More Pictures of my Hand

Today is Monday December 30 2024 and i rode my bike yesterday and the day before.

2024 has been an amazing year for bike riding.

Remember in the movie Midnight Run when Robert DeNiro is gearing up to go undercover to finally bust Jimmy Serrano and Yaphet Kotto asks him why he's smiling and he replies "i feel like a cop again"... that's kind of how I've felt for the last few months.

Anyway...

In 2024 I did one race which was the Little Sugar mountain bike race in Bentonville Arkansas. It was back in October and i did the 50 kilometer distance and got my ass kicked but i came out of that race with some good fitness and i've been riding that gravy train hard ever since. 

Couple that with a relatively mild November and December and its been like heaven the last few months. 

2025 could be an even better year for bike riding but right now i'm living in the now and living in the now means that right now i find myself writing about two bike rides i did in the past.

We're in now, now.

On Saturday i rode my mountain bike on the road, specifically a route i like to do where i time myself. i've been doing it since 2018 and logging all the times. i group the times based on which bike im riding, road bike, cyclocross bike, mountain bike, plus i've done it once on my singlespeed. Additionally there is a short version and a long version of the route. This year i've wimped out and only done the short version.

I had a half a*s goal this year of setting a personal best time on this route but unless i accomplish that tomorrow (the last day of 2024) i wont be meeting that goal.

On Saturday i had to beat a time of 35:30 which is my best mountain bike time on the short route, i did it in 37:00

Then on Sunday i did a 2 hour mountain bike ride that took closer to 2 and a half hours. i rode to the levy on the Kansas River and took it all the way to Kaw Point. They've been doing a ton of levy improvement construction down there so it was a lot of stop / go while i navigated all that.

But i was able to ride with no glove in late December... which is nice.

Three bike rides

Today is Friday December 27 2024 and i've done 3 rides in the past few days.

On Sunday the 22nd i rode my cx bike and got a flat, culminating with my mother, who was already on the way to our house, picking me up after i walked / ran for about 20 minutes.

On Tuesday the 24th i rode my mountain bike to the plaza and back, it was lovely.

Yesterday (the 26th) i rode my mountain bike again and besides falling down due to slipping on some slimy sewer run off and hitting my hip hard and getting gross slimy water all over my right side it was a great ride. It really was. Sometimes things just come together and this was one of those rides.

I'm sore today, mainly my hip... but its nothing a years in the tropics wouldn't fix.

Roads...

Where we're going we don't need roads.

Just kidding! Where i rode yesterday i needed lots of roads.

Speaking of which i've always loved riding my bike on the roads of KC.

We're a big enough city to have lots of cool neighborhoods and areas to explore but not so big that traffic and congestion is terrible.

I'm a fan.

We also seem to have a lot of mountain bike single-track. I didn't ride any of that yesterday but its out there. So much so that a friend recently said he was hesitant to move because of all our great single-track and that comment caught me off guard, do we really have it that good?

Whatever we have i do love it.

I also love riding my bike with no gloves and when you can do that in December its a pretty great day.

That's what i did yesterday. Rode my bike on the roads of KC wearing no gloves. 

I felt like Tim Johnson on his way to winning the 2007 cyclocross national championship. The race was in KC and it was cold but sunny and I think it turned into a two man race between him and Jonathan Page. About midway thru the race i vividly remember seeing Tim Johnson take off his gloves and i thought to myself "it's over he's got this".

It was and he did. 

He won.

Just like me.

It's like the great Bernie Mac says in Oceans 13...

"Literature? You don't need no literature. All you got's to do is FEEL it!"

 

Went to the best bike shop in the world today

Today is Friday December 13 2024 and today i visited the best bike shop in the world.

i would know, i've been to them all.

There are many factors that make this the best bike shop in the world and the fact that this song was playing when i walked in today is one of them...

Song

My mountain bike got jacked up, which i highlighted in an earlier post, so it needs to be fixed.

If you or anyone you know has a jacked up bike, or wants to purchase a new bike so that it can get jacked up, i highly recommend visiting the best bike shop in the world.

Two rides one post

Today is Monday December 9 2024 but yesterday and the day before i rode my bike.

The weather was primo.

On Saturday i rode mountain bikes with friends, which is rare for me these days. I'd say 98% of my rides are solo.

On Sunday i rode solo, on my single speed.

Saturday was epic as far as my typical outings are concerned. Sunshine, single track, discovering new paved trails and fun spots in the city, whisky, trivial pursuit, and a close encounter with a big limb that broke a few spokes. Right turn Clyde. We pedaled for 3 hours. It was a hell of a day at sea!

Sunday was much shorter but equally as enjoyable, i found a small window from 4pm-5pm so i grabbed my single speed (Which is basically my only functioning bike since my road bike stays chained up in the basement, the cx bike has a rear flat, and the mountain has two freshly broken spokes) and set out to do a timed loop i like to do thru the suburban neighborhoods by my house. 

It was hard because riding that single speed is hard but the Christmas lights were nice, the weather was good, the setting sun was pretty, and the music was lovely. 

2024 is ending on a high!

Ride # 1....

Ride # 2.....