Road Noise

The bicycling community has a lot of cutesy ideas and affectations, most of which I ignore. But there is this thing to ride your age in miles on your birthday. Well, my birthday turned out to be a nice weather day (for late November) and my recollection was that my calendar was empty, so on the spur of the moment I decided to blow off work and do a fifty-seven mile bike ride. As always, I chose the default, lazy route - hopping on the W&OD bike trail, which passes within a few blocks of my house, and just riding 28 1/2 miles out, then turning around and riding 28 1/2 miles bake. Or thereabouts - that distance takes me to the eastern outskirts of Leesburg, and just a little further gets you to a shopping center with a Dunkin' Donuts and a Starbucks. Given that it was a bit chilly I figured I might enjoy a coffee break at my turnaround point.

At about 10:30 AM, about eight miles short of my planned turnaround I stopped to use the Porta-potty at Smith's Switch Station (the older you get, both the miles and the number of potty breaks increase). I checked my phone to make sure nothing dire was happening at work and noticed an email from a colleague forwarding the documents I needed for our 11 AM call with a potential teaming partner. Uh oh. I had completely forgotten that I had agreed to participate in this call. Hmmm, what to do? I wasn't going to get to the turnaround in 30 minutes (I'm not a 16 MPH rider). Turn around? No, that wouldn't really get me anywhere. Email that I couldn't make the call after all? Nahh, I didn't want to leave my colleague in the lurch. So, I decided to ride on.

At 11 AM I was just a mile and change short of my destination. I pulled off to the side of the trail and dialed in - but I really didn't want to stand there in the cold for the whole call, so I told them that I was "in the car" on my way back from another appointment and was going to stay on mute because of road noise. I put the phone on speaker and muted it and held it in one hand while I continued to ride - slowly - along the trail. I didn't have the deterity to work the phone with one gloved hand while riding, so any time I needed to participate I'd stop, unmute the phone, say my piece, remute the phone, then keep riding. Fortunately, this didn't go on for too long, as it took me only five minutes or so to get to the doughnut shop. Also fortunate is that my colleague really likes to talk and it was his call, so I was mostly able to just listen and ride.

Once I got to the doughnut shop things got easier. While my colleague blathered on I ordered a doughnut as a birthday treat (I don't usually eat doughuts) and a regular coffee as a ride enhancer. Caffeine is a staple of my longer rides. It's something that I also usually avoid, which makes it super effective as an athletic performance enhancer. A cup of coffee and I'm recharged for a lot of miles.

Thanks to my colleague's loquaciousness what should have been a thirty minute call lasted almost an hour. Once we finally finished I packed up my puffy jacket in my seat bag (it was warming up nicely), put the rest of my gear on, and headed home. The ride home was uneventful, but between riding more slowly than I anticipate and the call, what I expected to be a five hour outing took seven - essentially an all day affair. total mileage was 60.9 - that's 57 for my age and 3.9 for good luck (and doughnuts).

Data Analytics

If you know the story of my heart problems you know that I was misdiagnosed for 2 1/2 years prior to my emergency surgery. My symptoms over that whole period were limited to chest tightness and difficulty breathing when I exercised outdoors in the heat of summer. I'm kind of a nutcase about preferring to exercise outdoors whenever possible, even in unpleasant weather*. Every summer there'd be some heat wave when something would feel wrong in my chest when I ran outside. I would go to the doctor and get misdiagnosed as having exercise-induced asthma and would be sent on my way with a handful of pills and inhalers which, the doctor said would take a month or so to take full effect. Sure enough, a month later I would indeed feel better - but it was because the heat had broken, not because of the meds. This happened in 2014. It happened again in 2015 (the doctor did sent me for a cardiac stress test that year, but it failed to reveal any problems). When I showed up with the exact same symptoms again in 2016 the doctor kind of rolled her eyes that I was presenting with the same symptoms yet again like it was some big deal, when it was just my seasonal exercise-induced asthma acting up again. That was the year I finally decided to act on my hunch that something else was going on and kept pressuring my doctor to get to the bottom of it - which, as many readers know, took until spring of the following year and culminated in emergency surgery on March 15th, 2017. Beware the Ides of March.

