A foolish consistency

Flying Wheels

I rode the 100 mile version of Flying Wheels today. It was a beautiful day for a long ride - hardly a cloud in the sky, temperature climbing past 80, and light winds through the trees. I rode with my friends Larry and Tom, and met quite a few peple on the ride. One rider is doing the one-day STP like we're planning, so it would be cool if we hooked up for that.

So much for the good parts. The ride itself kicked my butt. I've only ridden about 250 miles this season, so adding 102 miles today probably wasn't the brightest idea I've ever had. But in order to prep for STP, I had to do a long ride about now, and an organized, well-supported ride like Flying Wheels is really the only way to ride a century.

Anyway, I started out strong (too strong, perhaps) then had to slow down at the 50 mile mark. At the 90 mile mark going up the Issaquah-Fall City road, I just pooped out. I had an average speed of 16.6 at 90 mile mark, but that hill was a killer.

The end stats: 102 miles, 15.4 miles average speed (excluding stops), 8 hours overall time. Two years ago I rode the 70 mile version at 17.7 miles per hour, after putting nearly 1200 miles on the bike leading up to the ride.

BTW, it turns out that marathon training helps for a few things. I had no calf problems and aerobically I was just loafing most of the ride, but my quads just didn't have what I needed for those hills. Cross training only goes so far. You gotta ride to be good at riding. Duh.

Logical Fallacies

I ran across an interesting site entitled Stephen's Guide to the Logical Fallacies. Short and concise overviews of common logical fallacies such as the "Begging the Question" and the "Straw Man".

Walkable Communities

MSNBC has an article on a community that is striving to create "walkability".

I wish we had that here. I think it's sad that so many of our residential neighborhoods are un-walkable. Meaning, no sidewalks and no destinations, with block after block of homes nestled together. I grew up in a very walkable section of SE Portland, and I have fond memories of walking to the local movie theater (the now-closed Eastgate, more on that later), to school, to the 7-Eleven for a Slurpee, and the like. My kids will apparently have fond memories of sitting in the backseat, because they can't do any of that.

I have to drive my kids just about everywhere except a few friends who live within three or four blocks. Part of that is because I live on a hill, and it's a mile and 500' elevation change down to the school. But much of it is because once off the steep portion of the hill, there is really no place they could walk to or even safely ride their bikes. Take the local library on Newport Way. It's only about a mile away, but once you leave my local development, there are precious few sidewalks, just shoulders. Not the same. And on Newport Way, there is no shoulder at all for three blocks, one of them around a sharp bend in the road. No way would I have my 9 year old walk on that road.

They talk about building a community center across the street from the library (more on that later) yet how can my kids get there? You guessed it - I have to drive them.

It's the same all over

Linux needs a diet, says Bob Marr on OSNews, with this contribution. Marr makes the point that Linux should be able to run on older hardware:

"But that opportunity has been destroyed. The average Win98 and NT4 box has 32 or 64M of RAM and CPUs in the range of 300 - 500 MHz -- in other words, entirely unsuitable for modern desktop Linux distros. This gigantic market, so full of potential to spread Linux adoption and curb the Microsoft monopoly, has been eliminated by the massive bloat."

And what does he suggest? "We need to put a serious emphasis on elegant design, careful coding and making the most of RAM, not throwing in hurried features just because we can."

It's the same all over. It's terribly difficult to write performant, feature-rich, secure applications. This reminds me of the sign on the Bike Doctor's trailer:

Upgrading your bike components?

1. Strong
2. Lightweight
3. Affordable

Pick any two of the above

San Diego Rock 'n' Roll Marathon

Since March I have been training for to run the San Diego Rock 'n' Roll Marathon, raising money for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society via their Team-in-Training program.

Well, the big day was today. 147 of us from the WA/AK chapter raised a total of $485,000. All but two of us finished the marathon, some as runners, some as run/walkers, and some walkers.

My own time was a little over 5 hours, which missed my goal of 4:30 by a ways. For the last few weeks I had been battling an IT band problem, and it surfaced at mile 14. The next 6 miles became progressively more painful, despite burning minutes on the side of the course stretching, rubbing, etc. At about mile 20 I figured out that abandoning correct form and resorting to a straight legged kind of limp actually allowed me to run faster. The last 6 miles were thus simply slow and hot, since the sun by then had come out, but I made it across the finish line.

While I was in San Diego I spent some time with my stepson Scott, who lives there in Mission Beach. Ah, to be 22 again. Surf in the morning, hang out when you want to, drive a pedicab when you need money.

Anyway, we went to a Padres game, hung out, had a few drinks at the hotel, that sort of thing. Good times. And it was great having him there at the finish of the marathon.

Zero day

Today is the day I decided to start a blog. I have few if any goals for my blog, instead I shall find where it takes me.