Riding Hard and Getting Nowhere

For the most part, when you get on a bike, you are going to be traveling somewhere.  Maybe you are a commuter who rides to and from work every day.  Maybe you like to cruise over to a friend's house to visit for a while.  Maybe you are into riding events where you ride to the finish line.  It could just be that you are riding for fitness and enjoyment so you ride until you are ready to stop enjoying the scenery around you.  In any case, when you ride, you are going....somewhere.

When I started riding several years ago, I was doing it for fitness and training for some long event rides.  I would go out and ride in the heat, wind, and even in the cold.  It was the cold that really got me though.  That first winter, I managed to ride fairly often as it was a mild winter.  Temperatures were around the mid 40's to 50's most of the time and I found that I could ride in that for several hours at a time.  Keep in mind that I really didn't have much in the way of cold weather riding gear.  I just sucked it up and rode at a freezing state for the most part.

By the time the next winter had rolled around, I had made the move to clipless pedals and felt that I would possibly benefit from having an indoor trainer for the purpose of safely doing pedal drills.  Simply put, this was where I would unclip one side and pedal in a high gear for a minute or two with only one foot and then switch sides.  I just wasn't completely sold on the idea of a stationary trainer for just this simple job.  My wife, on the other hand, figured that it was a pretty good idea all the way around and she surprised me with a Cycleops Fluid II trainer.  Ultimately this ended up working wonders for my pedaling form.  A strange thing also happened, I found that you could very effectively do intervals with a stationary trainer.  Of course, these could be done on the road as well, but pesky things like stop signs, red lights, hills, traffic, and road hazards tended to interrupt your interval set.  I guess Toni saw this benefit too, even though I wasn't quite ready to give up my outside riding.

So what exactly is interval training?  It is self inflicted hell.  It is punishment for all the bad things that you have done throughout your life.  It breaks you down and leaves you feeling like you don't have the energy left in your body to pass out.  And....you do it completely voluntarily.

Simply put, interval training is a training method that uses short, high intensity efforts, coupled with lower intensity "recovery" periods to build up different aspects of your riding performance.  Whether you are a sprinter, climber, racer, or just want to lose a few pounds, intervals will help.  Additionally, if you are already a good sprinter, but need to work on climbing, intervals will help you improve on your weaknesses.

For me, in that first year, I figured that I would do interval training to offset the lack of road time I was going to get due to weather concerns.  I started doing intervals in mid October on a rainy day when I had scheduled myself to ride.  I tried using the DVD that came with the trainer.  I was not ready for that and didn't really understand what I was going to be doing.  While I rode, I still count that experience as a fail.

Cycleops Fluid 2 Trainer hooked up to my Specialized Tarmac

As you can see from this picture, the trainer is attached to the rear axle by removing the regular skewer and replacing with a much more substantial piece.  This new skewer is then locked in the "clamps" which fixes the bike on a four point platform for stability.  The fluid drive unit (the magic of the whole thing) is then rotated up and locked into place against the rear tire.  There are others that are based on magnets or air resistance. These are typically more noisy and don't offer the same kind of resistance as a fluid trainer does.  The benefits of a fluid trainer mainly are in the area of resistance.  With the fluid that is in the drive unit, there is a progressive resistance as the internal impeller turns quicker and quicker in the fluid.  There is a lot of heat that builds up as the speeds increase, so there is a fan built into the opposite side that produces a breeze across the drive unit to keep it cool(ish).  As you can see, this is a fairly simple device, and easy to hook up to any bike.

After my attempt at the video training, I decided that I wasn't quite ready to go off of cues on a television and did some research on intervals that I could do without watching a video and getting sidetracked.  The research that I did provided me with a lot of really great information on different programs.   The first ones that I tried were called pyramid intervals.  For these, you would warm up and then do 3 minutes at a pace you could maintain for that amount of time.  Then you would recover for 3 minutes at an easy pace.  Then you would ramp up your efforts to a quicker pace for 2 minutes, followed by a recovery of 2 minutes.  The last interval was a maxed out effort (as fast as you could go) for a minute with a minute recovery.  You could repeat this process as many times as time would allow.  I would normally go three sets of those which would take me about an hour including warm up and cool down.  Obviously, these became very boring very quickly.  Yes, they were effective and pushed me to be able to get to sprint speeds which was not my strong suit.  I just wanted something different.

