Trainer Ride

I do believe I'm recovering well from the 8 miles. Sunday was nothing and Monday night was a trainer ride.

My legs still feel kind of fatigued. With two broomball games and OH MY GOODNESS A SPINNING LEARNING CLASS on Wednesday (more about that later), I tried to take it easy. So mostly, I just rode along while music played. It was kinda boring.

More stretching. And about to go for a run in 43º temperature!!

A Trainer Ride

Finally finally FINALLY I got on my bike trainer again for real. I listened to some tunes and had a pretty great time. I don't really listen to music much, so maybe if I keep it that way, I'll be starved for music and get on the trainer more ;)

I've been doing some runs. Again, nothing too exciting or consistent. But this week I ran 3 on Tuesday, and then did a 35 minute bike ride on Wednesday. All I have to do today is run.

Saturday I'm going to meet Krista for a little run! We haven't ran together since days of working together at her former job. I'm soooooooo looking forward to running with someone. I hope I don't slow her down too much. She just wants some motivation, so hopefully that will be ok. (But I know her...)

I did a bunch of counter pushups yesterday. I was pretty sore from it this morning.

I'm trying to cut out sugar from my diet. It's interesting.

I just had two job proposal things happen today. One was a scope of work proposal and the other was meeting with people, reviewing the potential work. I'm not sure if I have either for certain, but I'm hoping I have both!

Oh I got a Fitbit! It's pretty fun. Really eye opening to see how little I move during the day. That is the one down side of working from home I guess. I don't have to walk across campus to go to meetings like I used to. However, the up side is I can step outside whenever I want and go for a walk.

HMTD5: Slow Biking

I rode for 42 minutes this morning while watching another episode of 30 Days. I can't ride to music until the new receiver comes. The current receiver, from the 70s, seems to be pushing a lot of bad noise through any speakers we have hooked up. Even when everything is just on and nothing is playing, crackles and static comes through randomly. Last week I thought for sure the speakers I was using were blown...the tell-tale blaatt! came out during a song that had bass. But upon further testing (hooking those speakers up to the good receiver in the living room), Greg thinks the old receiver is the culprit. SO that's good: speakers are fine. While all this was developing, Greg also found a new receiver he wants. He's been wanting a new one for quite some time. It's ordered. Convenient timing. Soon I will be able to listen to music again, as we'll replace the old 70s receiver with the living room receiver. I think I've said receiver way too many times.

So anyway, 42 minutes of Morgan Spurlock in a coal mine. It was interesting. I kept the biking easy. My heart rate was up but I wasn't breathing hard. My legs hurt. Not sure if it was the last of the broomball soreness escaping or what. And climbing the steps to my studio this morning hurt too.

I really need to look at my bike. I am pretty certain my chain is too dry. Last night I was hoping to go to a free bike clinic that Cycle Sport is putting on. Tuesdays at 6 they have a different subject they cover for different levels. Last night was general bike maintenance. It got canceled because of the weather, unfortunately, but supposedly will be rescheduled. Next week is how to fix a flat, which I can also very much benefit from since I suck/fail at that. Then the following week is chain maintenance - how to recognize chain wear, how to clean and lube, what products to use, how to use a chain tool, etc. Sounds awesome, but I think I'll lube up my chain prior, the way I've been doing it. I don't think it can go 2 more weeks.

HMTD2: Trainer

Last night I spent a lot of time picking out songs to make a playlist on YouTube so I could have good music and videos to watch while I rode on the trainer. MTV music just isn't cutting it. I got the playlist to 23 songs, which is longer than I'm riding right now. I will probably go back in and edit the playlist into a second one later. And I also think that I should make a Foo Fighters playlist...I'm kind of seeing that their stuff works really well for spinning–at least for me it does.

Here is what I rode to:

Brandi Carlisle: The Story  -  3:58
A favorite warm-up for me

Muse: Uprising  -  4:32
Easing into things...

Airborn Toxic Event: Sometime Around Midnight  -  5:03
This is an awesome building song. I started out spinning easy at a normal cadence, then just upped either the speed a little or the resistance during the entire song. It was pretty fun.

Queens of the Stone Age: No One Knows  -  4:18
I've never seen this video. QOTS wasn't how I had them pictured, especially the lead singer. I have to admit I love love love watching Dave Grohl drum. I just rode steady during this song, gawking at the screen.

Black Eyed Peas: I've Got A Feeling  -  4:52
I thought this song might be a little cooler to spin to than it was. It was ok. I picked up the pace during it.

MIA - Paper Planes  -  3:25
I most likely had a puzzled look on my face during this song, as I just couldn't stop looking at MIA with her blue eyeshadow and really weird 80s outfits. She still makes me think about the performance she did on some music awards show while she was pregnant... days before her due date. It was so funny seeing someone rap with a belly.

Killswitch Engage: My Curse  -  4:04
Nothing notable during this song...thing I must have just ridden with the pace upped a bit.

Foo Fighters: DOA  -  4:29
This is my benchmark song for how in/out of shape I am :)  During the chorus I stand up and run to the beat with heavy resistance. The first time I did this, I pooped out in the second one. I'm happy to say I made it through all of them this time, though I was taking it pretty easy in the middle. Ah to think about being strong again... sheesh.

System of A Down: Chop Suey  -  3:27
Love the song, but there was something really interesting about spinning to it. I think it was because the chorus is slow and melodic while the other parts of the song are the crazy fast aggressive parts. So it was almost opposite of how most songs work. Ride during the build up and then, bam, do something hard or fast when the chorus hits. Interesting.

Queens of the Stone Age: Go With the Flow  -  3:11
Just rode steady to this as a cool down of sorts since I was approaching 9:00 and had to get ready for a 10:00 meeting at Lux.

Overall it was very fun! Adding up the times it was about 41 minutes. I think I'm going to have to move songs around and play a bit before I get a really tight session in. That is a lot of work trying to pick songs: deciding if they'd work, thinking about what the song would drive you to do, trying to make a good mix of everything you want to do... more difficult than I thought it would be. I think I need more songs too. I've gone online to spin instructor sites to see if I could find any easy "set lists" out there. I haven't been able to find anything that isn't all about unknown upbeat music or mixups. License blah blah. I have 13 more I picked out that I'll try next time and see how those rate.

I hope I'm sore from this. I should be if I did it right. I was certainly breathing hard for most of it.