Sunny, -6°C with a "real feel" of -12°C

Cold and windy... YUCK... Houston we have winter. But there is no snow, and the sun is always nice coming through the window. Winter on the bike is best dealt with in the Pain Chamber. Unless your Chris and Heather Shearer, they were out on cross bikes riding and Peter "there's no bad weather, just bad clothing" Schouten, though he's seemed to have this excuse that he has home renovations and can't get out, Hmm...

Me I'm from Texas and the fact that I rode up the Gateneau in 6°C is pretty darn amazing in of it's self. Plus before you think I'm a wimp my sun room is not heated... it's always a few degrees above the temperature outside, then after I've been in it riding for an hour I can raise it several more degrees.

The secret to winter training is:

1.) have a plan

2.) have video

3.) have music

At this time in the season I am not onto the off-season yet, so I just want to ride and burn a bit of fat before I put on fat a the Christmas parties coming up. This gives me choices I could ride an epic ride of Texas one has good music one does not, I could do one of the spring classics from this year which I saw in real life and have downloaded the videos and I plan to play along with Cadence Revolution music mixes, OR I could do a Sufferfest... Which even though I plan on taking easy I always seem to get into the video.

Not being too bright I decided to a Sufferfest video "easy" I picked the Hunted, and set up the computer and began my training on rollers. Now with rollers you have about one foot of "road" that you have to stay on and you have to say balanced, I've been doing rollers for so many years this is mostly second nature. BUT the Sufferfest has sprints, and I was into the video and forgot I was on rollers and began sprinting out of the saddle which was not too hard but when I began to go anaerobic I ran off the rollers and "lost" the sprint, UGH! next there was a climb and on the attack I got out of the saddle and began climbing, hitting it hard and after a few minutes I began bouncing on the rollers and rode off the front of the rollers...

The point with Sufferfest and rollers, I think, is not to get too involved and remember your in a small room on a device that you can come off of. I also have a trainer which I use latter in the off-season when I begin hitting it hard. Till then I'm going to have to play it safe and be a little less involved in the race. NOT that I am competitive at all.

Three weeks off the bike

It seems that absence does make the heart fonder... Or does it just make the gut bigger?

I went back to Ottawa for two more weeks getting the IKEA ready for their opening yesterday December 7, 2011. I did not take my bike as I was traveling via VIA train, which I'm quite disappointed with. First in this modern era, VIA does not have an app, nor does their website have a mobile format, and finally with a packed train of 20-30 year old's their WiFi did not have enough bandwidth for me to use it.

With my weekend's free from cycling I had to do something so the first weekend I went to Hull, Quebec and visited the Canadian Museum of Civilization, the second weekend was spent working at IKEA, the crunch was on, all our materials showed up late and I've NEVER missed a deadline (nor has Robert). We did not have to use an infamous IKEA tool but I've spent five of the last seven weeks in the Ikea 2 meter ceiling grid.

Robert Brehn and I arrived home Monday morning about 1:00 a.m. so I just made Monday an off day. Tuesday I visited customers and have set up the next few weeks worth of work and did some books, but still tired...

SO then it's already Wednesday! I did finish early and I switched the road bike over to be a winter trainer, set up my rollers in the sun-room and put on The Sufferfest HHNF, and got in my riding... which I'll need because my gut's sticking out from my pants and I've not been to any Christmas parties yet! After the ride I took a shower then harnessed up the three dogs and took them out for a long walk, which I don't think they've been on one for a while... Whew! Then off to bed.