Since I didn't need the television, I moved into the office

I continued my research on intervals, but what I was finding was very few of them had explanations of what effort levels they were calling for.  For some reason, I have never been all that good at figuring out my perceived exertion levels, so a level 6 to me, turned out to be more like a level 8 when I was told to sprint to a level 10.  There wasn't that much difference in what I was doing.  Hey, I like things explained to me.  In one of my issues of Bicycling I had my answer for what would form my basic interval workout for the winter.  It was a program that was set up to be over four weeks and showed two different interval workouts each week.  The author suggested that this be mixed in with regular road riding, which I would have loved to do, but the winter of 2012 was not very forgiving.  It was constantly cold and wet with lots of snow and ice.  What that meant to me was I was pretty much stuck on the trainer for the whole season.  I had to do these intervals at a different pace than what was recommended because I had scheduled event rides as soon as mid April which I was going to need to be in top form for.  I altered the scheduling for the intervals and just started doing them sequentially when I had time to ride.  That could be anywhere from twice a week, to five days a week.  I tried to give myself rest days often to offset the rate that I was doing the sessions.

Here is a break down of what I was doing for most of the winter of 2012:

Workout 1--3x(10 minutes tempo + 5 min recovery spinning between intervals, or RBI)
Workout 2--3x(1 min fast pedal + 1 min RBI), 2x(15 min tempo + 5 min RBI)
Workout 3--3x(1 min fast pedal + 1 min RBI), 30 min tempo
Workout 4--3x(1 min power interval + 1 min RBI), 3x(8 min steady state + 4 min RBI)
Workout 5--3x(8 min steady state + 4 min RBI)
Workout 6--3x(10 min steady state + 5 min RBI)
Workout 7--3x(10 min steady state + 5 min RBI)

Now for some definitions of what you are seeing there:
Tempo--This is a slower pedaling state around 70-85 rpms
Fast Pedal--This is usually an easy gear, with a high cadence around 110 rpms
Power Interval--This is also a higher cadence, but at a harder gear.  Look for cadence in the area of 95-108 rpms
Steady State--This is your brisk pace, just below a time trial pace.  Cadence should be 85-95 rpms

This was what formed the basis of my winter training and I rotated through the different workouts for most of the season.  When I started my average speeds were in the mid 14's and by the time I was at a close to trainer sessions, they had moved into the high 16's.  This alone shows that they do help increase performance, but what does this mean to the real world of road cycling?

One of the first things that I noticed in the Spring was I was able to ride a 50 mile road ride without stopping.  This was a first for me.  I attributed that to the steady exertion that my body was used to after doing repeated hour sessions of non-stop pedaling.  My speeds were also up near 18mph for that distance of a ride, and my 25 mile rides were coming in at a solid 19-20mph average.  This was slightly better than how I had left the cycling season the year before, but the fact that I had increased any was miraculous considering that typically winter is a time for performance to drop considerably.

Something else that I noticed while I was on the trainer was that my heart rate was doing strange things.  When I started paying attention to it, I was regularly operating in the 106% plus range which I figured was not overly healthy.  According to my Garmin, my max heart rate (based on age) should have been 184bpm.  I was cruising at that number and honestly, I got a little scared at my cardio health.  It wasn't until I started to talk with Dale at the bike shop that I realized that there were ways to test your max heart rate for the individual which I did.  When I started that testing, I maxed out at 194bpm.  By the end of the winter, thanks to my training, I had actually stretched that to 196bpm.  Essentially, that was my heart rate when I started to get dizzy, lose vision, and wanted to puke.  I replicated that number several times with the same results which made it an accurate measure.

2000 ft of climbing in about 6 miles

I was able to build on that base performance throughout the spring and I got stronger than I had ever been on a bike.  So strong in fact that I was able to conquer a category 1 climb up Caesar's Head State Park in South Carolina in mid April.  I really don't think that there would have been any way for me to have done that without having done the trainer through the winter months.  My legs were strong, my heart was strong, and my endurance was through the roof!  I was at the top of my game when most were just getting used to riding again.  I was sold on the trainer, but I was so happy to be able to ride outside again that I packed the trainer up and didn't give it much thought again.

