I wanted to do it on a bike powered solely by me.

So, I inflated the tires on the Nishiki Maricopa to about 115 PSI, put it on the bike rack, and took it down to Spring Mill. I got on the Schukyll River Trail and kept going until I hit a bit more than 10 miles, which brought me into Valley Forge National Park.



I took about a 5 to 10 minute brake to hydrate, slurp down a Clif Shot, and give my crotch a rest.

Looking down towards the river from the SRT:



I have to say that the final 5 miles were a bit of a chore. The Nishiki's seat is pretty firm and even though I wore padded bike undershorts, it got uncomfortable.

That said, I wound up doing 20.26 miles, which felt really damn good.

It's been about 2.5 months since I started riding regularly and while I haven't lost any weight, my cardio is considerably improved and I can feel that my legs are stronger.

Cycling really is a great way to get good, low impact cardio exercise.

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