Bike test

I went out for a ride today and I finally got a true test of how much faster I am on my new bike.  Check this post for a description of my first ride on my new bike.  It was Easter Sunday so I spent my day up in Northern Kentucky with the family enjoying the wonderful day.  I had planned on biking from my parents house to my grandparents house for breakfast but the weather had other plans for me.  When I got out of church, it was only about 40 degrees and I didn’t have the correct clothes for cold weather riding.  Instead I waited until after breakfast and rode from my brother’s house to my parents house and back.  This made for a decent 20 mile round trip ride.

Overall, the ride went great.  I only had to stop once or twice for traffic lights and I was able to ride some decent hills along the way.  I checked my average speed at my parents house and it was an average of 16mph.  That’s a pretty significant improvement from the 12mph that I rode on the Tri for Sight.  The ride back to my brother’s house was a lot slower because it was mostly uphill.  I ended the ride with an overall speed of 14.5mph (still a pretty good improvement).

As soon as I got to his house, I jumped in the shower and had about 10 minutes to get ready for an Easter dinner over at another house.  My day was kind of hectic, but overall it was worth it.

On my ride, I remembered a quote that I once read.  It goes as follows:

“Success isn’t measured by how far you traveled, but by you gave up to get there”

It really made me put my training into perspective.  Between the marathon and Triathlon training, I will have to train for a solid 32 weeks.  That’s giving up a significant portion of my life.  It really cuts into my fun-time.  I can’t look at this training as something that I have to do.  If I do, I will probably fail.  I have to make it a lifestyle change.  It has to be something that I do because I want to because that’s who I am.  I think over the past 13 weeks, I have done a pretty good job of that.  I know I have struggled at times but who doesn’t?

–ZJ