The hour of Power...

Yesterday the kids asked me if we were going to turn all the lights on in the house again like we did last year for Earth hour. I forgot we even did that, but I'm sure we did and it's just one example of bringing some fun to the family. At 8:30 I turned every light in the house on and our house was lit up like a Christmas tree, but I did restrain myself, I didn't turn on any power tools, increase the heat or run all the water. I looked up and down the street and virtually every house had no lights on. I'm sure our neighbors weren't too impressed and most Ontarians will be disgusted, but I don't care, it created a memory and I don't believe there is global warming, new data is showing the world is getting colder and that's why they have switch the name to "climate change" from global warming. About a week ago I asked Reid, who's 12 years old,  if he wanted to be a "follower or leader". He took some time to think about it and then said " it depends on who the leader is". The answer was unexpected and blew me away, I thought it was genius. I wished I had thought of that.

When I woke up this morning there was a light rain and today was my long ride followed by a brick run. I kept debating if I should take my new bike and get it wet or take the time to get my old bike ready to ride. I ended up just waiting as long as I could before I had to get out the door to be back before dark. During that time I took Reid to buy him a jigsaw and some wood for one of his crazy projects he's working on, it's has to do with Star Wars. A couple of weeks ago it was a sewing machine and now it's a jigsaw. He's using his allowance to help pay for it. It will now be weeks before he gets his allowance.

It was a good decision to wait before I rode because once I got out the door I could see the dark clouds moving out and sunshine coming in. Once I got on the road I realized this was not going to be a fast ride because of the high winds. It was so windy that on some of the uphills I could only go 9 kph and on one downhill I only went 18 kph into a head wind. A real positive was that my heart rate was amazingly low, it averaged 121 bpm for the entire ride. It was night and day to last weeks ride. Mind you I didn't stay up until 5:30 am last night. 

At the 90 km point, I was 15 minutes from home and got another flat tire. My second one in the last two rides. When I started to change the tire about 5 minutes into it the tips of my fingers were starting to freeze. I was careful, put the new tube in and filled it up. As I was putting the tire back on, air started coming out of the stem, I forgot to close it. Then I realized that I had no C02 left. One of them must have fallen out on the ride. I debated if I should call Alice or just ride home on a flat and risk damaging the rim. Home was about 10 KM away. I decided to ride. About 5 minutes after I started to ride, another cyclist rode up and I borrowed his pump and filled the tire. YES!! I started to ride again and in about 60 seconds the tire was flat again and one of my water bottles fell out of the cage and was gone forever. I just kept riding home anyway. I got home, albeit slow and went for a brick run.

I thought the brick run would be a waste of time because I had to stop and fix my tire and my legs wouldn't get the benefit, but it wasn't. I could tell I was getting a good transitional workout. I was also surprised at how fast I was going. At the halfway point I was averaging a 7:41 pace and finish at a 7:46 pace. It was a good way to finish after the problems on the bike. I figured maybe Karma got me because I didn't turn out my lights for Earth Hour? I also hope my rim is okay. Oh yeah, I almost forgot, I passed the 1000 km mark on the new bike I got in mid January.

Long Bike - 3:34:11 / 99.3 KM / 27.2 kph

Brick Run - 30:01 / 3.86 miles / 7:46 pace