Yet Another Cycling Forum
General Category => The Knowledge => Further and Faster => Topic started by: nightrider on 27 July, 2017, 06:51:12 pm
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Just saying a tentative hello after a two year old break. I used to be keen cyclist who enjoyed club runs and Audax rides,until about two years ago I had a heart scare. Not a heart attack,although it did put the frighterners on me.
So I took up motorcycling again and had a accident when I rode into a dear,and broke lots of bones. I also bought an electric assist bike ,but didn't like it.
This year I have done some cycling 16-25 mile rides 2or 3 times a week. I've done about 1000miles this year. It's just a bit frustrating trying to get back,I've put on a couple of stone and I am a bit slower now especially uphill!
I was just wondering if any of you have had a simular experience. Any advice/encouragement will be much appreciated.
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I didn't break lots of bones, I broke one arm, but badly enough that it took a year to heal to the point I could use it on handlebars.
didn't ride the previous year due to not having balance.
So in a similar position to you - except that you are doing more miles than myself each week. I'm finding it hard to find the time to get out for a ride in the evening - I used to do my miles commuting, but I'm not fit enough to do that and don't have the time in the evening to fit in an hour's ride amidst all the other evening things.
Some weekends I manage to get out for a ride - even though I lack the fitness I used to have I can still manage a longer ride if I give up attempting to ride with any speed. So riding at 'touring' speeds on an unladen bike and enjoying the countryside.
To regain fitness, I'm trying jogging a couple of times a week. That had been something I'd thought I couldn't manage due to an arthritic joint but the joint seems to be cooperating so fingers crossed, I'll be able to jog at lunchtime.
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It's the friends that you make whilst cycling that I miss. Managing 13-14 mph average now. Walking pace up the hills though. I don't want to slow the others down and spoil their ride.
I think this is going to be a long slog.
If I succeed I've promised myself a new bike. A posh one.
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It's just a bit frustrating trying to get back,I've put on a couple of stone and I am a bit slower now especially uphill!
I was just wondering if any of you have had a simular experience. Any advice/encouragement will be much appreciated.
Came back to cycling much heavier and older than when I left.
My advice would be, it's better to ride hills and walk when you need to, than stay on the flat because you're scared of walking.
Keep on keeping on.
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Thanks,I'm thinking of changing back to SPD pedals for that very reason. I'm 56 years old butcher have seen loads of older cyclists out there enjoying themselves.
I started to actually dream about cycling. Today I am going to the start of a small club run just to say hello.
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I've yet to restart cycling after a couple of years break through lost mojo, but I will sometime, when I can get my head clear enough of work to concentrate on it ::-). Company isn't a problem for me as I never rode with anyone else anyway, but (and this may be somewhat heretical) if you do like company, and aren't particularly fit or fast, would a CTC slow ride be a possible way back in?
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Similar to me nightrider, although luckily without the heart scare! I have had other medical 'conditions' as they say, which has meant that I haven't been able to cycle too much until lately.
I'm nearly 56 with moobs & a tummy, but have managed to lose 2 stone over the last 6 months which I'm pleased about.
I actually look forward to going out now, whereas in the beginning (a year or so ago) I found it a massive struggle to get myself out on the bike. I'm still fat and slow...but I do enjoy it!
No real plans to join a club as I'm probably not as keen as they'd like me to be. I just have Strava to give me a goal to work towards.
Also an ex-motorcyclist of some 35 years. I hung up my leathers 3-4 years ago now...and funnily enough don't really miss it as I'm still on two wheels, albeit sans engine.
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Thanks,I'm thinking of changing back to SPD pedals for that very reason.
I reckon that is a good idea.
I did a short overnight camping trip this summer and ended up walking on a couple of hills. In the past I *never* walked hills so it was not something I felt great about. However I just decided to enjoy looking at the view and I did so. Being in MTB shoes meant it was comfortable-ish to push the bike on the steep roads. Would have been incredibly difficult if I'd been riding in road shoes with something like look cleats.
It's a bit disheartening when fit people come screaming past you (there are a lot in the lanes around Ilkley on a weekend) but I consoled myself that I had luggage and they didn't ;)
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It's the friends that you make whilst cycling that I miss. Managing 13-14 mph average now. Walking pace up the hills though. I don't want to slow the others down and spoil their ride.
Maybe see if you can find another group to ride with? There's plenty who don't average those sorts of speeds but still go clock up the miles.
I've ridden with a number of groups, sometimes the slowest, occasionally the fastest, usually somewhere in the middle - if I've learnt anything it's that unless specifically on a training ride no one minds waiting to regroup as much as the one they're waiting for thinks. You're more likely to be giving others a welcome break than spoiling anything.
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It's the friends that you make whilst cycling that I miss. Managing 13-14 mph average now.
That makes you faster than me (unless you're riding on the flat). Plenty of people to ride with if you avoid the serious cycling club type things.
