Officially too long

Well, I guess it has been far too long since I've updated my blog, so I thought I at least put something up. Might as well start with a picture, everyone loves pictures....

Is there a better subject to post a picture of? I know a few people that could argue no (at least a couple of grandparents can be counted on to side with me there). Abby certainly does like to wear her dad's cycling caps, her favorite seems to be the Lampre team cap (pink & blue) of the current world champion's team (that may or may not have anything to do with it, maybe she just likes pink).

I guess one reason there hasn't been much activity going on in this blog is because I have generally been posting about cycling. Surprisingly, that seems to take a back seat during the long winter months of Winnipeg. I was riding (outdoors) into the beginning of December, but then it started to get really cold, and aside from a few warm days here and there, it has been a very very cold winter. Often too cold to even go skiing.

I have however been riding a bit indoors ( and I really do mean a bit) in an effort to stop my legs from turning to mush over the winter. However, there are few things more mind numbingly boring than riding a trainer indoors. Videos and music help, but after 45min to an hour, I just have to get off. I guess it could be worse though, it could be a treadmill.... uggg...

On the brighter side, things are winding down at school and I will be finishing up this semester, finally being able to graduate and move on. It seems to have been going on forever, but has really only been a few years. It will be nice to have one less thing to worry about, and more time to do things I enjoy.

Suicidal Squirrel

Well, there I am on my ride to work this morning (Saturday), it was a nice cool morning, the sun was shining, lots of colorful leaves on the trees, and I'm cruising along nicely as there was a south wind.


As I'm coming around the corner to cross the bike/pedestrian bridge from Kingston Row to Jubilee (the one at BDI as pictured above), I spot him. Sitting on the curb near a garbage bin. Our eyes locked as I continued to approach him, I knew what he was thinking: "I can't make it another Winnipeg winter, so cold... so windy.... so..... cold.... I'm ending it now!" As I continued to approach, he got ready to jump, so I hit the brakes hoping to throw off his timing.

Time seemed to slow as I gazed down to watch this poor destitute squirrel attempt to take his own life by jumping into the slightly bladed spokes whirring in circles. It appears as though my efforts to throw off his timing have worked, he jumped late, I felt him hit my rear tire.

As I turned in time to watch him scurry away into the bushes, perhaps he hesitated as he realized it wasn't worth it. Sure, Winnipeg is cold and windy in the winter, but the summers are great for a squirrel. He looked "well fed" and I'm sure he's gorged himself on a few delicious treats from the nearby BDI Ice Cream Stand. What started as a delighted child's frozen treat after their soccer game, became the "crème d'asphalt", a delicassy for squirrels. Then again, these treats my have been what thwarted his attempted suicide this morning, his lack of agility due to the excess cream intake may have slowed him just enough to be off the mark. Hopefully this squirrel can find it in himself to tough out one more winter, because trust me the summers (and oh so creamy BDI soft serve ice cream) are worth it.

MS Tour Continued....

heh heh, well I got a bit distracted from finishing my post on the MS tour from a while ago,and I guess I've forgotten many of the details by now. So I'll just leave it at how it went,
shortly after lunch it started to pour buckets, I hadn't seen so much rain in a long time, then the hail hit. I was sitting in our car with Jess, watching the remaining riders finish up. Boy, was I glad I finished earlier, I had to put the wipers on full tilt to see them and we weren't even moving.

The evening went pretty well, I was feeling worse and worse though, and again, I didn't sleep well once we got to bed, then I woke up feeling terrible. I got ready to go meet a few guys for a warm up ride (it was ~4 degrees C), and to see how I was feeling for the day. I decided to go for it, but asked Jess to wait at the first rest stop for me in case I didn't feel like continuing. Well, soon after the ride started, so did the rain. I was powering up the hills, my legs felt great, but... my lungs just couldn't keep up. I had 2 options: 1 Ride slower (yeah right) or 2, pack it in.

I saw Jess, pulled off the road, put my bike on the rack, and drove home.