The next time I needed the trainer was when I was getting ready for my epic double century ride.  In the last week of training before the ride, I was avoiding hard efforts to save my legs for the upcoming distance.  However, I needed to spin them a little bit.  Knowing that I have a hard time riding easy on the road, I opted to set the trainer up for an hour session of easy spinning while watching a movie.  I could stay at an easy pace and just work the muscles a couple of days before the big ride.  It was effective because I wouldn't let myself try for speed.  It was just movement I was after.

After that, the trainer pretty much went in the closet with the intention of bringing it back out in the following winter.  My plans changed in early November though as I suffered a crash that ultimately prompted me to throw in the towel on cycling.  I sold everything, including my trainer and began my winter of very little exercise.  In fact, other than the occasional hike in the mountains, I was pretty much sedentary at home, and at work, I just sat in a car all day.  All that training and effort out of the window, and gone.  I was a couch potato, and my body was starting to feel it.

My cycling rebirth on my new mount.  Notice the "spare tire" I'm sporting beneath the jersey!

In late Summer, I decided to make a change in my life that would reintroduce cycling.  I bought a new bike (spent way too much on it to make me use it), and went out on my first road ride in ten months.  It about killed me, but I managed to crank out 50 miles. I was hurting from it, and could tell that I was out of shape.  I had been able to do that route at around 19mph less than a year ago, but had slowed to 15mph after being a spud for so long.  I had a lot of work to do to return to where I knew I should be.  Since it was the end of the season, I actually really wanted a trainer, but had been told that putting the Fact 11R frame on a trainer was not a great idea.  I started my search for a cheap road bike that I could put on the trainer to help build my fitness with intervals again.  Hey, I was sold on what they could do for me!

I had a very hard time sourcing such a bike, but I had a handle on where I could find a trainer.  You see, my friend that bought my trainer hated it so much that he only used it once, and was more than happy to sell it back to me.  In fact, I think he would have payed me to take it off his hands. Intervals just aren't for everyone.  I just needed a bike....

Ironically enough, on my 5th ride on my new bike, I ended up with an answer to my scavenger hunt for a cheap, less than road worthy bike with a functioning drive train that was 56cm so it would fit me.  The answer came in the form of a Dodge that turned left in front of me, causing me to crash into his passenger doors.  I was unhurt, but the bike shop deemed the bike to be unfit for the road since it was carbon fiber and there was a better than average chance that there was damage to the frame.  His insurance paid to replace the bike and after a little bit of inquiry, they opted to let me pick up the damaged bike that they were just going to dispose of.  Less than road worthy bike...check.  Functioning drive train....check, 56cm....check, bonus, has already been fit to me.  I had my bike!  Now it was time to get my trainer back.

I was even able to get the trainer tire back with the trainer.  It was all cleaned up and ready for a workout.

I used a very familiar place in the office to set up my pain cave

This looks familiar, but I'm a good bit heavier at 205lbs

Everything was in place to get back on track with my training.  The difference this time was I wasn't trying to maintain my fitness level, I was trying to find that fitness level again.  While I was happy with my road rides up to this point, they were a far cry from where I once was.  In fact, I had only been using the little ring on my crank because I knew my legs weren't ready for the big gears.  I had a lot of work to do, but at least I had all winter to do it.  My first hour session on the trainer went fair.  I was in the little ring still and was having to use a relatively low gear on the back for my easy spin, and a moderate gear for any intervals...all in the little ring though.  My speeds were in the low 14's which did not bode well for me.  If it's worth having, it's worth working for.  I committed to making this happen.  I decided that I would ride six days and then rest on the seventh.  That would be my routine, and I would go back to my tried and true intervals from two winters ago.

