picture blatantly stolen from: https://yogawithmaheshwari.files.wordpress.com/2015/02/chaturanga-how-to-perfect.jpg
I rode my road bike to work today while I wait for new tires on my commuter to arrive. I tried patching up my tube on the commuter one last time over the weekend, and it too went flat. HOLY MOLY! I got to work 13 minutes faster and burned 80 calories fewer than I typically do on the commuter! The perceived exertion was about half. The Dexter hill? That hill I challenge myself to ride without dropping below 10mph? The hill I can meet said challenge if I redline my heart rate at 175 bpm? Yeah, I blew up that hill at 12mph with my heart rate never going over 165. I was able to pedal at car speeds in downtown traffic while barely winded. It’s remarkable the difference a bike can make. I also walked up the 4 flights of stairs from the parking garage like a healthy person. I usually take each step slowly and deliberately, pulling myself up along the side rail to keep the sharp stabbing collapsing pain my knees at bay. What is most responsible for this difference, I wonder? Is it the overall lighter weight of the bike combined with missing the 20+ lb. load on the panniers? Is it my flashy tires with considerably less rolling resistance? Is it the mid-range components compared to the entry-level components on my commuter? While more people still passed me than I passed, I can tell myself they must all have better bikes than me. Sure, it has nothing to do with individual performance. Nope. I bet all those people flying past me have hidden electric motors, too. Right, right?
I also did a real chaturunga in yoga this morning. In 20 years of practice, my knees always hit the ground first. Today, perhaps because I felt so pumped on the bike, I lowered to the ground in the ideal way; chest and legs touching simultaneously.
Confusingly, I checked in at my health club with more gains in lean muscle mass than I had in all 6 months of working myself out to death; blood, sweat and tears. I say confusingly because the spent most of the past month sick with a cold. I hardly exercised at all and lifted weights even less. Obviously, I can’t continue to gain muscle while lying in bed, so I’ve decided this whole body composition methodology is bogus. I will move forward gauging success only by performance. Body compositions seems like an easier fitness indicator. When it comes to fitness, there are so many factors; endurance, stamina, power, speed, etc. that I am not sure what I want to measure or how. For instance, the speed at which I finish a 100-mile bike ride is an indicator of endurance. However, stronger muscles will enable me to climb more efficiently which would improve my finish time. And it is a different muscle that allows you to power up a short, steep hill than it is that allows you climb up a long, constant hill. Who knows. As long as the process is fun, right?
Fremont Bridge Bike Count: 311