Solstice Check In

This is a tough post to press 'send' on.

This year I had zero goals. I think if I had any they would have been totally shot to shit anyway.

I did finish endurorama at the mooch, which for me was a big deal. I'm so outta shape at this point finishing any ride is a big deal. Cramped up both quads and a calf halfway thru but finished.

I was going to post a new thread, but why not do it here since its a check in.

I'm battling a loss of passion for riding right now. I have always had a busy job, and just took a new one (started on Monday) but my hours at work will always seem to be insane. Between kids (my son is going thru some issues right now which has been tough on both the wife and myself), a demanding career, long commuting hours on top of that, and little time to sleep more than five or six hours a night as it is, I'm losing motivation to cut what little sleep I get short for my either 5am rides or my 9pm rides. I feel like I have been fighting the good fight for a while now, but I'm just beat and sometimes don't even want to look at my bike much less ride it. Haven't touched my bike since endurorama, and don't when the next time will be - maybe Sunday?

Sorry to be a downer, but needed to vent/share. I've lost riding passion before and came back to it, but I am just hitting a wall. Lost my masochist touch I guess. Or just hate being so outta shape. It's tough to ride like I know I can when my body can't do what i need it to do.
 
2012

Activities: 59 ( only three of them MTB rides )
Miles: 2043
Time: 153 hours
Elevation: 145,000 feet

I never look at stats other than current week so kinda interesting to see that info.

Only race was Iron Hills enduro MTB but will have LewMo and SixPack in the next month.

No official goal except to have fun and stay somewhat fit.

Having a blast on the Voodoo SS crossbike ( thanks Art! ) will need to classify SS differently on Garmin upload as it delivers a much better workout for me than gears do.

A few more enduros, road centuries, iron cross and of course cross season which I will start in August rather than late October...

All good!

-W
 
clarkenstein said:
I'm battling a loss of passion for riding right now.
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Sorry to hear this.
It sounds like you have a lot of things dragging you down, hopefully you can work through it and the tough times will pass. Stress destroys passion, loose the stress and find the passion. Easier said then done when you have kids. 😀
 
pixychick said:
Thanks so much for sharing!

Zaskar, totally great race at BS. Under 8 hours in the rain is fantastic in my mind. Many did not finnish. .... and way to go AM! 8 inches off, is very inspiring.
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thanks, still have sooo much more to get rid of....
 
clarkenstein said:
Sorry to be a downer, but needed to vent/share. I've lost riding passion before and came back to it, but I am just hitting a wall.
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You aren't the only one! This happened to me last year, REALLY bad. I don't think I rode for a month or two. Every time I'd force myself to ride I realized I wasn't having fun.

I'm always shocked that some people can ride almost every day and not hit this wall. I sure can't
 
There were a number of rides in-which my Garmin files became corrupt and wouldn't upload. Excluding those, for the year so far, I can report:

93 rides
180 hours
2816 miles


Thats not as much as i'd like. Ideally I'd be at 200+ hours by now. The unpredictable nature of some of my side-work has a tendency to dictate when I can and can't ride.

So far this year I got my feet wet in road racing. Haven't exactly dove ALL the way in but I got a taste and I'll probably pursue it even more next year. Having said that, Tour of Battenkill 2013 will likely end up a priority race for me.

Mountain biking has dropped off significantly this year. Quite frankly, I'm getting lazy and prefer not to drive an hour+ to a trailhead somewhere when I can roll out my front door to some really sweet roads. I am lucky in that no matter which direction I decide to ride - N,S,E or W, the roads are primo. I can only ride my local trails so many times until I get bored.

Priority races for the remainder of the year are: SSSP, DH40 and 6HCP - all endurance races. Anything else is just filler.

Cross season: While I plan on doing 5 or more CX races, cross is not my focus and will likely be just for fun.

Other than that I plan to keep riding, pushing my self, building fitness and having fun.
 
clarkenstein said:
Sorry to be a downer, but needed to vent/share. I've lost riding passion before and came back to it, but I am just hitting a wall.
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Sorry to hear that. I was feeling kind of the same over the winter and had to unload some stress in order to move forward.


