Cycle Ti Thunder

Niterider Digital Headtrip I have been reading on my Google+ groups and talking to a lot of cyclist in my cycle club who have a fear or reluctance to ride after the sun goes down.  I am posting this on all of my cycle groups so that you all can get a good opinion on riding at night. All summer I ride most of my morning commute in darkness.  When daylight savings time ends I will start to ride most of my evening commute in darkness all winter. Riding in darkness has it's advantages and disadvantages.  I will discuss some of the best ways to optimize riding in the dark based on my experience.   Just this year alone as of this writing I have cycled 6,883 miles. Of that mileage I have bike commuted 4,768 miles. I estimate that almost half of the bike commuter miles was in darkness.  I have ridden my bike in the dark in California, Oregon, Texas and now Georgia.  Each time I have stopped riding for a year or two and I start up ag...

In September of 2012 I started bike commuting to work on a regular basis.  That was when the cotton was just about ready to be harvested here in SQ Georgia.  Well it is cotton harvest time again and I am glad that I have accomplished one of my goals and that was to bike commute for one year.  I had to invent a few games along the way to keep me inspired to keep cycling to work and taking pictures of the cotton fields on Eight Mile Road was one of the games.

This century ride was like no other in that I did not have the complete belief that I was prepared physically to ride 100 miles. My last 60 mile ride a few weeks ago saw me black out in my wife's presence one hour after the ride. I felt fine after the ride, but after sitting in the recliner for an hour after my shower I tried to stand up and got intense leg cramps. When I finally stood up I got dizzy and sat back down. My wife told me later that I had blacked out and my body was shaking. I have never experienced this after any sort of exercise activity. My my doctor's test and wife believes I have a deficiency in manganese. I believe that I can not ride with the 40 somethings at 20+ MPH for 30 miles and then ride another 30 miles st my normal 16 MPH pace. My wife has been feeding me mineral rich foods including bone marrow soup with green leafy stuff like kale.   She has also been stuffing a few vitamin supplements in my mouth every evening.   All in all I have renew...

I had an enjoyable ride with the Pecan City Pedalers this morning.  I did not want to ride fast, but the lure of riding with friends and the sound of 14 tires on a country road allowed me to keep up with the group for most of the ride.  It was a beautiful fall day in SW Georgia, the winds were slight and the sun was not too hot.  A good time was had by all. We were celebrating the fact that our team, the Pecan City Pedalers Wing nuts came in first place for the state of Georgia in the National Bike Challenge.  I came in 10th place for the state and 737th nationally.  I was injured for August and September so I did not get the miles in that I wanted.  Next year I will do better.