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Welcome back!
I returned to cycling after a layoff of about 20 years, due to having more money, a car, 4 kids and no particular reason I could think of to ride a bike. Then I got rheumatoid arthritis and was told to get exercise. I tried swimming and found it intensely boring and then, in March 2006, I bought a bike. Then, in the September, I bought another. That's the one I'm still riding about and I've done 36000 miles on it.
I did lose a bit of weight in the early years back and I am still a bit lighter than I was 11 years ago, but I have never really managed a lot more than 11mph average. Mostly it's about 9 mph now and I do indeed find that there are not many people prepared to ride at my speed. I've got bags of stamina: completed the Dunwich Dynamo again this month, at a moving average of 8.97mph. I was on my own for about 90 of the 118 miles I did that night.
I know if I had a regular riding companion I would do a lot more miles - when Auntie Helen was still in Essex, she and I would meet most weeks and potter round a 50 to 60 mile route at about 10mph, with tea rooms and pubs for essential refreshments. I was doing about 6000 - 7000 miles a year then. The Dunwich Dynamo is the only >50 mile ride I've done this year.
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Thanks for the kind and helpful replies. I have promised myself a new shiny bike if I manage to get up to 100 miles a week.However I think that it might be a good idea to start a new thread about that.
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Managing three rides of twenty five miles a week now. Hoping to do a thirty two mile ride this weekend,which will be something of a breakthrough for me. My mates do club rides of about 40-50 miles and that's what I'm aiming at.
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Will hopefully see you on some Lincs rides next year, nightrider.
As I recall you used to drop me pretty regularly. Sure you'll find your legs again.
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I basically quit cycling after completing PBP2011. I was all cycled out after several years Audax taking up too much of my life.
I did some other stuff, got unfit, gained a lot of weight (quit YACF) and generally became a bicycle owner rather than a cyclist.
January 2013 was a turning point. I got the PBP twitch again and knew, if I didn't do something about it, it was pointless considering it. I joined a local "Social Cyling" group who got me out on Sunday mornings and Thursday evenings. That led to Audax again and Audax led to weight loss.
I turned up to PBP2015 as light as I'd been for over 20 years and the fittest I've ever been on a bike. I bailed on PBP on the return leg but I still cycled there and cycled back as well.
The 2 day ride home to Blighty ranks as my best time on a bicycle ever. I was light, I was fit and the sun was shining. It was so easy*
*But it took a lot of miles and 18 months to make it so easy. It was actually the social cycling that triggered my road back. It made it easy to get out when the weather was bad, because people were waiting for me.
Basically cycling had lost its fun and become a treadmill. Putting the fun back into it saved me.
The good news is that improvement comes thick and fast when you have a base cycling fitness. Weight is by far the biggest inhibitor.
It matters not how powerful and fit you are if you are trying to move an extra 30 pounds up steep hills (as I ended up doing)...it's gonna hurt.
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Thanks I've had lots of time to think about what's important to me. Half my friends are cyclists. 40 -50 miles with coffee and cake with my local cyclists is a great way to spend a few hours. My other club was Audax UK. Ride for a few hours with a stranger,talk each other through the bad patches and they are no longer a stranger. They are friends built up by mutual respect.
Still living in exile Rob?
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Still living in exile Rob?
Yeah, been 21 years now. There is a possibility of a return in a couple of years but I have to line a lot of things up for that to work.
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Just a wee heads up re walking. A few years ago on Orkney I went out for a ride (we were touring in the Motor Home) and had a hellish series of punctures resulting in having to walk back to the van some 3 miles. Felt fine doing it if bloody furious at being let down by my puncture kit. SPD shoes I should mention.
However the next morning... dear me I could barely walk and it was my calves that were giving me serious grief. It took a good 5 days before I was off the Neurofen and feeling reasonable and thankfully we didn't have to drive anywhere as I am none to sure I could have coped with the clutch.
I have just been to Sports Direct and had to buy *blush* xxl longs as I have bloated up to near 16 stones since retiring and am determined to get three of them off. It feels really crappy being like this.
PH
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Just a wee heads up re walking. A few years ago on Orkney I went out for a ride (we were touring in the Motor Home) and had a hellish series of punctures resulting in having to walk back to the van some 3 miles. Felt fine doing it if bloody furious at being let down by my puncture kit. SPD shoes I should mention.
However the next morning... dear me I could barely walk and it was my calves that were giving me serious grief. It took a good 5 days before I was off the Neurofen and feeling reasonable and thankfully we didn't have to drive anywhere as I am none to sure I could have coped with the clutch.
I have just been to Sports Direct and had to buy *blush* xxl longs as I have bloated up to near 16 stones since retiring and am determined to get three of them off. It feels really crappy being like this.
PH
I now look like Humpty, fricking,Dumpty in cycling kit now.