Category: Ride

A couple of my fastest times on the downhill segments, probably due to the tyre pressure.

A slow and pretty unremarkable uphill, other than a game of chicken with a big dump truck coming up behind me in a narrow part of the road. It shows my confidence is growing, I could not imagine myself doing that even a month ago.

Definitely starting to notice the cold, even in the afternoon.

2nd fastest time up the hill. I put it down to the tyre pressure being up at around 30 PSI, it felt a lot easier on the road.

The service and tubeless conversion seems to have gone well. It is pretty amazing how much the plus size tubes weigh, it’s got to be close to half a kilo.

The folks at MyRide gave me lots of great advice, and I was very happy with the work they had done on the bike, I’ll be back for sure.

While I was there I picked up a digital pressure gauge, I’m unsure if I’m using it correctly as it appears to be showing much lower pressures than I thought were in the tyres.

Rode down to drop the bike off for a service, quick blat down the hill from school. What was interesting is that last time I took the turn onto Brooklyn Road from Washington Ave I got quite freaked out. It is a measure of my growing confidence that this time it was no big deal.

I imagined riding out to Tangihana-a-Kupe would be pretty cruisy, but how wrong I was. The storm a few weeks back had destroyed much of the four wheel drive track. It was hard going in many places with deep loose shingle or sand. I had to walk quite a bit. It was a good challenge though, and I was reasonably happy with how I was able to deal with some pretty rough and rocky stuff.

It was overall a very enjoyable hour, although slow going to cover 8km.

It was a wet ride down, with a few speed wobbles, but quite exciting. A car that stayed a good distance behind me held back the traffic, and have me a good run. I realised afterwards that I was going over 40 most of the way down Brooklyn Road.

The ride up was hard again, and I had been careful to eat during the day. It is strange how close some cars come as they pass you, and I’m sure some are doing 60 or more.

There’s talk of a cycle lane going in up the hill, but there is opposition to it due to the loss of parking spaces and a second car lane that is barely used, and is a hangover from when that stretch of road had a 70km/hr limit. I find the opposition ridiculous given that so few cars park on Brooklyn Road.

What a great ride today, I was on the bike for close to two hours which is the longest ride for me so far by almost double. I had not eaten before going and had half a snack bar I was saving for the end of the ride, so I was pretty knackered by the end.

According to Strava I rode for over 28km, which I almost can’t believe.

It was so great to be by the sea, and I really love the coast track from Eastbourne to Pencarrow Lighthouse.

Sights along the way included Lake Kohangapiripiri, Lake Kohangatera, the wreck of the SS Paiaka, and the stunning light on the sea and land.

Approaching Baring Head from the coast (not the hillside track) was beautiful, I rode until I ran out of road. I could have kept going if I had walked a little further, but I was pretty glad I turned around when I did given how stuffed I was on my return.

It was my first commute after the Covid lockdown. I left at sunrise, so the light was low, and I was very conscious of trying to be visible. It was a fun ride down the hill and not as cold as I was expecting.

The way up was OK, I left at 4pm to beat the worst of the traffic and the rain. As it was the Friday before a long weekend I also expected traffic to be lighter, and I think it was in general.

The ride up the hill felt slow, and according to Strava it was 12:33, my slowest time by miles, and actually 3 minutes longer then my last ride up the hill. It could be because I stopped before crossing the traffic to get to my street, as 3 minutes over 1.4km doesn’t seem right to me. But it did feel like I was riding slowly.

It was rewarding to do it, and the start to the day was fun.

Same as yesterday, I wanted to blow the copwebs away with a short ride. It was chilly, but reasonably pleasant with less traffic than usual.

Up the hill and down, just around the block. Nice enough ride. I actaully like going up the hill, I just hate the traffic on the very narrow and twisty roads. If my timing had been a little different I would have met a bus in an awkward spot which would have sucked.

It was cold, but not too bad.