doing some biking again

so a few weekends ago i finally got around to fixing my bike up. It's an old but decent mountain bike that i bought in '93. two years ago i tuned it up and used to for commuting to work for a summer. unfortunately when we moved at the end of last year the rear derailer hanger got bent and the derailer was stuck in the rear tire spokes. luckily (since my bike is old) the frame is steel and i was able to straiten out the derailer hanger. then i spent some time cleaning and oiling the chain, lubricating the shifter and brake cables, and adjusting the shifters till everything ran smooth. subsequently i've been using it for commuting into work and riding on the weekends.

the ride into work is pretty flat and about 16 miles round trip. i've been riding into the office 2 to 3 days a week and i hope to keep this up till winter.

the past few weekends i've also been going on progressively longer rides. i started out by searching for assorted bike routes near where i live on bikely.com. i found one such route going along canada rd that didn't seem to difficult. it was 16 miles with only ~750 feet of elevation gain (most of which was near the beginning of the ride going up edgewood rd). i went up there on a sunday, and once i got up to canada rd i was happy to discover that (north of edgewood rd) it's closed to auto traffic on sundays from 9am to 1pm.

last weekend, based of a recommendation from a coworker, i decided to go south on canada rd and do a small loop through woodside. this was a little longer ride (20 miles, ~900 feet elevation gain) but pretty strait forward. the most difficult part of the ride was that i went on a day when it was 95+ F.

today i was planning on doing another slightly longer loop through woodside, but once i got down to woodside i was feeling pretty good, so foolishly i decided to ride up old la honda rd (click on the "Summary" tab to see elevation information). the ride was pretty brutal (for me), about 30 miles with over 2,260 feet of elevation gain. i had to stop at one point during the climb (which is about 4 miles) and i walked my bike about a quarter mile. the elevation drop riding down the 84 was pretty fun, but once i got back home i was very sore. so this afternoon i spent some time reading about pain and posture when biking. hopefully this will help keep future rides more pleasant. i'm also thinking that if i continue to do rides like this then a used road bike might be a worth while investment.