SWBKRUN Mentor Group-"Off Season?" What is that?!! (Page 62)

No work for me today.  We're getting new windows installed through the entire house (only 10 windows).  So the girls at are daycare/preschool, Becky is at work, and I'm lost in my own home trying to find something to do.  I cannot leave and don't want to be on the rollers.  We're having the warmest/sunniest/blue sky day of the year.  Expected 85 degree's low humidity and I'm stuck here.  So I went out for a while, enjoyed the sun while sitting in the sky swing. 

The new windows are looking good.  Replacement windows.  Guaranteed 36%+ savings in energy bills and the new tax credit. 

The crew says they should be done by 2 or 3 and they already have the all of the windows in place.  They just need to do inside and outside trim.  Then I get to replace all the blinds and furniture.  Hoping for time to ride after that.

I also found out today that I have an intern assigned to me for the next 240 hours.  I'll have a person who just finished paramedic school following me.  Hopefully I can teach this person something useful.

Yeah, actually I have a glass in my garage right now because I thought the label was cool.  Good stuff, or least it used to be when I drank beer regularly.

I did something similar one night.  My daughter had a soccer game at her high school, which is only about 1.5 miles from our house (3 miles if you take the long way around).  So I ran over before the game (took the long way), got there just about the time the game started, watched them win, then ran home the short way.  That way I was able to get my run in and go to her game.  You do what you have to to try and balance the 2 together (although I'm not sure I could have skipped the DQ - it's definitely a weakness of mine)!

OK, another swim question.  I've noticed that I tend to kick more as my swim workouts go on.  I start out nice and easy, but towards the end of my laps I feel like I'm really kicking alot.  I don't know if it's from feeling tired or because my form is changing (I don't feel like it is, but it's hard to tell without someone there to watch).  Are there any types of drills or other things I can do to help keep my kick even and relaxed?  Would kickboard drills help?  Or is it just a matter of swimming more?
Janet

I figured I'd just copy and paste the email I sent to a buddy of mine this morning as it tells the story pretty good. Someinfo about the area... The Bridgelands is a subdivision way out in the NW part of town.  In the 16 miles I rode, maybe 10 cars passed me.  The safest place to ride, right.   Needless to say I've thought about you guys a ton since it happened. 

I just loaded images into my album.

edit...very happy to see the good banter going on this morning.  sorry to post this but thought you would want to know.  my wise a$$ will be back shortly.

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I had a brick planned yesterday so I drove out the Bridgelands to get out of the traffic....LOL!  Parked at the playground by the pond and headed out to Katy Hockley and back.  A few hundred yards before the end of the ride (actually seeing it again today I was a much closer than I thought it was last night) I came through the first roundabout.  As I'm getting in the turn, a tahoe/suburban starts coming my way, the wrong way around the roundabout.  I'm thinking I'm either going to kiss his grill or bail and try for the grass.  Its funny, I remember thinking gold or green...I'm going green.  (Gold was the color of the car, grass being green).   I had no time to get the brakes because I was out on the bars.  Not sure how long this all took but I'm guessing less than 2 seconds.  The car ended up going the right way,  so of course now I'm questioning what I really saw.  I don't really know how the driver didn't see what happened but they didn't stop.  Probably a good thing because I wasn't happy. 

When I first looked at the bike, I saw what you can see in the images but it didn't make any sense...I didn't understand why the bike looked like that.  Thinking back, that's kind of funny!  I don't know how long I sat there for after this happened.  I knew I needed to just sit down and count 10 fingers and 10 toes.   After a few minutes I threw the bike over my shoulder and walked back to the car.  One thing I can't understand is how mangled the frame is but the front wheel is almost perfect and that's what hit the curb.

I think I landed on my head and right shoulder.  My left calf hurt a bit for the first hour after but its fine now which I'm very happy about (I can run tonight!!!).  My neck is sore, forehead is scratched. Right ear cut from the helmet strap.  Back has a little raspberry...can't call it road rash because I landed in grass.  That said, if I didn't land in grass, I'm not sure I'd be typing this right now.   My helmet has a substantial crack in the foam but the shell is in one piece...again I think because of the grass.   

I don't know how fast I was going because I haven't even put a computer on the bike yet.  I was almost an hour into the ride and  had covered ~16 miles so I'm assuming somewhere in that neighborhood.   Including the test ride, 40 miles on the bike.  Hey at least I got a race her once!

I went back out to the Bridgelands this morning...just wanted to try to "figure" out what else I could have done.  This is the part that really bothers me.  Not sure.  I parked the car and walked all around. I wanted to look at and see how I felt about going into it on the bars.  Frankly, I don't even know if being out of them would have made a difference as it happened so fast.  Now that I've wrecked would I get out of the bars here, probably.  If this didn't happen though, no.  You can't take a straight line through here but its just a real easy turn.  The bummer is it looks like a few feet to the right and I would have missed the curb completely and just rolled up the hill.  But then I might have chased that car so that's the positive there right. 

Well the bike shop opens at 10 so we'll see what they say.  The only important thing is I'm OK...but damn this sucks!

