2012 Bike Rides

It has been more than a year since I last wrote a blog post or finish any posts that were started. October 8th last year, Kimberly was engaged and that put a immediate stop to my blogging; life went crazy for a few months. Kim was married on the end of 2011 so I guess I have been lazy for almost  a year!?

My 2012 new year's resolution includes attending "workout classes" at the gym. It took almost a whole month to get the courage up to try a zomba class. The zoomba class was very fast paste, had a super fun teacher, but it was hard to figure out what I was to do with my arms and legs. The Spin classes took a little longer to work up the discipline; I went to one class in the summer of 2011 and it was incredibly difficult and not so much fun. I managed to start going to the spin classes about 12 weeks before the Goldilocks bike ride; did not want to be in the same shape as last year. And now I've committed to spin three times a week.  My weekly work out class schedule is three zomba classes for fun, three spin classes for the cardio training, and one muscle blast class for "torture" (I guess to toughen the body and the mind).

Kimberly and I did the Goldilocks and the Little Red Riding Hood women's only bike ride this spring. I think the spin classes had really paid off. We did the 40 miles loop for Goldilocks and 50 miles loop for Little Red Riding Hood and it was so much fun, so unlike the 2011 Goldilocks!

May 12th 2012, Goldilocks

 

Starting line - getting ready.

The weather could not be more perfect, sunny, but not too warm.

Rest stop. Similar cute signs were every where.

Finish Line. ( I did get there before Kimberly, just saying)

It felt great to be at this end of the balloons. 

Both of us got new shoes this year.

June 2nd 2012, Little Red Riding Hood

The weather was a bit cloudy and cool but we decided against jackets.

Hanging around before our start time.

Starting Line

First rest stop.

Ready to head out again after the first rest stop.

Second rest stop.

The scenery was beautiful all the way.

Third rest stop, I think this was my lowest point.

Lunch at the third stop.

Finish line.

We got a little bit of drizzles when we started the ride, but the weather cleared up and it was a beautiful day.

Lunch after we finished.

 Ice cream bar, I think we earned it.

Our souvenir bracelet. Peace! 

Goldilocks Bike Ride 2011

http://www.goldilocksride.com/

We did it! We rode 42 miles at the Goldilocks ride. It was truly a learning experience for Kim & I.

Neither one of us has been on a road bike before. I just purchased a new bike two weeks prior and Kim does not have a road bike so we had to borrow one. For various reasons: rain/cold/snow weather, she was away at school, I was working a lot of extra hours in April & May, we did not get a chance to try out the bikes until the night before the event. We "fixed" a few minor problems that night. First of all, the borrowed shoes did not fit Kim so she & I had to traded shoes. I was not used to the borrowed shoes and could not clip in or out and fall over. Skinned my right knee and bruised my thigh. (It was a good thing that I am used to falling over on a bike, happened quite a few times last year, and usually just a little bleeding at the knee with no major damage.) It turned out the clips were installed incorrectly to the shoes so I was able to fixed it. 

On Saturday May 7th we headed out early in the morning and the episode of the shoes/clips issues last night turned out to be a small problem. I still had a little trouble clipping in, but it was manageable and minor compare to what was ahead of us. 

As soon as we got there to pick up our packets, we realized that we did not have any spare tiers or tools with us. It was too late to do anything about it so we prayed and hoped that we would not have flat tires.  Our biggest problem came when we started the ride. Kim could not keep up! Imagine that, the half-marathon runner had a hard time staying up with the almost half a century old mom; we were going down hill and I was hardly paddling. At first I though it was because she did not know how to use the gears efficiently. Eventually, I traded bike with her and immediately realized that there was something wrong with the bike. It was more work to ride it than my heavy mountain bike. We pulled over and figured out that the rear break was off center and was rubbing against the tire. No wonder she could not keep up; she was riding with the break on. Since it was the first time she rode a road bike, she had no idea what a road bike should feel like. Of course we had no tool and could not fix it. I finally lift the little lever on the break that is used when you want to remove the wheel to fix a flat tire. I made sure the rear break would still work for her and we moved on. I instructed her to pull over when she see a support vehicle to have them help her fix the break issue and went ahead. Anyway, while I spotted a support vehicle and pulled over to wait for her, she missed the car and me and went ahead. Anyway, we were separated because I thought she was still behind me and keep waiting for her at the rest stops while She thought I got impatient and left her behind. We did not see each other again until the end.

