Messages from the Pale Blue Dot

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33 Days Until Start of the Adventure Cycling Southern Tier

Four short weeks and a few days until we’ll dip our pedals in the Pacific Ocean in San Diego and begin riding east over fifty-nine days to St. Augustine, Florida. There will be fifteen of us (thirteen plus two tour leaders) and one van with trailer, riding and camping our way across California, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas (two and a half weeks getting all the way across Texas), Louisiana, Mississippi, a bit of Alabama and Florida.

The Southern Tier has been on my bucket list for many years. I was prepared to do it this year self-contained but Adventure Cycling Association is offering a van-supported version and I am happy to have someone else schlep my tent and gear, as well as provide cooking gear each night. We are still riding and camping our way across the US, but with just a dash of convenience for what should prove a challenging adventure.

Training during the winter for a ride that starts on 3 March is always a challenge in the Northeast, where snow, black ice, bitter cold and freezing rain (as well as living in the middle of Midtown Manhattan) are often impediments to outdoor exercise. So, I’ve been coping, stealing a week of cycling before Christmas while transiting through South Africa, spinning indoors at Flywheel, running at the YMCA and, like today, waiting for the moment when the temperatures climb above zero and the pavement is free of snow and black ice, to get on my bike and spin around Central Park.

Not a long ride today, but with temps hovering just above zero C and blustery winds, it was just enough to say that I’ve worked out and not killed myself doing it. Preparing for touring during the winter is much different than training during the offseason to be ready to race in March. There is no pressure to hammer up the hills in the cold, knocking out barf-inducing wattage intervals and going deep into the pain cave during long anaerobic mitochondria-producing climbs. To ride 100-130 km per day, day after day, with no real pressure to go fast, is not so tough and so my training regime is less than brutal.

One more week in Manhattan, meeting with the lawyers and winding down after twenty-five years of working in a high-pressure job, before heading off to put my head back in the game for a week at the United Arab Emirates World Government Summit in Dubai. One more week of spinning indoors (as the temperatures drop down well below zero again), time on the mat at Yo Yoga and some running at the YMCA if my back spasms will behave. 

Effective 14 January 2019, my previous email is no longer working. Please use [email protected] to contact me