After speaking with other riders the next day, they said the weather just got worse, more rain, wind, and apparently the food at the end of the ride consisted of 3 chicken fingers and some other small snacks.

The ride itself was beautiful, I quite enjoyed it as it was the first time I actually encountered hills on a ride. We hope to go out there next year for some camping, hopefully the weather will be nicer.

here's a little graph showing the elevation changes of the first day.




Nothing spectacular, but I was wishing I had a couple more gears in that steep part. Oh, it's not the complete course, just where it started to go up, the whole ride was ~72km or so.

MS Bike Tour Update

I'd like to start off by thanking everyone for their generosity in donating $$ for the MS Society of Canada. The grand total for the event was $190,000 (not all from me). Good job everyone.

Now for the ride report:

Friday evening we drove out to Dauphin, we left the house at around 5:00 p.m. and we stopped in Headingly for dinner.... at 6:00! oh man, that was the shortest hour-long drive ever. The rest of the drive was fine, and we rolled into the hotel parking lot with 10 minutes to spare until the office closed for the night. So we unpacked the car and got settled. No sooner than my head hit the pillow, my nose started to run, and my sinuses quickly became congested, and I had trouble sleeping that night (although it was better than in stonewall a couple years ago when our noisy neighbors kept us up until 4:30a.m.). I was not looking forward to the morning.

7:30 Saturday Morning: Up, getting dressed, feeling terrible. I made my way over to the community center where the breakfast and sign-in was. I went to the table, handed in my envelope, and received my registration packet.... for "Randy Smith" huh? so I went back, and got the proper named envelope, then proceeded to attach my number onto my jersey and bike, but... no zip ties, so I had to go get some zip ties ugg.. I hope the whole weekend isn't going to be like this. Feeling a little better my expectations for the ride increased. I spotted a few guys from the shop, and we chatted as we waited for the event to start.

9:00 the ride begins after a short ceremony and "warm up" which consisted of bending over a couple of times and stretching our arms. Temperatures were somewhere around 5 or 6 degrees at the start of the day hence the tights and long-sleeved jersey. As things got rolling, we got a small group together and were riding at a decent speed (at least that's what I thought), we were slowly picking up the pace, and after one of my pulls (the rider in the front that breaks the wind for the other riders) at ~37km/h one of the guys in the group sneered as he said, "it's hard for me to warm up when you're sprinting". Huh? if my sprints are that slow, I really need to look at a different sport.

The ride was mainly flat for the first 30 minutes or so, then we got closer to the park, and started up the escarpment. My first day where there were some actual hills was going to be a learning experience for me, living in Manitoba, the biggest hill I had come across was the bridge over the floodway. Our group divided up pretty quickly, and there were 3 of us riding together through the hills. There were some tough ones where I ran out of gears, but I made it up them pretty well.

A couple of other riders joined up with us, one of which Jess used to work with at the hospital, but he has gone back to school to become a doctor. Nice fellow. Anyways, we held a good pace the rest of the way to the finish and our time was 2 hours 31 minutes for 72 km. All in all, I was pleased with my performance as I didn't have all the time I wanted to prepare for the ride (I hadn't ridden in over a month, and before that I wasn't exactly riding regularly either).

Well, I have to go to work now, so I'll continue this later. starting with lunch....

2008 MS bike tour

This September I will be participating in the Riding Mountain Challenge. An MS bike tour event that happens in and around Riding Mountain National Park here in Manitoba.

The Machine must run perfectly.

In 2006 I rode the "Biking to the Viking" event and enjoyed the event, there were lots of people there, and it was a nicely run event, and I was able to raise a fair amount of pledges for the MS Society of Canada, it is a great charity which I have a bit of a soft spot for.

Last year, I was signed up to do the event I will be doing this year, but SOMEONE had to go and get married..... Paul... so inconsiderate. So out of duty to 2 great friends, I withdrew from the ride to grace them with my presence at their wedding. **wink wink**

So I'm quite excited to be participating in it again this year, we have a cabin booked, Jess is going to bring Abby, and we'll be having a great weekend together. I will have to be getting a bit more rides in to prepare for this though, I wouldn't want to be the last one to finish.

