Weight Gain Mystery Solved (maybe)
Despite working out a minimum of 3 hours per day (most of it near my lactate threshold) and watching what I eat, I've been steadily gaining about 1.5 pounds per week since Christmas.
While shopping with Amy tonight, I caught a glimpse of the nutrition label on the non-fat milk I drink and was shocked to see that each serving contains 90 calories and there are 16 servings per gallon. Not so bad until I realized that I'm drinking about a gallon per day. That's 1,440 calories in milk ALONE. Going to have to cut that by 75% if I'm going to start losing weight.
I thought I was doing good but cutting out all soda, coffee and eating a lot of fiber but I never thought about the milk until now. Milk is probably the only true addiction I really have so cutting back is going to be really hard.
Blown Away
The last Sunday of every month, the club/team I ride with holds a little race, usually around 40 miles. Today was the February race and there was a nice turnout of about 45 people since the temperature was in the low 60's at race time (1 pm).
Despite some nasty saddle sores (it comes with the territory when you're riding 25 hours per week) and a very hilly course (we rotate among 5 courses), I felt like I had a decent shot today.
Due to the size of the field, we took off from the very start and the final selection was made within the first six miles. We had a slight headwind coming from the north and the speed was such that if you permitted a gap of more than 5 feet from your front wheel to the rider in front of you, you were dropped. I stayed at the front and kept the pace high in preparation for being dropped myself and soon as we hit the steeper pitches of Dublin Rd.
We had a nice but slight tailwind assisting us up Dublin and as I expected, I was dropped from the leaders and was the last one from our group to summit. Midway through the climb, some dude in a VERY old bike, no cleats and a huge backpack passed me like he was a motorcycle. I was alarmed but thought he had just come from a side street and hadn't already been climbing for a mile. He looked young and was incredibly strong. I found out later that he's only 14 and has only been riding since January. His bike later broke down (snapped chain) but if that hadn't happened, he would have killed us all.
Immediately upon cresting Dublin Rd, the wind began to really blow from the West. I'm talking 25 mph sustained with 50 mph gusts. One guy who was pretty tiny, was blown down and landed in the middle of the sidewalk. As we headed east and straight into the wind, we all decided to sit up as the wind was just too dangerous. There were tree branches coming off trees and aluminum cans flying all over the street. We also decided to cut about 15 miles off the course. Though we chose to "sit up", we all had to work incredibly hard just to maintain 10 mph in the wind, even with drafting (60 seconds each pull).
When we got to downtown, it was like a dust storm had swallowed the city and there was very little visibility. We could hardly hear each other talk and didn't want to ride to close in case we were blown suddenly to one side.
Course profile:
RIde data:
Course on Google Maps: 
Time: 1 hour 38 minutes, 16 seconds
Distance: 26.32
Average speed: 16.1 mph (whoa!)
Elevation gain: 2,187 feet
Average heart rate: 154, max 179
Motionbased GPS data link: http://trail.motionbased.com/trail/activity/5039619
The Pug Screensaver
About a month ago, I found a Flash movie on the Internet with a pug licking a window that makes it look like he's licking your computer monitor. I put it up there and sent out a little joke e-mail to family advising them to use my new screen cleaning technology.
The Googlebot got a hold of it and someone searched my site for "dog screen savers". A few days later and I'm getting over 1,000 hits a day. A few days after that, I'm getting a few e-mails everyday asking if I could turn this into a screen saver. The file was a .swf flash file so it took me a while to figure out how to convert it without forking over $50 for some crappy shareware that I'd only use once. Google was spammed to death with this crap so I turned to Microsoft's Live Search and lo and behold, there was a free webservice to do exactly what I wanted. It's called Creamshavers and they will convert any .swf file into a Windows screen saver for free.
If you're interested in using this as a Windows 98/2000/XP/Vista screen saver, download the executable from me HERE. It will open a basic Windows installer and when it's done, the pug will be your default screen saver. If you don't already have it installed, the installer will ask you to install the standalone Adobe Shockwave player which is free.
Please e-mail me if you have any problems or questions.
I Hate Colorado
It was nice enough today that I thought I could bag 100 miles before the cold and snow returned on Sunday. My goal was to ride from home to the Royal Gorge Bridge just south of Canyon City and back. The way down was fine, my legs felt good and after the first 14 miles, it's all downhill to Canyon City. The way back was a nightmare. In addition to climbing 2,400 feet in the first 16 miles back, the wind shifted with an oncoming cold front and I was faced with some serious headwinds. Some gusts were in excess of 40 mph and there were several occasions where I almost fell over because I was going so slow. The 20 degree temperature drop wasn't any fun either. After climbing all the way back to the plateu, it was clear that I wasn't going to make it back home before it was dark. WIth 12 miles remaining, I was forced to have Amy come and get me.
Ride stats:
Miles: 89.44 miles
Duration: 5 hours, 14 minutes, 3 seconds
Average speed: 17.09
Elevation Gain: 6,044 feet
Flat tires: 0
Angry wives: 1