We come up with  list of things to be aware of for first timer of a biking event.

• First of all, make sure your bike works properly.
• Carry a spare tier and some tools. We were lucky that we did not have flat tires. After the Goldilocks, I went straight to the bike shop and purchased a seat bag and some tools in case of a flat tire or a broken chain.
• Adjust the helmet to fit properly; my helmet kept sliding backwards, it was such a bother.
• Each riders needs to carry a cell phone - this is not only important when you get separated and need to contact someone, it is also very important if you have a flat tire,  get injured, or experience a bike malfunction that you need to be picked up from the side of the road. Kim did not want to carry her cell phone with her from her long distance running experience, but it was a mistake for biking event.
• Each rider needs to carry the little map provided by the even organizer - when I pulled over to the support vehicle, a lady had to call her family to come get her because she rear rim was bad and could not continue the event. If you don't have the map, it's harder to give you location. The map also had event organizer contact phone numbers that could come in handy.
• Eat, eat, eat, and drink, drink, drink. Stop at every rest stop to eat and drink even if you don't think you need to. I rode to the turn around point which was about 28 miles. It was after a long uphill ride so I rested, ate, drank, refilled my water bottle, had a potty break, rested some more, and was ready to head back. Now it was a nice long down hill so I was feeling great. I arrived at the 3rd stop in very little time. I was worried about where Kim was and decided to go ahead and skip the rest stop and ride to the end. BAD IDEA!!! I was "bonked" when I was about 5 miles from the finishing point. According to Infinite bike shop, in endurance sports, particularly cycling and running, hitting the wall or the bonk describes a condition caused by the depletion of glycogen stores in the liver and muscles, which manifests itself by precipitous fatigue and loss of energy. I have never did anything long distance before and did not realized that I need to eat weather I think or feel that I need it or not. 
• Each rider should carry some food, preferably sugary food in the pocket. When I started to feel the huger and lost of energy, I stopped when I feel I had to but I only had water to drink. Soon I ran out of water and I was so hungry. I went on. At the very last hill, and it was just a little hill, I had to stop again and I was shaking.  I had to walk my bike about 15 feet to the top of the hill. When I felt that I could continue, I was in such bad shape that I barely had enough energy to lift my leg over the bike. I could not clip my right foot in to get started. I managed to lift my foot to try to clip in again and simply toppled over onto the ground. Talk about precipitous fatigue! Only if I had some sugary food with me; I could of avoided all of the un-necessay sufferings.
• Last but not the least: apply sun screen to every exposed face, arm and leg area. We both forgot to sunscreen and we were sun burned! Kim was in better shape because she had been out in the sun more often than I. My poor thighs and the back of my legs was burn pretty bad and I was in pain for days. My sister-in-law who is an experienced long distance biker said that she carries a small tube of sunscreen in her seat bag so she will always have access to some sunscreen; smart!

Despite all of our inexperience and troubles, we had a great time and immediately went and signed up for next year after we had a chance to eat. I wondered why after all my "sufferings", I was so ready to do it again? Kim also wonder how in the world I got these markings on my legs; they weren't just grease marks, I had cuts and bruises and one of the bruise mark looked just like the bike chain mark. Yeah, I think I won the klutz award. 

  

Crossing the finishing line was exhilarating; it was all worth it. And the only way to get there is to RIDE ON!!! I bought this necklace before we even started the ride; I guess I knew what I needed to do to finish.

Cassidy's Prom 2011

Cassidy turned sixteen and was ask to prom a week after her birthday. Kimberly was the sweet big sister; she came home from BYU to dress hunting with us and then came home again to do Cassidy's hair and makeup. She was so excited to help to sent Cassidy on her first date. Here are some photos of preparing to go to prom.

Cassidy's Sweet 16

Chinese New Year

I love Chinese New Year celebrations; probably because it always bring me memory of great Chinese dishes of my mother. For the last few years, we got together with my friend Chris's family and cooked a lot of food and did a lot of chit-chatting for the Chinese New Years dinner. Last year a few of Kimberly's friends came to the dinner and this year she invited even more friends. In stead the usual 10-12 people we had about twenty. I put them to work as soon as they arrived to wrap the egg rolls and make pot stickers and it was a lot of fun. 

Run and Swim to End the Summer

What a way to end the summer! Kim ran a half marathon this morning at Park City and Cassidy swam a mile with her swim academy this afternoon.