I saw success in both how I felt on the bike, and also my average speeds for each session.  I wasn't quite back to where I had been before, but I was getting pretty close.  I had also moved out of the little ring and started to work primarily in the big ring using lower gears on the cassette.  I was feeling more and more like myself.  When I started averaging in the 16's after about three weeks of solid work, I felt like my base performance was getting close to normal.  I also started to realize that rotating between just seven workouts was going to get very boring quickly.  I also knew that unless I was pushing my body, and changing things up, I would eventually plateau and cease seeing any benefits.  So, in order to head that problem off before it even got started, I decided it was time to change up my interval workouts.

I started to search the Internet for some new intervals.  Instead of concentrating on power, I looked for something that would help get rid of some of the pounds I had added to my mid section.  The reason for this was I was feeling so confident that I would be back to my old riding form that I had signed up for the 2015 Assault on the Carolinas which was scheduled to take place in mid April.  In a stroke of deja vu, I found myself in a similar situation as I was in in 2012 where the Trainer had come to my rescue.  This time, I was going to rely on it to help me get back to a decent riding weight from my current 200 lbs, down from a high of 205 lbs from early September.

The interval program I found was a five week long adaptation of a nine week program by James Herrera.  This program is designed to burn fat, but more importantly, it is one that is set up to increase in intensity as it progresses.  Its also designed to be done completely on a trainer as opposed to blended in with road rides as my other intervals were.  It also kept with my six on, one off schedule incorporating rest days where I was just spinning with no intervals.  In short, it was designed around the schedule I was wanting.  The description of the sessions were also spelled out very nicely and were based on heart rates as opposed to cadences that I was used to.  It was very clear on what to do, and the effort level I needed to use.  This was going to be a no brainer, I just needed to wait until Monday to get started with the program...beginning with a rest day off of the bike.

I had a few days to get things ready for my new session.  One problem that I could foresee was that many of the intervals were set up to 30 seconds, or 90 seconds long.  Up until now, I had been able to watch the timer and get my interval times done that way.  I was going to get confused when I started introducing complex math into my intervals.  I needed to figure something out to make this easier to follow so all of my attention could be applied to the actual workout.  Fortunately for me, I was already using the Garmin Edge 510 which has a "Workout" function built in.

I could explain how the "Workout" function works, but this video does an excellent job of it.  How it helps me is that I can input each workout step by step into my Garmin and it will tell me what my heart rate needs to be and give me a count down of how long I need to maintain it.  It takes all the guess work out of the workout which is great when some of the sessions are 20 steps long and lasting over 2 hours.  I know that the Garmin GPS cycle computers get a mixed bag of reviews, but every time I turn around I find something new to love about the devices.

For the first time, I was going to be training by heart rate, not perceived exertion.  To me, this made my workouts very scientific and tangible.  It was no longer based on how I felt, but rather how my body was reacting.  From my last few weeks on the trainer, I knew that surprisingly, my max heart rate was still at 196bpm which was incredible after 10 months off of a bike, and only a few weeks back on it.  I didn't ask questions, just went with it.  I also went with the Garmin breakdown of zones for the work loads (I didn't know any better at the time).  With that information added in, I set up my first week's worth of workouts.

When Tuesday rolled around, I started things up and set out on my first heart rate based workout.  I found that the zone 4 and zone 5 workouts were pretty good, but I felt like I was working less than I was used to.  This is to say, I really felt like I was sandbagging the workout and not going as hard as I had been with the other program.  I continued on with Wednesday feeling the same way.  Thursday and Friday were the simple and easy spins that were designed to recover from the previous days.  Saturday was an hour and a half session as was Sunday.  Those days provided me with a little more effort and I felt like I liked the intervals more than I had originally thought.  My final test of whether or not I liked this program came on Sunday when I weighed in.  The previous week, I had been a solid 198 which was down 7 lbs from my high weight of 205 at the beginning of September.  This week, I was down to 195 lbs which was an additional 3 lbs.  Yeah, I was liking this program!

The next week added onto the intensity and the total time for the week was up from 6:30 to 7:00 total.  The workouts were a bit harder, but I still felt like I was getting off easy going by the heart rate.  At the end of that week, I was down to 194 lbs so I had no room to argue.  I was getting results, and they were happening quickly.  The third week, was a recovery week with only two interval workouts scheduled and the rest just simple spins.  Total ride time for the week was only 5:45.  At the end of that week, I expected to to see no change in my weight, but I found that I was down to 192 lbs. I was starting to feel like I had found a magical potion and started to really feel good about myself.