Anyway, I recount that whole history here because I had a vague notion that my exercise performance had started slowing down in 2014 and that it was another missed sign of my medical issues; however, it hadn't occurred to me that I actually had a data set against which to evaluate that hypothesis. For the most part I didn't consistently track my exercise until I started using Strava in conjunction with Freezing Saddles in 2016, and besides, there are a lot of variables in most of my exercise. Kayaking performance is subject to wind, waves, and stopping to look at birds and stuff. Running could have been a source of data, as I have been running the same route for years, but I hadn't tracked my times over the years. Bicycling? Well, I tend to meander - not a reliable source of performance data Then, just the other day it dawned on me that I have a complete, decade-long data set of my erg rowing. For some reason, I have always recorded my rows in Concpet2's online logbook (Concept2 is the manufacturer of the rowing machine). Holy longitudinal data set, Batman! Furthermore, rowing was my most consistent exercise data set - the same machine in the same room usually at the same time of day and approximately the same level of exertion every time. No weather. No birds to distract me. No hills. The only slight variation comes from my choice of entertainment - I watch videos when I row and admittedly, I row harder when watching action and adventure shows than more mellow dramas or comedy. I row really hard to Fauda, an Israeli coputner-terrorism action show available on Netflix. But that's minor variability.

Take a look at the plot below, which includes all my recorded rows since 2008 (minus a few which inexplicably downloaded from Concept2's web-based logbook with invalid values). In particular, focus on the orange line - a smoothed version of the data.** I start out with some really good numbers - low times per 500m (that's what the Y Axis scale is). When I first started in 2008 I got really into it and rowed really hard. It was Cyndi (KayakCyndi to some readers) who got me started rowing - and any workout one does with Cyndi is going to be balls to the wall. So I start out with low split times. Then, as the initial excitement faded (and I stopped competing with Cyndi) I slowed down a little and settled into a somewhat more moderate pace. Then the line is flat for about three years: mid-2011 through mid-2014. Then, suddenly, right around the time I started feeling symptoms my rowing times start slowing down. The split times start increasing - and keep increasing all the way until my surgery (where there's a gap in the data in early 2017). Then, since I started rowing again after my surgery the times have been coming back down. 

Figure 1: Rowing History 2008 - Present

But here's some good news. Look at the chart below - in this chart I've zoomed into the period from when I started having symptoms up to the present. When you look at the data from 2014 until just before my surgery there's a trend of slowing down (the orange line is a linear fit, or trend line to the pre-surgery data). Then look at the data from when I resumed rowing to the present and you see the trend line there is decreasing - my rowing performance is getting better (the grey line is a linear fit to my post-surgery data). In fact, if you look at my most recent rows you'll see my numbers are back in the range of my 2014 performance. So in rowing, at least, my performance has completely recovered to pre-illness levels, if not the times of ten years ago (too much to ask!). My running is still slower than before, as is my bicycling. Perhaps the spare parts they took out of my leg to repair my heart affect these leg-based sports more than rowing, which uses a wider range of muscles (core and upper body in addition to using legs for the catch and initial drive). I can only speculate.

I'll also point out that these variations are smaller than they appear, since I've zoomed in on the Y axis. In Figure 2 the difference between the duration of the slowest and fastest rows is about 4 minutes out of 30-ish minute workouts. Still, that's more than 10% - enough, in my mind, to represent real trends in the data and not just the randomness of one exercise performance vs. another.

Figure 2: Rowing History during my period of illness and recovery

So there you have it. Clear signs of my cardiac issues years before the day I was belatedly recognized as an acute cardiac case. Plus, the data belies the initial seasonal exercise-induced asthma diagnosis, since if this had been a seasonal ailment presumably my athletic performance would have rebounded each year after the symptoms faded. Someday perhaps our doctors will make use of all this sensor data we're all gathering these days from Fitbits, Apple watches, Strava, etc., in their diagnoses. To tell you the truth, having doctors mine my personal data is a both little bit exciting and equally scary. Certainly it'll require doctors to develop new skill sets, or maybe the emergence of new medical specialties of diagnostic data analytics, or something like that, along with new privacy regulations and practices. Well, into the future we go, one (recorded) step at a time. 

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*I admit that lately I have developed somewhat of an aversion to exercising outdoors in snow and ice. 

**The orange line in Figure 1 is a fourth order polynomial fit to the data. The coefficients are shown in the figure. A fifth order polynomial tells a similar story, but the curves are a little more exaggerated. Lower order fits don't catch the nuances of the data.

They tried to make me go to rehab, I said, "Yes! Yes! Yes!"

