Myrna CG Mibus - Idyllwild

By the time I found time to ride my bike for 30 Days of Biking today it was raining - again - so I decided to bring my Salsa fatbike, Bear, in the house and ride indoors. It's actually rather difficult to ride in the house. It certainly is difficult to build up much speed or log any actual milage. The ride might have worked better if I would have: taken off my tap shoes (I'd been practicing tap and wanted to keep practicing after my "ride" so kept them on). made sure there wasn't any mud left on my big ol' tires from my last ride. moved some furniture out of the way. Here's my ride report: the "ride" was short and rather erratic (pedal, stop, move stuff, walk, pedal etc.). Tap shoes don't work well on metal pedals. Absolutely no traction. I had to vacuum a lot of mud off the floor when my ride was done. I laughed When all was said and done, I took off my tap shoes, put on a rain jacket and some puddle boots and rode Bear...

This year marks the 5th year of 30 Days of Biking , a challenge to ride your bike every day for 30 days straight in the month of April. I've done the challenge every year plus three bonus rounds in September. That's a lot of biking in all sorts of weather. In past challenges, I have biked through snow, sleet, rain, hail and have been out in very nice weather, too. The weather this April has been less than desirable. So far I've not had to bike in snow or sleet (though it's due to snow today) but it's been cold and I had to pull out my winter jacket again. Oh well. Thus, most of my rides have been short hops of a half a mile to two miles. They count. I've also had the fun of getting out on some longer rides, like two rides on the Cannon Valley Trail this past weekend when the weather was pretty nice (for Minnesota). I'm looking forward to some more nice weather so I can get some longer rides in. Taken on one of our longer rides last weekend. My Vaya, ...

“Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance, you must keep moving.” Albert Einsten I'm at the Anderson Center in Red Wing this weekend with two of my writing friends, Joy  and Chris . We're here having a writing weekend and are working on our various writing projects. The Anderson Center is an awesome place. We're staying in a huge house surrounded by lots of green space and a sculpture garden. It's quiet here and it's a perfect place to write, read and rejuvenate. It's also a perfect place for bicycling as the Anderson Center is right by the Cannon Valley Trail . So in addition to packing some books, my journal, fountain pens, computer and works in progress, I packed Zippy, my  Salsa Vaya, so I could ride this weekend - partially because I like to ride the trail, partially because I'm in the middle of another 30 Days of Biking challenge and partially because I find that riding helps me write. Earlier today I rode about 12 miles. Most of th...

Back in February I read a post on the Salsa Cycles Facebook page : "Minnesota area women - if you are thinking about taking on a gravel event, but perhaps intimidated by the typically 100-mile distance, this might be something you are interested in. RiotGRRRaveL - a 30 - 35-mile women & family friendly gravel ride near Hastings, Minnesota on June 21st. Hit the link to learn more... " That post spoke to me. I've been interested in gravel rides and races but have been VERY intimidated by the 100 mile distances. As a fairly slow rider who likes to talk a lot and stop for coffee on my rides, I've also been pretty intimidated at the thought of riding a gravel race with a bunch of competitive men (the vast majority of bike racers, gravel and otherwise, are men). Immediately intrigued, I clicked on the link to learn more - and within moments I signed myself up to ride RiotGrrravel .  The fact that I signed up for a gravel ride, let alone a race, is pretty crazy.  I ...