One Two Three Four, Now I'm Feeling Very Sore

Back in the day it was an upcoming race that kept me motivated to keep riding and stay in shape. These days I'm not really into racing. Are any muni riders in a four-hour radius even organizing muni events or joining mountain bike races? So I made my own goal for the year: to ride the Hojack regularly, through the Chiyoda and Bird Sanctuary trails, and try to top my own round-trip time, from home to the end and back.

Today was my first ride. It was a cool 45°F and I was joined by Kessa, patiently riding lazily on her mountain bike. I'm out of shape and this was the first real ride of the year.

Unfortunately it did not go well. I fell FOUR times while in high gear. Every fall was caused by me just losing control in high gear. There are enough bumps in the trail to cause me to wobble forward and back and have to correct my balance, and my corrections clearly aren't good enough sometimes. It feels like a feedback loop and a series of over corrections but just kind of happens in the blink of an eye.

The first fall was on the outbound leg on the Hojack.
Moving fast, I lost it, fell forward, pushed the handlebars down, a step or two, one tuck and roll to my back, and a short slide.
My left knee hurt and was dirty from an impact and my palms were chaffed and stung a bit. It hurt but I was ok to walk it off and keep going.

Fall two was also outbound.
Same, moving fast, I lost it, fell forward, pushed the handlebars down, a step or two, one tuck and roll to my back, and a short slide.
I think I hit the same parts. My left knee hurt more and was now bleeding and dirty and my palms we more chaffed and stung more. But this time I got some wind knocked out of me. I think I jammed my left elbow into my left side during my roll and my ribs hurt. I'm 99% sure my unicycle never hit me during a fall, but maybe.

Seeing that it wasn't going well, my knee was weeping blood, and I had already felt like I probably wasn't in great shape to get to the Hojack end and back, I decided heading back home would make sense.

Fall three then happened on the Bird Sanctuary trail.
Same, moving fast, I lost it, fell forward, pushed the handlebars down, a step or two, one tuck and roll to my back, and a short slide.

The fall added some dirt to my bloody knee, but more notably caused my left calf to cramp up. I think I stepped off awkwardly and pulled it wrong. I had to remain on the ground for a few moments for the cramp to subside before my leg was usable again.

Fall four happened soon after getting onto the Chiyoda trail.
Same-ish, just not moving too fast yet, I lost it, fell forward, pushed the handlebars down, a step or two, one tuck and roll to my back, and a short slide.
This time my right calf cramped up! And my right pinky must have gotten pushed funny because it hurt in a worrisome way.

But everything was still working, and Kessa and I continued home.

On the road portion, I didn't want to press my luck again, and there was a noticeable headwind to contend with, so I sadly kept it in low gear and hobbled home.

Once home, of course I cleaned up and checked myself out.
The left bloody knee was the focus.
Palms were raw and ached.
Pinky is sore but ok.
Left side is on the edge of scary sore. Laughing and breathing deep makes it hurt more. Bruised ribs?
Right knee is sore and scuffed by an impact.
Shoulder is scuffed through my clothes.
Ego a bit hurt.

So what happened?
I'm out of shape and fatigued to the point of failure?
I'm getting older and my balance is suffering?
I'm expecting too much from myself in high gear?
Tire pressure issues?

And now what?
End my personal year challenge on my first ride?
Get back on the horse once I'm healed and try again?
Train more first?
Do smaller wheel slow muni more instead?

The ride was 8.7 miles. I also rode 3.4 miles while Kessa jogged the neighborhood streets, last Sunday.

Speedy Ride With Kessa

Kessa is an exercise machine and often wants to go on a bike ride or workout, which we often do together. But today her quads were sore, and she wanted to go on a less intense ride, so she encouraged me to ride my Flansberrium geared uni.

end of ride photo tradition

So she biked and I unicycled from home through Chiyoda and the Bird Sanctuary trail to North Ponds and back. We also added The Meadows neighborhood trail before heading home. My shifting was nearly flawless, so I'm very happy with that. One thing that is great with having Kessa with me, is that she'll check any roads for cars before I am quite there to give me the go ahead. I still slow down and prepare to stop, but in many places there's no way to look both way until you're right at the road's edge, so stopping would normally be required.

We stopped both on the way and back at the pull-up bars off the path behind the rec center. Kessa's a beast and cranked out her personal best of 8. Bring it!

7.8 miles, average speed 7.6 mph

Muni Season

rest at the end of Whiting green

This has been a very hot summer, but the temperatures have finally dropped and it's feeling more and more like muni season.

My weekend obligations got in the way so I took a few hours off from work on Monday afternoon to ride muni at Webster Park and Whiting. Nothing too crazy to mention. Good weather, good exercise, good to get out and ride.

I rode my 24" KH muni, as it's my go-to ride for dry challenging trails.

7.14 miles

4th of July Ride

I rode at Webster Park and Whiting Road Nature Preserve today just like the good old days.

It was a good ride. Everything is mostly the same but I saw some changes.

One thing I noticed were the "Grand Tour" signs in Webster Park. I'm pretty sure they're new to me, though the signs looked weathered, so I assume they've been there for years now. It seemed to be just the main trail. The trail itself isn't new.

There were also a few places where erosion over time had changes the trail a bit. Usually there was just more of a gully in the trail.

On one trail I know to be rooty, it was still rooty, but just different than I remembered. I think between erosion and roots growing, it just changed.

The last section of it had an incredibly difficult surface I wouldn't even try to attempt. It was practically a ladder of roots.

In Whiting I rode the Green trail out to the end where there is a bench, and then back.

I rode 6 miles.

Going For Speed

For whatever reason I had the thought of riding the neighboring neighborhood trail loop and doing laps to see if I could improve my speed. I wear my phone on my Camelbak strap and use MapMyRide to report my times and split speed at each mile.

Since I started on the road to get there, I would only consider miles that started and ended on the trail.

And even then, the miles would span different sections of the trail, which does have some elevation changes, so some miles probably would be inherently faster. But who cares, this is just for fun. 

Here are the results:

Mile	26er	Geared 27.5	% Increase
2	7.74	9.14	+18.1%
3	7.90	9.12	+15.4%
4	7.95	9.12	+14.7%
5	8.30	9.86	+18.8%

I think I have potential to increase my speed on the geared uni, but it's harder to control and feel confident on.

16th Unicycle Anniversary

 Kessa joined the tradition!

Kessa Learns to Ride

For the past month I have continued to ride here and there, but not any solo muni rides. I've been riding while Kessa runs, and we've biked together as well.

But the more exciting news is that Kessa got the itch to learn to ride a unicycle! After several evenings of practicing, she is now able to ride around the neighborhood! I've ridden a number of times side by side with her. Usually that's just under a mile and half. Pretty good for a new rider!

She needs to learn to free mount though, so she likes having me or Amy with her, for a shoulder to lean on.

Sydney also took a ride around the block. She hadn't ridden in years, but I guess it's like riding a bike!