Cycling is like life. Cycling with no goal is meaningless. What meaning is there cycling in circles? Or living aimlessly? Meaning comes from direction and destination. Join me in my life's journey on a mountain bike :)

Blogging since 2003. Thank you for reading :))

Sunday, October 26, 2008

ITBS

Oct distance: 156 km

Hougang, 36 km. Whether a glass is half full or half empty, the water level is the same. Does it matter if it is "half full" or or "half empty"? Well, half empty is good if the goal is to empty the glass. It marks progress. Facts are only part of the story. Feelings count too. Pain from iliotibial band syndrome (ITBS) is a fact and a feeling; it's so bad I can barely use stairs. It hurts when I pedal. I rue the experience until I realise I've been doing half marathons runs on my own, with just a water bottle and some sweets. Now, that's sweet. There is progress, there is hope. Easy does it, two weeks more to my 24-hour endurance ride and after that four weeks to my first marathon run.

Sunday, October 19, 2008

Circumnavigation

West Coast, 72 km. How apt it is that today's ride is a hard one. The km sweated up till today adds up to 40,094. The circumference of the earth at the equator is 40,075.02 km (I crossed the meridional distance last week). What a week. Work-wise, I feel like Atlas carrying the weight of my little world. And on Fri, I spend the longest time ever as a road runner: 3.5 hours. It would've been shorter had I not have to limp home from Singapore Flyer. Today, I keep up with a roadie. It's been some time since I've cycled so hard: I cover twice my usual distance today than is usual, and at the roadie's speed on my fat tyres.

Sunday, October 12, 2008

Softer is harder

Seletar, 48 km. I've not pumped my tyres for a few weeks. They are fat, squishy and slow on the road. It takes hard effort to crank up and I feel the burn when I cycle a steady 30 km/h to train for next month's Enduro (Bike-Aid's 24 hour charity ride). It's a good workout when I want to do hard work in a short time. Off-road, the soft tyres give a rather plush ride, unless the road is so rough, I bounce so much till my hands burn from keeping a firm handle on the bike. I guess some hardship helps to build up rather than tear down ...