Category: Weekly Recap

Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links…   4000 Is the New 2021 At the beginning of the year, I joined a Strava challenge to ride 2021 miles during the year and easily met that goal during the summer. Last week I realized that I’m closing in on 4,000 miles and set that as my new […]

Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links…   Cyclists Do Meetups Just Like Runners I’ve learned pretty quickly that the cycling community is every bit as nice as the running community despite what I thought as a runner when I occasionally got yelled at by rude cyclists on the W&OD Trail, but as with any group […]

Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links…   Still Figuring out Dressing for Cold Weather Cycling After getting far too cold on two of my bike rides this past week, it’s obvious that I’m still figuring out what to wear when cycling in cooler temps. I don’t have a lot of experience with cold weather riding […]

Four Generations Together My oldest son and I took Baby Bean to the farm to visit my mom Tuesday through Thursday. Needless to say, Mom was thrilled to meet her great-grandson and I got precious pictures of her holding him plus a wonderful four generations photo. The normal drive to the farm is about six […]

Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links…   W&OD Trail Closure As work continues by Dominion Electric on the aging electrical lines running along the W&OD Trail, rather than continuing to detour traffic for short distances from the paved trail onto the parallel gravel horse trail, both will be closed this coming week between Loudoun County […]

Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links…   New Format, Who Dis A few years ago I recapped each week by events, grouping my runs together, my strength training workouts together, etc. Eventually, I changed to my current day-of-the-week format and now find myself at a quandary and playing around with the format once again. I […]

Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links…   Waving to the Children Back in late September 2017, ESPN College GameDay came to Blacksburg before our primetime game against Clemson, the reigning National Champions. It’s always fun to be in the crowd for College GameDay and this was our third opportunity to watch the show live while […]

Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links…   Procrastination at its Best I was up at 7 AM to put the finishing touches on my blog post and post it by 8 AM, but it’s well past noon and I’m still spinning my wheels and procrastinating. The majority of my post was complete – workout descriptions […]

Cardio Junkie in the Making Strength training and cardio 2 to 3 times per week has been a part of my routine since the my early 20’s; however, intense cardio wouldn’t become a way of life until I started training for my first marathon when I was 39. Sure, I ran regularly, but without a […]

Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links…   Embracing Options Back in the day, 12 miles was a short run for me. These days, 12 miles is an exciting weekly running total. As I transition to cycling from exclusively running, I’m slowly letting go of my “run all the miles” attitude and embracing my love for […]

Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links…   Will a New Garmin Make Me Faster? Friday afternoon Bill went out to run errands and came home with a new bike Garmin (affiliate link) for me! My old Garmin came within 2% of its battery dying when I rode the Reston Century and I was nervous that […]

Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links…   I’m Not a 100-Year-Old Rider When I posted the following picture of my Garmin (affiliate link) to my Facebook after the Reston Century, my friend laughed and commented that now that I’ve ridden a century, I’m a centurian; to which I replied, “Not to be confused with a […]

Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links…   Send Positive Vibes My Way We’ll be heading out for the Reston Century shortly after this publishes so if you’re reading this prior to our expected finish time of around 2 PM, please send positive vibes my way!   Overview of the Week Before discussing each day’s workouts, […]

I’ve Been Down This Road Before Shortly after returning home from Tuesday morning’s bike ride I got the call I was expecting, but with additional information I didn’t anticipate. Just five days earlier I’d had a biopsy on a new growth on my upper lip – both my dermatologist and I suspected it was a […]

Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links…   Missing Most of the Olympics I put my sleep as a priority a couple of years ago and even bought a Fitbit (affiliate link) to track my sleep. I have a long way to go to get the recommended 8 hours per night, but I’ve come a long […]

Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links…   Becoming Familiar with Two of the Four Climbs There will be four significant climbs during the Reston Century: • Woodburn Road – .9 miles long (11% steepest, 4.5% average grade) at mile 31 • Taylorstown Road – 1.3 miles long (17.7% steepest, 6.1% average grade) at mile 61 […]

Training for My First Century Always looking to for a challenge and to push it to the next level, Bill and I registered for the August 22nd Reston Century. My training plan is pretty simple – spend more time in the saddle with 3 to 4 rides per week and to get a 70-miler under […]

Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links…   Fourteen Miles, High by Today’s Numbers Still sidelined from last week’s removal of a squamous cell carcinoma on the top of my left shoulder, I couldn’t ride my bike or use my left arm while strength training. Not one to just sit around, I worked around my restrictions. […]