Name the Route

Oh look! It's another interesting route which requires an inappropriate pseudonym.

I want to call it The Fetus ...but I'm open to suggestions

This is the route Betty, Clarence, and I rode on Saturday morning...instead of running 22 miles with the San Diego Track Club, we rode 20. Our initial plan was to head to North County, but because we are either gluttons for punishment, or lazy, we rode on about the same route where the track club was running their longest run of the training season. I remember this run from last year. It was grueling. I had a fabulous talk with all my body parts here last year.

Bad thing about this ride:

• I did feel a little guilty that I wasn't running with my running peeps when I started seeing them near Mission Bay High School.
• More guilt when I saw Irene (she looked great).
  
• Even more guilt as we went searching for Mik, Kat, BBJ, & Scotty, and then found them on the San Diego Riverbed coming out of Fiesta Island.
  

Good things about this ride:

• I wasn't running (I'd run 6 miles with Betty the day before at Lake BP, and my legs were a little tired)
• Irene's husband yelling out "heyyyyyyy heffferrrrrrrrs" as we rode past (which always makes me laugh...especially at other people's reactions).
  
• It was, for the most part, a pretty flat ride.
  
• It was familiar (that is, I knew where to park the car...and ever so cleverly, we parked at World Famous, our favorite restaurant in PB)
• I have to admit I was especially glad I wasn't running on the San Diego Riverbed part...it's a really pretty beat-up path (although this is when all three of us noted that the pot-holes were not especially hoo-ha friendly either).
• When we got done riding, I could still walk. I can't always say this after a really long run.
  

I worked much harder on this ride, than on previous rides, that's for sure. Garmin says that we averaged about 12mph, but that includes the times we had stopped. I think that when we ride in the city somewhere, I'm going to turn on the "autopause" feature, so I have a better idea of how fast we're going.

Yeah...I don't know if you can see it or not, but all those purple lines that hit the bottom...that's when we were stopped, without those, I think we averaged somewhere between 14 or 15 mph...but again, it's hard to tell. Also....as you can tell...pretty flat course around the bay.

And yes, locked into the clipless pedals, I fell over again!!! GAH! I've figured out that I always fall to my left because I am an absolute dork when drying to clip out with my left foot, so I typically don't...anyway, I've got to practice that.

Here's where I fell

Another look (BTW Google Earth ROCKS!)...and yes, Fiesta Island is this ugly...but it's flat, paved, and very little car-traffic, so as a bike route, it also ROCKS...

I fell because I stopped to get my camera to take some pictures. Some photo highlights from the morning include:

Clarence and me...look...Not. Hurt. At. All! (well, except for the ego).

Luckily, both Betty and Clarence were ahead of me, so neither one saw the fall...:-)

Definitely most of the morning comedy involved Clarence and me and our experiences getting in and out of toe clips (she has the old-school cage kind). As we took off from each stop light, you could hear both of us swearing and "oh shit" -ing as we took off.

Suffice it to say, I'm not convinced that clipless or clipped is easier...both seem fraught with complications. I will also add that neither Clarence or Betty fell over on their bikes.

The other entertainment came from watching Clarence switch gears. She had her MIL's bike...it is a little older (but VERY NICE, custom made) road bike, but the kind with the gear-shifts down on the shaft (yes...I had to say it).

Clarence's sweeeeeeeeet ride.

Yeah...that's the gear shift thing-y...slightly above the water bottle

Here's Clarence describing one of the gears she was in for the whole ride.

And the other gear she managed to get into without falling

Betty described what she did to shift gears on her (new) bike.

After our ride, we had a lovely breakfast at World Famous...

note the empty champagne bottle...Mimosas, of course...

Mik was also there with her family...she was a good girl and ran with the club.

Mik and family's kids...playin' on the beach...aren't they cute?

False advertising?

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Some addendums

1. Happy Mother's Day to all the mom's everywhere...and like Al says, furbabies count too (JoLynn, RBR, and Penny, that's for you too...you all are among the best Mom's to your babies!) I'm incredibly blessed that mine's still hangin' in there!
   
2. Answers to some iPhone diet questions. 1,000 calories a day is the baseline for losing two pounds a week (admitedly, too much weight to lose too quickly, but I put it there so that if I go over, I'm hopefully still under what I should be intaking). If I burn 600 calories biking or running, I add them in. That's why super-long runs are sooooo sweet, a 2 hour run burns something like 1200 calories...Sweeeeeeet. It also explains why I gained weight training for the marathon. I KNOW I ate waaaaaaaay more than I should have.
3. Have a great week everyone!