Friday, December 21, 2007

Car Wedgie

On the way to school this morning we came across a car that had given itself a wedgie.
Car Wedgie
We had a good laugh but I suspect the driver didn't think it was so funny.

I also uploaded most of the pictures from my Great Western in the Winter hike. The trail is one of my favorite mountain bike trails and was great even if I did do it without the mountain bike. Here are the pictures of the trail.

Wednesday, December 19, 2007

Great Western Trail in the Winter

I should have been doing the interval training, but on Monday I had an appointment with the outplacement agency that Novell hires for people they lay off. So after dropping the kids off at school I figured I would just hang around the area and take pictures until my appointment. So I headed up the Great Western trail. This is a trip we frequently do on mountain bikes.

It looked like I would be able to finish the whole trip in time for my appointment, but I had a hard time finding the trail in the snow at the one point, and ended up being about 40 minutes late for my meeting. Oh well I got some great pictures, and I'm not looking for a job anyway, because I am going to open my bike store as soon as they get the building built. I put the pictures together as a video an then thought I would try uploading to youtube and to blogger. My first attempt at uploading a video.

While walking the trail I realized why I no longer like winter. It is because I don't do enough winter activities. It was great to spend some time appreciating the simple things in life, the beauty of nature. It was also fun to run across a LARGE herd of elk. Anyway, if anyone ever reads this, I hope you enjoy the video.

Saturday, December 15, 2007

Biking shoes

My kids were talking about how much people spend on shoes. Saying things like "I would never spend that much for a pair of shoes!" I didn't dare tell them how much my Specialized S-Works shoes cost. Anyway I have typically used my normal shoes when riding on the stationary bike. The problem is that the arch in my foot gets real sore after a workout. So I switched over to using my mountain bike shoes for my last training session. What a difference! The stiff soles fixed the problem. I guess I should dig out my old worn out mountain bike shoes for the indoor training. While they are beyond their useful life for real biking I think they will work well for the indoor stuff and maybe make my other biking shoes last longer.

Friday, December 14, 2007

Big Cushy vs Light Weight

I guess I have finally capitulated and started riding the indoor bike. It seems every month in the Bicycling Magazine there is an article by Chris Charmichael promoting some intervals based workout routine. This month it is steady state intervals and power intervals. I figured now that I am indoors I might actually try this interval thing and see how it goes.

I did a set of steady state intervals yesterday and then a long steady ride today, that is if you can call 1 hour long, it gets boring being indoors so about 1 hour is all I can do. The intervals, however, were not to bad but the seat is a different story. When people see my light weight seat they always question how comfortable it could be. However I can ride my bike with the nice light not much to it seat for 11 hours straight and not get as sore as the big padded cushy seat that came with the stationary bike I am using. I also find sitting for an hour on a padded bench at church much more difficult to endure than all day on the bike.

Google Ads

What is with these google ads? I thought they were suppose to have something relevant to my blog. I won't mention what they are advertising because I don't want encourage those ads, but I would think the frequent reference to MOUNTAIN BIKING, CYCLING, and OUTDOOR RECREATION would get ads that had something to do with mountain biking, cycling and outdoor recreation, not ads based on the fact that someone else has the same name I have. I guess I may need to add some filters so I can get more mountain biking cycling and outdoor type things.

Thursday, December 13, 2007

Sore Back - Great Core Workout

After it snowed the other day my son wanted to build an igloo. I don't know how to make a good igloo but I do know how to make snow caves. This was probably the best snow cave I have ever made. I got out the snow shovel and piled up the snow until it was about six feet high. We then dug out the cave. Because the snow was so soft this was an easy cave to dig out. After a few days in the sun the cave was about half as high as it was originally but still an intact cave.

It has now been a week since we built the snow cave and my back is finally getting over the sore muscles from lifting all that snow. It was probably the best core muscle workout I have ever done.

I posted another picture from the snow cave on flickr.

Tuesday, December 11, 2007

No loose change

It has been a long time since I actually road a bike, and I am starting to question if I am still a cyclist. It is just hard to get out when it is so cold out there. With snow on the roads I don't dare ride my road bike and with muddy or snowy trails I don't feel like riding the mountain bike. I could ride the stationary bike, but instead find myself doing a bit of weight lifting. Winter sure is a hard time for a biker.

Today when doing my laundry, instead of finding loose change in the dryer I find nuts from presta valves. I guess I still am a biker. I just hope I can get back out on the bike before I run out of those little nuts.

Saturday, December 01, 2007

Snowman

Snowy day today. I guess with all of the snow I just have to shovel my driveways to stay in shape.

I have been working on an Email Santa website. I will continue to improve it but I think it is ready for people to start using now. Try it out and let me know what you think. http://www.stnickemail.com

My Bicycle Store