So, I've been going to rehab for about four weeks. Since I'm a musician, I like to say I'm "in rehab", since it has that rock-and-roll substance abuse ring to it (heck, Amy Winehouse got a whole song out of the topic). The truth is much less cool - I'm in cardiac rehab. S

Actually, maybe the rock-and-roller analogy is appropriate: cardiac rehab is where the Woodstock generation is hanging out these days. Most of my fellow rehabbers are in the 70+ age group. Do the math - these are the twenty-somethings of the Summer of Love, now in their last (or perhaps penultimate) chapter. About half of the folks tote around oxygen bottles from machine to machine. Many are a little hard of hearing, and a few are a little mentally fahrblunget.

And then there's the "youngster" of the bunch. The active fifty-something guy who rides his bike to rehab. Who smiles politely every time they give him literature encouraging him to take up exercising, then throws the stuff away - because OF COURSE he's going to take up exercising. RESUME exercising, that is. Who is already walking and experimenting with a little running, biking, doing some gentle yoga, and even doing a modicum of strength training (abs and squats).

Starting rehab was something I really looked forward to in the days following my surgery - a milestone which meant I was ready to start on the path back to normalcy. However, it's been a little bit of a disappointment, since it's clear that rehab is designed for the elderly and sedentary. I grit my teeth and put up with the rehab protocol, which mandates a very gentle progression of exercise. In the fourth week they finally ratcheted things up to the point where some of the exercises raise my heart rate. I mean, it's not like they can't see that the exercises have been too low intensity for me - they watch the readout from the heart rate monitor I wear the whole time I'm there. Well, I guess protocols is protocols. I keep plugging away, and the fact that I'm exercising and my heart activity looks normal is giving me confidence to gently ramp things up in my own exercising.

Plus they have free coffee (though it's decaf).

Springtime Movie Script

Here's a "meet cute" idea for a romantic comedy. It's a lovely springtime day. The boy and the girl each individually decide to go out for a bike ride. They both wind up riding the same bike path and keep getting stuck at red lights together, and begin to exchange witty banter as they wait for each light to turn green. She's young and attractive. He's older, but has a certain seasoned charisma from having lived life fully. When she finishes her ride she walks into a neighborhood cafe to get a cappuccino, and they simultaneously notice each other. Romance ensues.

OK, I am not even remotely in the market to meet anyone, in a cute way or otherwise. And I'm a little short on seasoned charisma. But I did get caught with the same young woman at every red light on the bike path from Columbia Pike to the river. And one time we did actually speak to each other, exchanging a comment about how we were missing every light. When we got to the the intersection of the Mt. Vernon trail I turned left, while she stopped - to meet up with her boyfriend, who had been waiting there for her. And that's when I realized that if I ever indeed found myself in a romcom I'd be the nerdy guy who watches the girl wind up with someone else.

Well, no matter, my goal was to get some bike mileage in, not to find some SWF. I already have the best one of those. And my mood improved when I spotted some unusual ducks on the river - they looked like scaups, or scoters, or something.

Writing "SWF" makes me wonder: in the age of online dating, free from the word count constraints of newspaper personal ads, does anyone even know what "SWF" means anymore? By coincidence, I was speaking with one of the Westover Beer Garden Book Club regulars this evening. She's currently in the market, as they say, and is actively making use of several online dating sites. She's thirty something years old and had no idea that there had been such a thing as personal ads. She may not be aware that there was a time before the Internet. Sigh.

Anyway, this post has been one long digression, hasn't it? Today was my telework day and I planned my work schedule so I could take a break in the afternoon and go for a bike ride. The day was beautiful, warm and sunny. I rode the Arlington Loop: about 18 miles down the W&OD trail, the Four Mile Run connector, up the river on the Mt. Vernon trail, then out the Custis back home. Alas, my wintertime indoor fitness biking doesn't seem to have added much to my pedaling power or stamina. I was still granny gearing it up those choppy hills on the Custis and my weak little quads were feeling it towards the end. The good news is that I had none of the knee pain I had experienced on the 25 mile ride I did a few weeks ago. I stretched before this ride - maybe that made a difference. Or maybe my legs are good for a distance somewhere in [18 - 25) miles.

Bottom line - my job may have its problems, but I love springtime telework days!

A Cold Start to the Biking Season

My recent visit to the Adirondacks somewhat reset my definition of "cold". For some reason I've really been hibernating this winter, always figuring it was too cold to do anything outside. But, I figure, if I can go out and have fun cross-country skiing with temps in the single digits, certainly I can get on my bike and ride with temps in the 50's, right?