We awoke at 5:15am this morning to get ready. We arrived at the starting location, Newpark Resort and Hotel, at about 6:15am and met up with cousin Kati and her family. It was still dark and there were a lot runners there! It's amazing how many people run marathons or half marathons.

The marathon started at 6:30am. After all of the marathoner took off, runners started to line up for the half marathon. Kim and Kati decided to be in the front of the second wave in stead of the end of the first wave so they lined up right after the orange tape.

The first wave moved out at 6:45am and the girls move to the starting line waiting for the signal.

Waiting, waiting . . . 

They sure did not look like they were about to endure a lot of pain and suffering.

                                               6:50am, time to run!

The half marathoner had to run around the parking lot to get on the trail so we went toward the west end of the parking lot to catch our first photo opportunity of the girls running.

As soon as we took the above photo, we headed to the east end of the parking lot. Here was our second and last opportunity to watch them run, until the end that was. It's funny that we only took a few steps while they ran abut one mile around the parking lot.

These two had been running for a few minutes and they sure look happy to be in the race.









I thought I'd include the course map for those who what to check out the Park City half marathon course. This map is intended for IE browser so it may not work for Firefox or other internet browser.


While Kimberly was sweating and breathing/running hard, Cassidy was getting compensated for having to get up bright and early to watch the marathon.

It just so happened that within 20 steps from where we where watching the girls getting on the trails, there was a Kneaders. Happy Day!

I did not ordered anything at Kneaders; it was too early to eat such a big sweet breakfast. But Cassidy was always hungry. She ordered the Chunky Cinnamon French Toast. It looked delicious! I wounder how many calories it had?

I was so surprised to see a runner back in the parking lot around 8am while we were sitting in Kneaders. That meant he finished running 13+ miles in just over an hour. Wow! We headed toward the finish line at about 8:30am. The girls were running about 10 minute mile during training. We figured that it would take them about two hours and ten minutes to arrive at the finish line. Because the half marathon was an out and back course, the finish line was where the girls started the trail. I was sure that they were looking forward to see the beautiful word "FINISH".

While we were waiting for the girls to cross the finish line, I started to worried a little about Kimberly. She had had a lot of pain ever since her training runs were longer than 7 miles. She had suffered shin splint, her hips would locked up after a run to where she could hardly walk, or sometimes her hip would grind during a run. I was not sure that she would be able to run the course and was afraid that her body would fall apart during the half marathon. 

 

We saw Kati!    

There was no words to describe the feeling of seeing her coming towards the finish line. She was faster than we had anticipated. Her official time is 2 hours 3 minutes and 34.9 seconds.

After Kati came in, I was more worried that Kim was injured. The girls' running speed was about the same, so we expected them to stay pretty close to each other. With every passing moment, I thought that there was a real possibility that Kim was hurt.

Here come Kimberly!

She was smiling, what a great sight!!!

 Her official time is 2 hours 5 minutes and 38.5 seconds.

Way to go girls,

We are so proud of you!!!

In the 19-24 age group, Kati finished 9th and Kimberly finished 12th.
  

After the half marathon was over, we had to hurry back to Marriott Summit Watch so Kimberly could sit in the hot tub for a little while to relax before we had to check out. We had stayed at Park City for the week and it was time to pack up and head home. Actually, Cassidy and I stayed the full week; Roland and Kaydn were visiting grandpa and grandma Brown in Canada. Kim had to work everyday so she only stayed some nights. Kimberly felt pretty good after four Advils (thank you, Dan!), so we did a little shopping on Main Street after we checked out of the hotel. We discovered that there was a bike race going on Main street; a marathon and a bike race all in one day in the same town; pretty impressive.

After returning home, unloading luggage, and running errands with Kimberly to help her get ready to move down to BYU for her senior year, it was time to take Cassidy to the swimming pool for the swim academy semi-annual mile swim. She was wearing her brand new swim suit we purchased before the mile swim. This girl has been growing taller again.

Cassidy and Kaydn joined the swim academy last September, so this is Cassidy's first mile swim.

One mile is 36 laps, or 72 length of the pool, a lot of back and forth. Here is a photo of the swimmers and the counters.

What a great feeling to finish the mile swim; she should wear the goggle indentation proudly!

She finished the mile swim in 31 minutes and 57 seconds.

Three cheers to Cassidy!

One ran the half marathon, one swam a mile, I guess I'd better stay up late to finish this entry on the blog.

 What a special day!