Now this is a serious improvement! I rode Friday through Monday, and then took Tuesday and Wednesday off. Today's ride, on my regular route, was a whole two minutes faster than my best time this year!

I still have a long way to go, but the strength returning to my legs — and the endurance and efficiency to my cardiovascular system — feels just wonderful.

Oh man! Four days in a row, and five of the last seven.

I was tired when I left today, but I was exhausted when I got back. My muscles need a rest.

Rode to Roy and Laura's house for an ecclesial picnic with Graham Mansfield of Adelaide (South Australia).

It was really windy! I hate riding into the wind as much as I like riding downhill.

Unfortunately, by the time I was ready to ride home the wind had died down but it was getting dark, and traffic was heavy (beach traffic was going home). So, Frank Locke took me home (thanks, Frank). Oh well!

Hey, I finally had another 3-ride week. Haven't done that since the first week of riding this year.

Unfortunately, I feel like I've hit a plateau. I rode the same route every day this week, and my time didn't really improve at all. Perhaps this is my punishment for takign 10 days off. ;-)

Boooorinnngggg! Same ride as Tuesday, and there was nothing remarkable about it at all.

A boring day on the bike is still better than most other things I can think of.

This was a slight modification of my regular route, so I still need to get back to Misquamicut to finish the really long one. Maybe on Friday?

This ride felt good, which was strange since it had been a week and a half.

What would have been a very long ride (almost 40 miles) was stopped when I visited my Grandparents' place to refill my water bottle.

Still, this was an excellent ride, with a new record average speed (for this year, not career), and I feel great.

Finally got a chance to try out the new route I laid out on the map. It only added on three miles. Duh!

Still, today's average speed was the best ever. I was right at 16.0 miles/hour until I slowed down for the driveway, when it dropped to 15.9.

Oh, one other thing... this was my first ride with the new saddle that Corinne bought for me. I like it!

Regular route, ridden backwards. This made the giant Old Mystic hill, which is normally too steep and twisty to really get a lot of speed, incredibly hard to climb. Going down the other side was a blast, as it's long and relatively straight and down!