Week 4 completed. Over halfway to St Augustine(virtually)

Well tonight I’m resting in Austin, Tx. (Virtually) 1720 miles behind me and over 57% of my ride to St Augustine complete.

This has been an interesting week. I took Good Friday off after 21 straight days of riding averaging over 60 miles a day. It was a pure joy to lay around and take it easy. But I doubt I’ll take another day off because getting on the bike Saturday took a lot of will power. Of course Mother Nature was bitchy and gave me 48-52 degree weather with rain and a wind so strong it blew the rain in sheets across the road like a Michigan snow storm. But I soldiered on, sorry Ma you are not breaking my will.

I was rewarded with a perfect Sunday to ride, though it was strange to not hear church bells and see people dressed up in their Easter Best for Sunday service. I got in a nice 82 miles looking for the Easter Bunny. Did not seem him but did see evidence he had been around.

Monday brought another decent day and 81 miles. I’m not going to bitch about the wind other that to say it still persists and I have just decided to accept it. I finished out the week with a 91 mile ride to hit 400 miles which is my lowest mileage week so far. But next week will be a doozy.

But before closing my complaints on the wind here is a little more on its impact

Last week I showed how the wind simulated a hill gradient. I also found a formula that translates this to elevation gained.

The chart below converts wind to gradient and the following calculations. Converts it to feet gained

So if you have a 7% gradient for 3 miles the following is the calculation for feet gained

Step 1

Divide the percent grade you have written by 100 using a calculator. For example, 7/100 = 0.07.

Step 2

Multiply your answer by the number of miles you have run on your treadmill. For example, you have run three miles: 0.07 x 3 = 0.21. You have completed an elevation gain of 0.21 miles.

Step 3

Multiply your answer by 5,280. For example, 0.21 x 5280 = 1108.8. You have completed an elevation gain of approximately 1,108 feet.

So there you have it. When I ride into a head wind of 24 mph for 20 miles it’s like gaining 5280ft in elevation in addition to the actual elevation gain. Ok enough. I am not commenting on the wind again.

Ok so I’m in virtual Austin and I have 3 songs competing for my ear worm. George Strait’s “All my ex’s Live in Texas.

And 2 Hank Williams songs

“A Country Boy Can Survive and “Texas Women”

I can relate to the Hank’s first song as I grew up in rural southwestern Michigan in farming country in a town of less than 70 people. I went to a one room school for my first year. And as a young boy was a student of the oldtimers who had survived the depression of the 1920’s who shared their tradecraft with me and how they survived it. I grew up in a hunting -fishing environment would walk out the back door with my shotgun and dog to chase pheasant, partridge, rabbits and the occasional unfortunate squirrel in the fields and woods. Or I would cross the street and walk through a locust tree thicket to the river which ambles slowly to the mill pond in town and then over the dam on its way to Lake Michigan. I caught pike, bass, pan fish and learned to set trot lines for catfish and bull head and caught snapping turtles. It was great being a kid in my small town.

As Spring arrived so did the cars with license plates from Mississippi, Alabama, Arkansas, Tennessee etc. with migrants that followed the crops with their families. I spent summers picking berries and other fruit with the migrant kids and learned a lot about their nomadic lifestyle, among other things, including RC Cola, Moon Pies and BC headache powder. The migrants were the poor whites from south and not what we think of today. But the kids seemed happy and were hard workers who were expected to pull their weight. It was a tough life and they were always on the move following the harvest. I often wonder what became of them.

Looking back it’s hard to imagine that some 30 years later I would be walking the halls of Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch, Credit Suisse, and others on Wall Street, have opened the Nasdaq Stock Market in Times Square not once but twice, helped a Silicon Valley Company go public as their treasurer, worked with the former CEO of General Motors, spoke on several occasions with the current CEO of Ford and started and sold 2 small companies. That’s a long way from the blueberry fields of Breedsville and Grand Junction,Michigan. But as John Mellencamp sang “I was born in a small town, saw it all in a small town, had myself a ball in a small town,that’s probably where they’ll bury me.” And I can breathe in a small town!

But I digress. I was going to comment on Hank’s Texas Women song.

I love that line and candidly a long legged girl in cowboy boots, Levi 501’s, a flannel shirt and ponytail does make my pulse quicken a bit. Then I think “I wonder what her Grandma looks like?” Does she have a pickup truck? A shotgun and a fly rod? See I’ve become invisible to women of a certain age (namely those below 55). Ah well. To dream. Guess I’m still a country boy at heart.

I know I have wandered off the path of biking a bit. But this blog is in large part for my daughter Katie and I find it easier to share these stories in print.

So here is my ride summary for the week. By next week I will have exited Texas and have under 1000 miles to go. I can’t see the end of the trail but I can sense it.

Until then. Smooth roads and may the wind be at your back. Stay safe and healthy and practice social distancing. Seems to come natural to me😷