How Not to Take Ride Videos

I thought myself pretty clever that I’d be taking my digital camera with me today.  Clever beyond all compare, at least until I got onto the bike and realized just how horrible of an idea this had been.  Chris and I did a hill climb day on my favorite local series of hills, went up them 4 times total in an hour.  I’m thinking the only way I’ll get a decent video is if I grab a helmet cam, but I’m not that interested in dishing out the money for one.  Oh well, will just keep trying other things…

 

Heading northwest along the Susquehanna….

 

 

- Andy

An Experiment

I promised that I’d try and get some pictures and/or videos from today’s ride, so I did what I could to deliver.  I apologize for the quality, but it appears I can’t find my digital camera and am thus forced to utilize my cell phone’s camera and camcorder features.

 
Just one of the many straight sections we rode on.  My computer tells me we did a little over 20 miles in an hour and 42 minutes.

 
Chris did a good job making it through the ride.  Not bad for his second real ride since getting a bike.

I tried thinking of something witty to go here, but I’m experiencing the same lack of intelligence I was during the picture.

I have some videos that I took, but after uploading the first to YouTube, I’ve decided that one is enough with the poor quality that they ended up being.

 

More to come tomorrow, we’re doing hill-climbs!

 

- Andy

Back On The Saddle….Again

So after 2 weeks ‘rest’ from my injury, I finally got back onto the bike today for a somewhat serious ride that I could bear.  Chris and I did an easy 12 mile loop along Front Street and City Island in Harrisburg.  The ride felt good, and I was able to do some hill-climbing that I wasn’t even able to do when I was preparing for the Livestrong event.  Chris and I have a 33 mile ride planned for tomorrow afternoon to really give the legs a bit of a stretch, and to say I’m looking forward to it is a bit of an understatement.

Zibings projects are moving along at a good clip now as well, with my arm no longer restricting the amount of time I can type.  It even looks like someone is interested in helping to resurrect the Super Tech Help forums, which would be nice to see.  So much to do, so little time.

I’ll make sure I get some photos from the ride tomorrow, maybe even a video.

 

 
I got warmed up a bit too early for Chris and had to wait.  Turns out my Rally America hoodie is great for keeping me warmed up!

 

- Andy

Arm-Update

After about a week, my arm is still giving me trouble, but the amount of trouble decreases on a daily basis.  I am still unable to fully extend my arm, and putting more than 10-20 pounds worth of weight in my hand is more than it can handle.  Even so, I’m happy with the way it has progressed and can tell that it is indeed healing happily on its own.  I had some trouble typing this week because of the way I have to twist my arm to use my keyboard, but that is finally going away and I can get caught up on the various projects that fell behind.  I’m not in any amount of extreme pain (as long as I’m careful with the arm), so I’ll just continue on letting it heal itself.

I have my bike back with a (pretty neat) new back wheel/tire.  They even put on a higher grade set of cogs on the wheel for me, so hopefully this helps my derailleur out through the gears.  I’m anxious to get back on the bike and riding again, but I’ll wait until my arm is much more healed to be sure I’m not going to cause myself any more damage.

More updates to come on Zibings projects this next week!

 

- Andy

A Disappointing End of the Day

Today I participated in the Philadelphia Livestrong Challenge.  I set off around 8:10am with the rest of the 45-mile group.  The ride started off quite well, this of course being the first time I’d gone on any manner of group ride in my life.  I ended up making friends with a fellow rider named Bob who took me “under his wing” as a past participant to make sure I didn’t kill myself.  It was certainly great having a friendly face amongst the hills to keep me upbeat.

Even so, my day didn’t end even remotely close to how I’d hoped.  A little before mile marker 10, on a quick left-right turn series, I was involved in a bit of a pileup.  As far as I can tell I was the only rider who was tossed off of their saddle, but it didn’t really matter much in the end.  I flipped over the front bars, did some strange aerobatics that involved jamming my left elbow and head (with helmet) onto the ground.  I popped up immediately and walked my bike to the side of the road as police and other riders stopped to ask if I was ok.

At this point, I could feel that I’d hit my left elbow quite hard, but it seemed as though I’d be able to recover.  I calmed my nerves, hopped onto the bike, and gave it a go with Bob for some more distance.  I made it to approximately mile 22 before I couldn’t stand to put weight on my arm anymore and stopped.  I was picked up by a SAG (Support and Gear) vehicle, and eventually made my way through medical stations and to the start line, but I didn’t get to finish.

My arm is quite sore right now, but I don’t seem to have done any major structural damage that won’t heal on it’s own.  To say I’m disappointed in my inability to finish would be an understatement, but it is simply how the cards fell today.  I met a lot of great people and am looking forward to next year’s challenge in Philadelphia.  You can be sure I’ll be back, and next year I won’t be so kind to the course…

 

- Andy

2009 Livestrong Challenge - Philadelphia

I've been talking about doing this for a week or so now (basically since I was informed of it's existence), and finally I paid the registration fee and committed to participating. I will be riding my bike 45-miles for the fight against cancer on August 23rd, 2009 around Philadelphia. I only need to raise $250 in order to be allowed to ride, but I figured I might as well set my sights high. You can visit my 'fundraising headquarters' at http://philly09.livestrong.org/andym84/. After about 9 years of being off my bike, I'm going to do a 45-mile ride after only riding for about 3.5 weeks consistently. Am I crazy? More than likely...

At least it's for a good cause.



Click Here to Donate


- Andy

100 Posts!

After getting back from a bike ride with my dad, I noticed that I’ve made 99 posts on my blog.  As I sit here and attempt to pretend that my legs don’t exist, I thought I’d just go over a few things that are happening in my life, with Zibings, family and anything else I can think to include.

Back In The Saddle
As I just mentioned, I’ve come back after a bike ride with my father.  All told I racked up about 18.4 extremely painful miles while Dad logged around 16.4.  The reason for the difference lies with how horribly out of shape I actually appear to be on a bike.  Within the first 2 miles of the trip, Dad lost me completely.  Oh well, it’s bound to happen when you haven’t really touched a bike in 9 years.

N2F Yverdon
After my busy day today I didn’t get to do this tonight, but tomorrow I am tentatively scheduling the debut of our RC (Release Candidate) for Yverdon v0.2.  We’re getting some new people to help with testing and are hoping to be out of RC with a new site before the end of next month.  Exciting for us!

The Zibings Network
We’ve been plugging away at a few milestones on the project as well as working on adding some new team members.  We have a designer coming on board, hopefully two new developers as well as some management switches.  All in all, we’re happy with the progress and will be even happier once we start having updates to show off to the world.

 

It’s been a pretty crazy month and it seems like months more crazy are coming up soon.  Thanks to everyone who’s been reading the blog, here’s to another 100 posts!

 

- Andy