At the end of 2017 I set a goal to ride my bicycle an average of 20 miles per week in 2018. Doing the math that meant I needed to log 1040 miles on my bike in 365 days. I had probably ridden less than 40 miles on my bike in 2017, let alone 1040. So why this crazy goal? Some of it was peer pressure and some was turning 40. My weight was higher than it should be as well as my blood pressure. I wanted to improve my health so I could keep up with my son and one day play with my grandchildren. My bike commuting coworker assured me that this low impact exercise would be just what I needed to start down the path of fitness.

I had a bike, why not start riding? As I looked at my 14 year old, $100 mountain bike I decided I needed to upgrade my ride if I was going to do this. My son had just about outgrown his bike and my wife’s bicycle was also 14 years old, so I figured for Christmas we would all get new bikes. Not your typical mid-life crisis purchase but I’m too frugal to buy a Vette.

I didn’t want to get a road bike because I still wanted to ride to the park and down trails with the family, but I wanted something I would be comfortable riding for an hour on the street. It turns out the bicycle industry had seen this need and I started looking at hybrids. I went to a local bike shop and at the recommendation of a friend, I decided on the Roam 3 by Giant. Green isn’t my favorite color but the other color option was awful!

For my wife we got a great deal on a Diamondback Vital 2 that provided her a more relaxed and upright sitting position. While she liked the feel of the bike more than her old one, it was the purple color that sealed the deal for her. We got our son a yellow Avigo Air Flex BMX bike, complete with handle bar brakes, seven gears and shock absorbers. He was going to look cool on his new ride. He needed to grow an inch or two to feel comfortable on the bike but at seven years old, those inches showed up quick.

With my new bike in hand I had to set a goal. Something that didn’t seem overwhelming but high enough that I would have to work to achieve it. As someone who had never ridden more than 10 miles on a bike at one time that seemed like a reasonable number. However the team ride at work is longer than that and I hoped to improve through the year so I needed to set a goal that would push me. After much thought and encouragement from friends, I decided on averaging 20 miles a week. Averaging allowed for some leeway in the beginning that I could make up in the second half of the year.

The team ride at work helped to add 12-15 miles to my tally most weeks, but January was cold and February and August had more rain than days so there were some miles to make up. I also started getting up early on Saturdays and riding a 10-13 mile loop. I crossed the 800 mile mark on November 8th and realized that I needed to step it up a notch if I was going to reach my goal. Thankfully December had plenty of beautiful ridding days. On December 29th I hit mile 1040! There were some rides with the family that I didn’t have Strava logging the miles so my total is probably a little higher but I wanted the screenshot as proof.

My son has grown into his bike and is getting confident in his riding. Family rides aren’t as regular as they should be but we ride our bikes to the park now instead of driving. The loop to the park is 3.1 miles and we have stretched that out to 4 miles a couple of times. The library is less than a mile away but I managed to turn that into a 3 mile loop since the loop includes the snow cone hut on the way back.

Reaching my goal was hard work but it paid off. I am now 15 pounds lighter than I was at the beginning of the year and my blood pressure is safely back in the normal range. How far did I come as a cyclist in those 1000+ miles? I looked over ride data for the year and my first few rides were averaging about 9 mph. The last part of the year I was averaging better than 14 mph and even hit 15mph one day when the wind wasn’t set on pushing me over. My longest ride was a 40 mile non-competitive ride sponsored by a local bike shop that I rode with the guy that got me in to cycling. Other obvious signs of improvement were having to pull my belt a notch tighter and having friends and family ask if I’m losing weight.

Well, 2018 is behind us and we are already 3 days in to 2019. I need to set a new cycling goal. I’m thinking a 25% increase is reasonable. 25 miles per week works out to be 1300 miles. Well, it is on the blog now so I guess I will stick with it! I also need to thank Chris for encouraging me to start riding, pushing me (literally on some of our rides) to get better and riding painfully slow those first few rides so I could keep up. Thanks Chris!

What are your goals for this new year? What are you doing to improve your health? Are you riding a bike? Find me on Strava or let me know in the comments.

Jacob

P.S. If you don’t know what I mean by the good 1040, either you aren’t in the USA or you managed to block April 15th from your mind. Either way, I’m pretty sure the reason the IRS calls it the 1040 form is because out of every $50 you earn, you get 10 and they get 40!