I took the recovery week to do some evaluations of my fitness.  I was checking my resting heart rate which had been 72bpm since I started back cycling.  I was happy to learn that my resting heart rate had dropped down to 60bpm which was where it had been at my peak of cycling before.  Based on several ventures into zone 5, I was maxing out at 196bpm still which was great!  I started to input the new resting rate into the Garmin files and saw the percentages of the zones off to the side.  They did not quite match up to what James Herrera had, so I figured out how to change the percentages.  What ended up happening was each zone climbed up about 10bpm which shifted me into a significantly different zone map.

OK, so what does that mean.  Well, for starters, zone 3 used to be 152-166bpm, and it was now 161-174bpm.  I had tried to keep my heart rate around 165 previously, so I had always been in this zone, but now, instead of being on the top end, I was at the bottom end now.  I was going to have to push harder to get on the upper end of the zone now.  Additionally, I had recently decided that my gearing was too low because my cadence had been steadily climbing.  I was now working on a gear up across the board from where I had been which also increased the level of difficulty.  My first run at the new zone map, with the new gearing was going to be an interesting affair.

When that day arrived, I could tell I was working much harder than I had been.  In fact, I was working harder than I had been with the other interval sets.  This felt more like what I was expecting.  I was getting the pain that I had come to expect from the trainer.  It was an awesome pain that could only mean I was getting stronger and faster.  The numbers supported this as well.  On a similar session, I had averaged 15.5mph while with the new heart rate map and different gearing, I was at 16.6mph.  On the second day, that number rose to 17.2mph which was faster than any trainer interval session I had done in the past.  If my estimations from my last experience on the trainer hold true, I can expect average speeds in the area of 19-19.5mph over a 50 mile route.  Of course, my current weight might slow that down a bit, but I'm getting close to my goal of 180lbs which was where I was when I stopped riding.

I know that most cyclists hate an indoor trainer with a purple passion, and rightfully so.  I would much rather get outside and ride, but I know that when results are what I'm after, that outside ride will actually fall short of what I'm looking for.  The ultimate results are not known yet, but they will be proven in the spring when I hit the road on my brand new S-Works Tarmac and finish training for the Assault on the Carolinas.  I know that as of right now, there are some undeniable results.  Lets take a look....

Weight
Sept 18, 2014--205lbs
Oct 26, 2014--192lbs
Nov 2, 2014--190lbs

Average speed for an hour interval session
March 6, 2013--17.1 One of my last trainer sessions, and one of my fastest
Sept 19, 2014--14.3 One of the first new attempts
Oct 29, 2014--17.2 Strongest to date with the new heart rate zone

Something else I have noticed in the last couple of sessions in dealing with my heart rate.  It seems that my max has taken a slight jump to 197bpm.  The difference between 196 and 197 might not seem like much.  However, considering when I first maxed out at 196, I was 39 years old and according to the American Heart Association, I should have been maxing out at 184bpm.  Now at 40 years old, they report that I should be maxing out at 180, but here I am actually increasing to 197!!  I'm not the most physically fit in the well rounded sense, so I have to attribute that number to cycling, and every time I record an increase, its after working on the trainer regularly.  I'm telling you, when used correctly, a stationary trainer is a great tool to increase your fitness level, and make your outdoor cycling more fun, and a lot faster.

If I play my cards just right, I'll be back in shape to tackle the biggest ride I've ever done once again....Double Down 2 the Beach.  With only seven weeks back in the saddle as of this writing, I'm feeling pretty confident that I will be able to hold my bike up once again while standing in the Atlantic Ocean.

June 2013, after 212.21 miles at an average of 18.1 mph in one day!!!!

My Ride, My Therapy

This is more a stream of thought than anything else.