If you would like to sponsor me click HERE to do it online, or you can print off a form and mail it in. Any and all pledges are greatly appreciated, and it's for charity so be generous!

Mother's Day Update

Well well, time sure goes fast doesn't it? Since my last post, concerning the appearance of grass, I saw more grass, then lots of dirt and sand (spring time on Winnipeg streets) then less dirt and sand, then more snow, and after waiting and waiting, some signs that summer is coming, we have had a colder than normal spring. Which, after a colder than normal winter isn't very exciting. But what is exciting, is that even though it is chillier than normal around, it's still warm enough to ride without putting on 2 jackets.

On the odd day where it's not too cold, Jess and I have had a chance to give the new trailer a spin, it's a bit weird pulling that thing around, but it tracks pretty nicely and rolls pretty smooth, although Abby seems to fall over in it, remedied by a couple of camping pillows stuffed beside her. I'm looking forward to going out to birds hill park, or some other more scenic areas than our neighborhood to give it a longer test. It sure is nice to have the family along on some rides with me, even if the are a bit short.

As far as long rides go, I'm having a hard time finding time to get out for a while, with me taking another class over the summer, and working full time again, and Jess going back to work part-time, the time I have at home is better spent with my daughter and wife. I have managed to get out a couple of times this year however, just hitting my normal route out to St. Adolphe and back. It's a nice ride, but I want to do something else this year.

Earlier this year I sold my mountain bike planning to replace it when the new models were available, and this week I picked one up. Big improvement without costing anything more. Here's a link to better pictures of it. LINK. I hope to get it on the trail soon and see how it performs.

Now for the mother's day part. Jess, you rock, thanks for letting me play so much with my bikes, and putting up with me. You're a great mom, and wife. Thank you for your support while I finish school (can't wait for December). I know it's hard on you, but it will be over soon. Love you.

I saw grass!!

It wasn't green by any stretch of the word, but it was there, and it was visible. Definitely something that gives hope to the approaching spring (and improved cycling conditions horray!). I have recently taken a bike that has been in the family for generations (my dad used it, so that makes it plural) and had seen better days, and I gave it new life. I used it after I sold my bike back in London (that I had grown out of), and after moving here, I repainted it in British Racing Green with gold trim (it was neon snot green with silver patches where it was starting to rust). It served me well for a while, and shortly after beginning my employment at a bike shop, the parts on it started to disintegrate. So I stripped everything off the frame threw out most of it, and put the frame on the wall in the garage for another day. A few times I was tempted to throw it in with the load as we were heading to the dump, but I decided to hang onto it.


This spring I got the urge to build a single speed bike. So I perused the catalogs at work (having forgotten about the frame in my garage) looking for an economical steel frame that would work well for my intended purposes. Well there weren't any that were quite economical enough for me. Then one day while I was tidying up in the garage, I saw the old frame hanging on the wall. **light goes on**. I quickly cleaned it up and took it into work, Finding some nice cheap parts in the parts bins and putting on a different fork so I could use better brakes I began turning it into a sort of Frankenbike. Slowly it took shape and with some borrowed wheels from one of my other bikes, I was able to take it out for a spin and rode it to school the next day.




There is something different about riding a bike that is truly yours, that you built, you fell like you know the bike inside and out. You notice the smallest noise, or the slightest amount of play in the headset (which had to be adjusted). Riding with only one gear was also an interesting experience, as I'm used to having at least 14 to chose from, and as many as 27. The original gear that I chose was a little too big and found it a bit too hard when the wind started up in my face. Changing gears is a bit more labor intensive now, but I think I've found one that will work nicely.
It is a bike that I built to be a commuter, that looks cheap and is cheap to minimize the chances of someone stealing it. But there is something special about it, it's not just "a cheap bike" it's the cheap bike I built. It took my father around town, to school and work, and now it does the same for me. It has served my family well, and looks like it will continue to do so for at least a few more years. Whatever form it may take on.

Pictures will follow soon.