Vacation training #2: leg exercise.

In keeping with my on-going theme of not actually writing about training on a bike (Honestly forty mile training rides in the cancer chariot’s saddle are fairly uninteresting…. “Hey look it’s a squirrel!”), I’m going to let you in on a great Mt. Desert Island, Maine secret. The Perpendicular Trail on Mansell Mt. Great opportunity to get some good views, get some good hiking, and test your hyperventilation skills. It’s actually a perfect opportunity for quad and calf conditioning, because it’s straight up a mountain. Seriously. Its takes an almost direct route from the base of the mountain perpendicularly up to the summit. Follow the catchy trail name, now? Johnny Rockefeller figured it was a good use of manpower to enlist plebeians to quarry, shape, and place 1,000 granite steps on the side of an understated mountain. Good for him, and me, that he didn’t have anything better to do with his money. 950' of elevation in 1 mile. That's nearly 80 degrees. Straight up.

Base                                                                           Mid trail                                                                               Summit

This guy actually mapped the hike and denoted where his pictures were taken. Pretty nifty. I don't know who he, or Anna is, but technology lets me steal his link off the interweb.

Training continues. As does fundraising. Want to help? Support me here. I promise to write about cycling next time. Or at least cancer.

Training continues... blogging, not so much.

I have been training. I haven't been writing about it. I guess that's better than visa versa, right?

We spent some time on vacation a couple weeks ago and despite renting a mountain bike one day and doing some unintended hill climbs (wife was not happy with my choice of trails) I ddint spend much time in the saddle. However, with the holistic approach of just getting some exercise, I did pretty well.

In the name of keeping with family tradition, I was nominated to carry back a collection of rocks we found on a relatively isolated beach.

Fine, load me up like your own personal pack horse so I can help deface a national park. Being 25 pounds heavier, I slightly lag behind the group headed home. As their pack horse, I decide to canter to catch up. What the hay… Ill just keep going. After a half mile jog on a wooded path, laden with 25 extra pounds of contraband, I come to the trail head, sweaty and with a small flesh wound on my leg. Helga and Klaus (dramatic license), the German tourists, who I run into look horrified. Whether it is the blood, the amount of sweat a slight man could generate, or the idea of them having to do whatever I just did to see the National Park icon we are neighboring, the expression quickly dissipates when, through my best international sign language, I direct them towards the correct tourist path.

Vacation training: check.

I’m almost to my personal fundraising goal. Help me out and put some cash towards my efforts and towards cancer research here.

Fashion Forward

My company has graciously designed and produced cycling attire for our entire team. Unfortunately the team uniform is the traditional form-fitting, lycra, bike shorts and jerseys. I'm so excited to have my fellow employees, who I try to maintain a “mostly business” relationship with, see the crevasses and lumps of my chiseled form in HD, 3D detail. Fantastic.

Don't fret though, I did choose Option B in the shorts. Cycling bib shorts have always too closely resembled olde tyme, World's Fair weight lifters, for my taste. I don't have the genes to grow a handle bar mustache. Further, no one needs to see my body hair harvest. No one.

Your support will help me get over my embarrasment of wearing these things. At least at that point I will be doing it for a good cause rather than just to shdisplay my bod. Donate here.