I am a police officer, I work in patrol.  Simply put, that means that I respond to 911 calls.  This can range from calls involving a barking dog, to a shoplifting, to a murder, or something where I might have to take a life.  I have seen death in many forms, I have seen humanity at its lowest.  As of this writing, I have been a cop for 15 years.  Time has taken its toll on me in this job.  I have become stressed, hardened, and callus to much of the world.  All the little things have added up over the years.  By "little things" I mean seeing brains splattered across walls, having brains dripping on my shoes while performing first aid, seeing a baby in a bath tub drowned, and seeing the Mother stabbed in her bed while she slept.  These are the little things over the course of a career that even though you expect to see them, tend to occupy a permanent place in your psyche.

I thought about these events and scenes occasionally as the years passed by, but things changed in the Fall of 2009, when I went on a call that resulted in a fellow officer committing suicide right in front of me.  The vision of him pulling the trigger on his pistol which was pressed to his temple is a sight I will never be able to forget.  It was a couple of years after this that I really found out that I suffer from PTSD to some extent.  It was the culmination of all of those years and that one single event that changed my mental makeup for quite possibly the rest of my life.

Jumping back several years, to 2005, I had started taking landscape pictures with the hopes of creating order in the chaotic world I lived in.  For years this worked for me.  I had my much needed escape, and ability to concentrate on the beauty of the world around me.  I found a lot of joy in photography and became reasonably good at it.  I was in my prime in 2009 and was creating magic with a camera.  I had found my creative outlet and one that would provide some mental solace to my fatiguing brain.  That November, however, I faced that one fateful call that still to this day affects every aspect of my life.  I was temporarily reassigned pending a standard internal investigation.  I looked to my photography to occupy my mind and bring peace back to my world.

Oddly enough though, photography wasn't helping me.  In fact, as the time went on, I started to feel let down by my photography.  I wasn't satisfied with it any more.  I usually came home grumpier than when I went out which was the direct opposite of what I was used to.  I attributed it to having found the love of my life and the feelings of guilt I had from being away from her.  It made sense, and I found that I was having more fun opting to forgo a photo outing to stay home with Toni. Eventually, by the Spring of 2011, I had decided that photography wasn't providing that outlet it once had.  I was sad and depressed much more than I though I should be.  It was time to hang it up.

I sold everything photography related, in order to bankroll what was becoming a new hobby for me....cycling.  I didn't look back once I started riding my Specialized Tarmac.  I became happy again, and I became focused with life in general.  My depression was pretty much over it seemed, and I poured my efforts into training and riding.  It wasn't until the end of 2013, that I started to feel burned out from riding.  I suffered a crash, and the thought of cycling taking me away from Toni was just too much for me to handle.  The decision was made to go back to photography.  Hey, I was in a happy place, and photography was much safer than cycling.  How could I go wrong?

Take Flight

Well, in a very short amount of time something very odd happened.  I was getting ready to go to work one morning and I remember very vividly a paralyzing fear that came over me.  There was no reason for it, but I was scared to death to get dressed and go into work.  I started to tremble and sweat.  I couldn't move.  That made me even more afraid.  What was going on?  I wasn't sure, but it subsided after about 10 minutes.  I forced myself to get dressed and go into work.  Everything was fine once I got there, but I kept wondering why I had felt the way I felt.

Occasionally, from that point on, I would find myself getting very nervous about calls I would go on.  So nervous in fact that I would start to tremble while talking to people.  This was not normal, not normal at all.  In all my years of being a police officer, I had never felt like this at work, and there were plenty of times that I should have.  I turned to my photography once again to try and calm myself.  I went out more than I had been and did full day Treks, along with some special subjects close by the house.  I was creating decent pictures, but I wasn't happy with them, and just like before, I was coming home feeling defeated, and worthless.

Not long after this, I was in a training class where PTSD was discussed.  I fell in every one of those categories.  I didn't feel that my PTSD was overly serious, but I could see that it could potentially cause me problems down the road.  I was pretty sure that I was affected not only by the culmination of stressful events over a long period of time, but also the acute event of watching somebody I knew put a bullet in their head.

With a few other things going on involving negative changes to my body (I was getting fat and out of shape), Toni and I decided I should probably get back on a bike for my health and well being.  I immediately sensed a increase in my happiness at just the prospect.  When I actually got the bike, I was elated.  When I went on my first ride, I felt young again, like a kid with no problems.  I started to think that cycling was just a happier hobby for me than photography.  I was fine with that, and wanted to make it my lifestyle again.

