Mike and Steve both passed 2000 kilometers this past week or weekend, counting back to March. As I write this, Mike has logged 2057 after July 17, and he rode 80 kilometers on our trip to St. Francis on Sunday July 18.
I haven’t been tracking my mileage. I am probably 150 to 200 less than Mike at this point. He put in a century ride with Steve last weekend (July 11) when I was at the folk festival, and a series if short rides to work and with his neighbour. That still means I am approaching 2000 K if I haven’t also reached it.
The weather has been cool this spring, and we have cancelled planned rides due to rain. We began to get hot summer mornings a few weeks ago. It was hot and humid on Sunday July 18 and we turned around at St. Francis. We had found a favourable wind after we reached the White Horse at the intersection of Highway 26 and the Transcanada and were tempted to push on but we knew we would then have to deal with the wind all the way back to the Transcanada, and then with a cross wind most of the way home.
We weren’t sure how we might feel if we did the extra mileage for a century in the heat.
We seem to be in better shape this year. We aren’t necessarily riding greater distances although we have started getting 100 K days when we used to regard 60 to 75 K as a long ride. Mainly we are riding harder and faster. We find that a wind or 15 to 25 K is normal for prairie riding and we try to ride into the wind on the outbound leg of the journey. We are finding that our average speeds as calculated by our cycling computers are in the twenties instead of the teens. Those averages include low speeds at intersections. On the open road we seem to sustain speeds of 24-27 kph with crosswinds and moderate adverse winds, and 30 K with light favourable winds.
It isn’t the speed that the riders on the Tour de France are getting but we don’t see too many guys our age passing us any more.