ALWAYS WEAR A HELMET

Edited by fattyfatfat 2009-05-20 10:36 AM

Just looked at those pictures - I'd be pissed!!  Seriously.

Call the police and give them the pictures and a good description of the vehicle, time of day... anything you can remember.  That's criminal.  In Michigan bicyclists have the right of way - Same Road, Same Rules and Same Rights.

HOLY SHIAT!!! Like you said, at least you can type this out. It could have been alot worse. But dude, that sucks. Maybe the LBS will be nice to you. How does insurance work down there? I think up here you can claim a bike on your homeowners insurance but only up to $500, unless you put a separate not einto your policy. Good luck man. I like the fact that your chin is up, saying that at least you can run tonight. And like Jeremy said, call the cops.

Edited by TrevorC 2009-05-20 10:50 AM

That sucks, John.  At least you came out alright.  And with a good attitude it sounds like.  Stay strong.  And give it a couple days, your emotions will fade, and then clear decisions can be made.

JOHN JOHN... Holy sadness!  Hope you are ok.... As for the bike.... It looks as though MANY of the components are still in good shape.  Maybe you can strip the bike down, and just buy a frame.  Not what you want to hear, I know... If you turn into insurance, be sure to borrow a pair of ZIPP 404's and show the insurance company that they "were part" of the bike !!!!

John,

Sounds like you made the right decision.  Bikes can always be replaced hard to replace a person...

Not sure if the car was coming the right way or not but when you only have split seconds to decide bailing to safety is always the better option.

BTW, how are you feeling now?



Edited by dalessit 2009-05-20 12:37 PM

John, be extra cautious about your head and neck.  Your comment of cracked foam on the inside of the helmet worries me.  I'm so glad you are alright.  Major bumber about the bike.  And on her maiden voyage too (or close enough).  Take care of yourself.

Thanks gang!  Just back from LBS   QROO won't do a crash replacement on last years model.   They will however get me an 09 for half the cost which is cool and I think the way I'm going to go.  My homeowners insurance deductible is more than the bike so that's out.

Tony I need 3 beers right now...3 of those Heineken mini-kegs should be just fine. 

Ok if you are in a good mood then I can use my joke.

Don't think this gets you out of your 12 mile ride for the virtual challenge...

Ha ha - that's funny right there, I don't care who you are!

I'm going to use my sons batman bike.  Thankfully it has training wheels. 

Well since I'm providing the entertainment today.... something to laugh at

LOL, those are great pic's

Is that beer in the cup?

Oh and good to see that I am not the only person that rides bow-legged.

Edited by dalessit 2009-05-20 2:01 PM

Oh John, I love your race pics....I would bet you could shave a few minutes off your times if you weren't 'posing' for your pics!! HA....resoanably good news on the bike front too I see. 50% off a new one helps for sure.

Edited by TrevorC 2009-05-20 3:01 PM

So I went for a run at lunch. I' m recognizing that I need to start adhering to a training program more and more. My workouts all seem to be the same, no variance. Runs have become "just lets see how far I can run today". So I did some intervals...30sec sprints, 1min recovery. Did 11 of them, then ran up a 10 story flight of stairs and down twice. It was really awesome!! I was actually getting 'quivering quads' or whatever you want to call it. Was good to feel a burn when I was trying to walk down the last couple flights of stairs. I never do that kind of stuff. I usually just run.

I guess my point is... What kind of running workouts do you guys do? I always hear 3/week....long, speed, and easy. What do you guys do for speedwork?

I'm a poor example because I don't plan my training really, or even detail my workouts.  I just do whatever I feel like.  I do have a plan on BT, but I only use it to track volume of training and take some suggestions from it.

For speed stuff what I do is make changes on almost every treadmill run and during some regular runs.  I do run intervals on the treadmill.  So one thing you could try to do for intervals (and this was just suggested to me this week) is to run a 1/4 mile at race pace, then spend 3 minutes recovering.  Repeat however many times you want to get to a set distance, Obviously warm up and cool down.

You said you were doing 1 minute recovery runs.  1 Minute really isn't long enough to allow your HR to come down, so when you do your next interval your body is really ready for it.  So you could potentially do more intervals or harder intervals by allowing a longer recovery time.

I like the idea of throwing in some stairs/climbs.  That would have helped me in my du last weekend as the runs were on rocky and washed out trails with sand in between.  Always be prepared, right?

Jeremy... I got in touch with a Houston PD friend.  He knows the story and is a fellow triathlete.  Basically, its complete BS for them not to at least stop but, no contact with the car and I hit a fixed object, so don't bother.  I figured there wasn't much they could do especially since I'm not that knocked up.  

Tony...I forgot to mention in the post that my shoulders didn't hurt and I was on the bars for most of the ride.  Another positive right!

Canadian...It seems I'm always on some sort of plan to follow whether its a 5k, 10k, HIM, etc.   I bet our little BQ'er might chime in here w/ some excellent words of running wisdom.

 

yup... B.E.E.R