After my crash on my fifth ride, I should have felt different about riding, and should have wanted to go back to photography as my outlet.  Strangely enough, I didn't, I wanted get back on my wheels again as soon as possible, and I left the camera in the closet while I focused on my fitness, and trying to get a replacement bike as quickly as possible.

In this time, I had plenty of time to think and evaluate the different emotions I had experienced of the last few months.  I came to realize that even though I had suffered a pretty bad crash, I was still happier having been back on the bike.  While I was waiting for the bike in the first place, I had spent nearly a month preparing for getting back into riding.  My stress levels were back down again at home and at work. I felt happier, and more confident. Cycling, as a lifestyle obviously had some pretty significant benefits to my world beyond just the physical health aspect.

I started to examine things even further.  I wanted to know why photography wasn't doing it for me any more, and why cycling was so effective.  What I have come up with so far is that they deal with two different qualities of life.  Photography opens me up to emotion and feelings, while cycling is all about moving forward, staying focused, and constantly improving yourself.  Fundamentally speaking, while behind the camera, I look for images that make me feel a certain way.  In practice, I take whatever emotion I am feeling at the time, and find pictures to help express that emotion.  Much like alcohol does to a drinker, my photography enhances whatever I am feeling at the time.  My slight depression became much stronger.  Also, I get in the habit of leaving my emotions unguarded even when the camera is put up.  I allow myself to feel deeper when I am in the practice of being a photographer.  I look for emotion everywhere I turn.  Because of where I was mentally, I would subconsciously seek out emotions that were on the sad end of the spectrum rather than happy.  I sought out the emotions I could identify with.  I am pretty sure that this is the reason that I started becoming so apprehensive about being at work.  The more I tried to offset it with photography, the worse it became, and the worse I felt about my photography.  I was stuck in a cycle of thoughts that were tearing me apart from the inside out.

On the other hand, when I am a cyclist, and riding, I am looking toward the positive as a general rule.  I am focused on self betterment through better fitness, faster and long rides, and I learn to put my safety as a paramount concern.  In short, when you are riding on the road, there is only one major thought that goes through your head without any prompting..."I want to LIVE!!!!"  Riding a bike has nothing to do with where you have been, its all about where you are going, what is ahead, and how do I get there.  This is why it is so difficult to be sad after a bike ride.  You are always so full of hope for the next mile, the next ride, or just the next hill.  You train yourself to look forward, not behind.

It is this mental retraining that cycling provided in both 2011 and now that holds the key to my happiness.  It is really twofold in a way.  I feel happier about myself because I am in control of my weight and fitness, so I feel better just to look at myself.  I also become a more positive person because I am thinking about the next ride, instead of pouring over pictures from hours before, or even days before.  Photography is all about memories....in my case, memories that I would just rather leave in the past.

Many of my memories are painful, which brings me to another metaphor for cycling.  Doing distance rides (60 miles and more), a cyclist will deal with a lot of pain from various muscles, and points of contact with the bike (we don't sit on easy chairs while riding).  Its a known quantity, and something that each of us has learned to deal with.  Pain is how you know you are pushing yourself and getting better.  With cycling, you learn to relate pain to improvement, so pain is a good thing.  My memories cause me pain, but when I look at that pain from a cyclist's perspective, I can see it as positive growth.  In a way, what doesn't kill you, makes you stronger.

Being a cyclist, makes me stronger.  I'm not just talking about physically.  It makes me stronger mentally. It keeps me sharp, and on my toes.  I hone my ability to make snap decisions which makes me more confident at work.  Life is just better on two wheels.

I admit, this was an atypical entry here, but it was something that has been weighing on me for a little while and I felt that I should put it down on paper so to speak.  There are many reasons why cyclists ride, and honestly, there are more reasons why I ride than what I have stated here.  However, I think that this really sums up why cycling fits as a lifestyle choice for me.  It's my time with me, and my time to meditate.  It fits in my introverted world, and I think ultimately makes me a better person.