Well, the high was forecast to be in the 50's. I set out in the morning when it was still in the high 30's. The temperature was slow to rise, never actually reaching the forecast high, and the day was grey. No problem - I was well bundled up and, with the exception of my feet, stayed warm. My bike apparently likes the cold even less than I do. The front derailleur was balky, hesitating to shift up due to a sticky cable. I used it as little as possible, shifting mostly through the rear gears.

I rode about 25 miles, heading west from the W&OD parking lot at Rt. 28. My original goal had been 30 miles but based on my freezing feet, the way my body was feeling, and my malfunctioning shifter I decided to cut it short. Good thing. At about the 20 mile point the outsides of my knees started to hurt and by the time I finished my ride I was in some significant pain. I'm not sure if this is an IT band issue or something else. I have had this problem at time from running, though never this severe, and never on both knees. I've had this happen before on the bike too. Maybe I'm pushing my distance too hard too soon. I creaked through the last miles at about 10 MPH, seriously contemplating getting off and walking. But I made it. Back at the car I warmed up with some tea from my Thermos, then headed to the nearby Wegman's to restock my coffee K-cup supply. While there I warmed up further with some lunch: spicy tuna rolls (fake crab maki topped with choped tuna bits, topped with three spicy sauces) and a hot cup of coffee. Rejuvenated, I toddled home, considering the ride a success despite the discomfort. I do need to figure this knee problem out - I don't want it to quash my nascent bike riding focus.

Shenandoah Foliage Hike

On Saturday Valerie and I went for a strenuous hike in the woods.

Take a moment. Read that sentence again. And again. Now read this one:

On Saturday I went to a Bar Mitzvah celebration at the home of Abu Bakr al-Bagdhadi, the leader of ISIS.

Which sentence surprised you more?

Well, the fact that this hike happened and was in fact a big a success proves that anyone can change, so maybe there's hope for ol' Abu yet.

The circumstances were a visit to Ted down at JMU. His college sits in the Shenandoah Valley and it was pretty close to peak foliage season so we decided that as our big activity Saturday we'd do some leaf peeping. To tell you the truth, I had set the bar low in terms of what we were going to do - stop at a couple of overlooks, do a short hike up a fire road and then turn back.

After an unexpectedly delicious breakfast at Ted's favorite breakfast place and a quick stroll through the Harrisonburg farmer's market we headed for the hills. There was a backup of cars at the entrance to the park (I thought it might not be bad since we were entering via the Swift Run Gap entrance - far from any cities - but I was wrong). We got a nice surprise, though, when we finally got to the gate - the ranger waved us through the gate without collecting the entrance fee. What's better than peak foliage? FREE peak foliage!

We parked at the South River picnic area lot (mile 63). I figured we'd stroll the South River Falls fire road with a stretch goal of reaching the falls. I didn't bother mentioning the "real" trail, which I figured would be too strenuous. As it happened, on our way out of the parking lot we passed the trail head for the "real" South River Falls Trail. As we looked at the map some people came out and assured us that it wasn't an overly difficult trail. And so off down the trail we went!

Well, it's true it wasn't a killer trail, but it had a lot of elevation change for a non-hike who only recently took up walking - and only on flat, paved trails. Plus there were stream crossings, switchbacks, and rough tread in places. Valerie did really well!!! We wound up hiking the whole South River loop - out on the South River Falls trail, stopping at the falls overlook, then continuing on to where it hit the fire road. From there we took the fire road back. As it happens, this particular fire road isn't that much easier of a hike than the trail, so the way back wasn't a piece of cake either. We made the climb back at a slow pace and skipped the opportunity to do the last little bit on the Appalachian trail, opting instead to hike up to Skyline Drive and finish up on pavement.

Stream Crossing

Along the trail Ted made fun of us a lot for our slow pace, frequently skipping ahead down the trail. I don't let that sort of thing bother me - I can always write him out of the will :) Plus there have been plenty of warm days when he's collapsed into an exhausted lump at a point where I've barely broken a sweat (heat is the penguin's Kryptonite).

The scenery was as grand as expected. Brilliant hues, leaves of all colors all around us. The day was crisp and sunny. Everyone finished the hike happy and a little bit worn out - in a good way.

Perhaps my favorite foliage hike ever, because I did it with my family.