The good news for me is that I've ridden only 3 rides less this year (so far) than I did all of last year, so that's a huge improvement for me. 🙂 I guess Garmin Connect is good for something! I am hoping to tackle that Century as well Brad...maybe this summer, congrats to you for that.
 
clarkenstein said:
Sorry to be a downer, but needed to vent/share. I've lost riding passion before and came back to it, but I am just hitting a wall. Lost my masochist touch I guess. Or just hate being so outta shape. It's tough to ride like I know I can when my body can't do what i need it to do.
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Sorry to hear of this. Life gets us too busy sometimes, and when I think of it, riding a bike is more of a luxury or gift to me. Maintaining fitness makes it easier for sure but may not be mandatory. Life is always changing and fitness is temporary for many of us. Even doing an errand once a month on a bike can improve the way I look at life.

Hope you find some passion, in whatever form that fits.
 
gt2brew said:
The good news for me is that I've ridden only 3 rides less this year (so far) than I did all of last year, so that's a huge improvement for me. 🙂 I guess Garmin Connect is good for something! I am hoping to tackle that Century as well Brad...maybe this summer, congrats to you for that.
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Yay!! .... Also, a big thanks for all you do behind the scenes. I do not think everyone is aware of all the time you put in for Jorba and Allaire. You deserve to ride lots and know that many others can do the same because of people like you. Go get em ! :getsome:
 
i start marking mileage on calendar everytime i went on a ride be it a race,commute or touring.start from january 2012 i loged over 3000miles both road and mtb until today.

i have no goal to set for, i just rode for fun and race for even funner

i'm lucky to have a job that make me can ride 5x/week.

so.roughly 5k mile to 6k mile every yrs for me is more than enough.

but..i want to be able to ride or race my bike until i'm no longer capable.
i want to be like some 75yrs old man/woman cyclist that can still kick young peoples ass.
(see if i can live long enough tho😉)

thanks to ellen and art also many others volunters for all of hard work and effort that you guys put into it.
 
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My goals are always the same: Ride more, ride new places, and keep having fun. So far I'm doing real well at #1 and #3. I hope to get up to RW one of these days to see the great work that's being done up there. Otherwise, between MDR and the Mooch parks I'm pretty satisfied with the trails I've been riding.

As far as saddle time, I've logged 36 rides, 860 miles, and ~76 hours moving. I'm not crushing it like some, but that's roughly my totals for each of the last 2 years so I guess I'm getting somewhere. My wife is in nursing school and she requires that I vacate the house on weekends so she can study, so that definitely helps me. As for bumping it up even more, I live 1 mile from work so I should be taking advantage of that more often for weekday rides.

I'll be racing the Six Pack so that's a first for me, and also a new place to ride. I'm looking at it as more of a group ride than a race. I'm not a fast rider but I keep a steady pace, so I hope to complete 5 laps. I'm also looking to log a few more big mile road rides (70+) before I ride century for the cure in September.

All in all I think we've been given some great weather this year. Hope everyone has been enjoying it to their fullest!
 
Pixy- Congrats on making the connector a reality.
Thanks for all the work you and Art do-
I hope you get how much we all appreciate it.


clarkenstein said:
I'm battling a loss of passion for riding right now.
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Dave- I'm sorry to hear this.
It's ironic since the Base contest got so many of us out riding.
I hope we didn't steal your mojo.
Good luck with the life things and finding the fun in riding.
You've been where you are and back, you'll find it again.


I'm having my most productive year on wheels so far.

The Base contest and mild winter really helped kick things off.
Because of that I was in great shape to really enjoy a lot of riding in AZ in February.
That was great right there.

Since then I've had some slower months, but I think I can still make 3,000 for the year.
I made the mistake of signing up for some running events this year, so getting ready for those has cut into ride time.

And I woke up faster about a month ago. Not sure how this happened,
but my times on all my usual rides are improving every time I'm out.
I like that.

The one thing about this year I'm not loving is how little trail time I'm logging.
Given the weather we are having, it's a crime.
 
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I've only had a Garmin since April, so my totals are from then:

35 rides
793 miles
60 hours
42,500 feet of elevation gain
 
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