September review and October Goals

The month of September was awesome.  While I didn't hit my mileage goal of 240 miles for the month having only ridden 160 miles, I'm OK with that. There were other, more important goals that were met.

My dad and I rode Viva Bike Vegas 2013 together which was awesome.  We also got in some other, quality rides after the big ride while they were visiting.  As he said, its too bad we don't live closer so that we can ride together more.

Besides a quick ride around Long Lake with my dad and my brother in 2011 when we were up at my brother's cabin, this was the first chance we had to ride together in over 30 years.  30+ years ago we had ridden in several Bike-A-Thons for the March of Dimes, the last a 100 miler.  Funny how we never "trained" for those rides, but just did them as a matter of course.  They were easy since we were riding everywhere back then.

So, while I didn't make my mileage goal for September, I've decided to set a new one for October,increasing the mileage for the month.  Leaving room for missed days and with hoping to get in longer rides leading up to the Bike MS back to back 30 milers, my goal is 300 miles for October.

Decided to start off strong and I was planning on putting in at least 12 miles this morning, but it seemed the fates had other plans for me and I decided to listen to them.  I woke up about 10 minutes before the alarm was set to go off and my stomach was having issues.  After attending to that I got dressed and headed downstairs.

I got ready, put air in the tires and turned on my Garmin.  I grabbed my helmet, turned on the lights and was waiting for my Garmin to Sync with the satellites.  I looked at it to check the progress and noticed it was off.  I thought maybe I hadn't turned it on so I tried again.  Nope it turned right off.  For some reason the battery was dead.  I always download and charge it every time I use it so this was a mystery to me.

I still had my Fitbit so I could time the ride, I just wouldn't have the file to upload to the various sites.  So I started the timer and set off.  The first couple of laps went well with nothing remarkable happening. On the third lap I noticed my front light getting dimmer and dimmer and within a half mile it was out.  Now with the crazy inattentive drivers and the early morning I knew it wasn't safe to ride without a light for visibility.  I headed in when I got back to the house, found the new package of batteries an changed them out.  I turned the light on and it was nice and bright.

The strangest thing happened then.  I turned my bike around and prepared to head out to put in some more miles and my light turned itself off.  No matter what I tried, it refused to turn back on.  SO I recognized the fact that someone or something didn't want me to ride this morning and put my bike away and came into the house, calling it a day.

So, to summarize, my October riding has started with a mere 3 miles today.

Hope you can get on your bikes and ride!