Ted, Out Ahead

Bay Ridge Run

Thomas Wolfe wrote that "Only the Dead Know Brooklyn." Well, it's certainly true that even most of its inhabitants don't know it all. I went out for a run while back in Brooklyn for a visit. I had never realized before how easy it is to get from the Hotel Gregory in Bay Ridge onto the Shore Parkway jogging and bike path that runs along New York Bay. In fact, I can't remember ever having explored this path before despite my having admired it a gazillion times while cruising along the adjacent Belt Parkway (never mind that I should have been watching the road, not the bike path). The path offers a gorgeous view of the harbor, punctuated by the towering visage of the Verrazano Narrows Bridge. When it opened this bridge was the longest suspension bridge in the world and it's still the longest in the U.S. (the latter according to Wikipedia).

There's a real difference in feel between Brooklyn and DC. In the early mornings the W&OD trail near my house is filled with people grimly set on accomplishing some goal - getting their cardio in, doing some mileage. Washington is all about goals, all about the ends, not the means. Everyone is decked out in serious exercise attire, the better to efficiently make their milestones - beating yesterday's time, going the distance.

In contrast, the Shore trail in Brooklyn feels almost like a party at 7 AM. Yeah, there are serious runners, but there are also people just strolling along enjoying the breeze and the view. One guy had set up a lawn chair and was reading the paper. People on bikes pedaled past at a moderate pace - wearing street clothes, no less. Such behavior would be frowned upon among the spandex-clad, breakneck speed "serious" bikers of DC. A group did tai chi with swords. A few people leaned on the railing and watched the ships go by. The people along the Shore trail were really in the moment, enjoying where they were and the experience of being there, not whether their heart rates were in the target zone.

I'm a Brooklynite by background but also an adopted DC'r, so I split the difference. Yes, I had a big grin on my face as I padded along the trail in my Vibrams - the sight of the bridge and the oh-so clearly Brooklyn people made me happy. But, I was also there for serious exercise. After overdoing it a bit on the run (I kept going after one of Achilles tendons screamed "Stop!") I did some exercises at a park bench - dips, squats, lunges, bootslappers, push-ups. This being New York, no one raised an eyebrow at my odd antics. The ground on the trail was a little too trashy to get down on the ground and do exercises so I passed for the moment on some of my routine. I walked up to a little park along the higher level path on the other side of the Belt where I had seen the tai chi practitioners earlier. The ground was cleaner there so I did a few more exercises. After this I thought I was done but my walk back to the hotel took me past Ft. Hamilton High School. I wandered onto the field, where I found a soccer team practicing some odd drills, urging each other on in Spanish. The field itself was artificial turf and badly needed vacuuming -- or whatever it is you do to clean the schmutz off of Astroturf, but still quite usable. I found a quiet corner away from the soccer team and did abdominal work. Finally, I headed back to the hotel and woke up the boys.

I miss that part of the New York attitude - life is a party, go out and enjoy! Washington is so damn serious. I like the (marginally) slower pace of DC, but can't we learn to have some fun?

Gym -- arrgh

I went to the gym today after a long, long absence. I like going to the company gym at a technology firm. There are plenty of other scrawny-lookin' folks there and I never have to feel embarrassed about the not-so-heavy weights I use.

Now to see which aches more tonight, my teeth (I started the day at the dentist) or my muscles.

The Concept 2 Arrives!

My primary form of exercise since Teddy was born has been running. I didn't take it up because I loved it. No, it was just the only exercise I could do on a moment's notice. I'm fortunate to have a really nice bike trail a few blocks from home, which provides a place for some pleasant off-street runs. After 14 years, my morning runs have become an enjoyable habit, except in the extremes of temperature. Running has also been good cross-training for kayaking. Kayaking is my real joy, but given the time involved in getting to and from the water, it's not something I can do every day.

The problem is, the years of running have started to take their toll. LAtely my back and one knee have been bothering me a little bit, and I've come to realize that I have a lot of imbalances in muscle development. Plus, it's winter and it is a little dreary to run in the cold and dark.

I mentioned to my kayaking friend Cyndi that I thought a rowing machine would be a good workout, but I had never been able to get a good workout from one. Cyndi, a competitive kayak racer, took this as a challenge. She took me to her gym and proceeded to torture me with one of the hardest workouts I've ever done - an experience we've now repeated a half dozen times or so. I'm pumped just at the notion that I can row at a pace that (almost) matches hers.

To make a long story short, our little-used treadmill has been sold and in its place is a Concept2 rower I picked up off of Craigslist. Now I can subject myself to torture any time - and have been. It's cool exercise, though I have to admit it's still more fun to be out on the pseudo-water with a partner - particularly someone as relentlessly upbeat as Cyndi.