Bike Commute - Spring is HERE!

Spring in Washington

Growing up, summer was always my favorite season. School was out, weather was warm, what's not to love? I could never understand those who said that spring was their favorite - especially in New England where snow stayed on the ground until at least April, trees didn't bloom until sometime in May, and there was that in-between season called "mud season." No, not my favorite... until I moved to Washington.

Enter: Cherry Blossoms.

Pink is the best color!

Minus the mayhem that comes with the cherry blossoms (ahem... people and LOTS of them, bad traffic on streets and sidewalks, and people forgetting their common sense and stopping their cars in the middle of the road to take photos - true story!!), this is hands-down the BEST time of year down here.

Tidal Basin on my AM ride into the city

We've had an exceptionally warm late winter, causing the cherry blossoms to bloom a few weeks early, thus giving me an absolutely fantastic bike commute home. So fantastic that I played tourist and took about 15 photos during my ride, stopping every couple blocks around the Mall and Tidal Basin. So fantastic that I pulled over and offered to take a family photo for a group of tourists (don't worry, hell is not frozen over, I checked - it's just that those darn blossoms put me in such a great mood). To top everything off, I saw friends out on the bike trail on the rest of my ride home (Hi Tim, glad the Walter Reed hill was kind to you!!) and now I'm having frozen yogurt for dessert. Huzzah! I love spring!

Blooms around the Monument

Looking towards the Tidal Basin

Bike Commuting - GetSetGO!

So my first bike commute of 2012 happened today. It's February and the temperatures were supposed to hit the high 60s - who could resist two wheels in open air with weather like that?!? I didn't even need my Gore Windstopper jacket on the AM ride in, it was that nice outside. This was my first commute to our office since we moved from L'Enfant Plaza to a new building a little north of Union Station and it involves a little more dodging and weaving of traffic and potholes, but overall it wasn't nearly as bad as I thought it would be. I did manage to get lost in the 1/2 mile between the Mall and Union Station and found myself on an overpass over the train tracks headed to the wrong part of town. Sigh. Maybe tomorrow's commute will be a little less directionally-challenging. I had company on the commute home with my co-worker/friend/fellow-triathlete Janine. She's bike commuted a bunch of times to the new office (and she is smart and has lights on her bike, something I need to get on PRONTO) so I stuck myself to her back wheel as we headed back over the river to the motherland.

It was so nice not to deal with Metro at all today. While I had nurtured hopes that my commute time would be substantially shorter by bike compared to Metro, the vast number of traffic lights between Union Station and the 14th Street Bridge put the kibosh on that one real fast. Both commutes are comparable (but the one by bike is far more reliable and overall more pleasant). If this warm weather sticks around (because, let's face it, I am a fair-weather bike commuter), I'll be on my bike to and from work alot more often.

Bike Commute Bonk and Other Adventures

I've been fed up for awhile with the inefficiencies (and high cost) of Metro, so a few weeks ago I started biking to work. My commute now takes less time AND I'm in a much better mood when I arrive at my destination. The commute is about 22 miles round-trip... and this means I'm burning about 800 additional calories a day... which means I need to eat more. I figured this out firsthand when I didn't eat an afternoon snack on Friday and on my commute home, I could feel myself starting to bonk. All I could think about was food and I was rapidly slowing down - soon I found myself being passed by kids, elderly ladies, guys riding stunt bikes 5 sizes too small for them.

Saturday I did one of my favorite bike rides with some good friends - Skymass. The first thirty miles are up, up, up Skyline drive. This is followed by a fun descent into Luray in the valley, which is quickly followed by a steep, terrible, horrible, no-good, very bad climb. But you feel really good when you get to the top. Unless you're like me and fall off your bike when you reach the top... because you didn't unclip fast enough. The rest of the ride is downhill, rollers, and a fast ride back home. We biked in a pace line, which I've never done before. I'm still skittish about riding so close to someone's wheel, but I think I'll get more comfortable the more rides I do like this. Plus, it makes you go FAST - I did this ride 30 minutes faster than the last time I did it. 80 (hilly) miles in 4:56. It also always seems to rain at the end of the ride. We got caught in a downpour about 10 miles from our cars. Oh well, cooled us off. There was thunder and lightening too, so I decided to drive back home and do the remaining 32 miles of my ride in Arlington - good choice because the storms never followed me home.

Today was a long run AND my first ice bath of the season. My legs are still sore from the weekend, but I think they'd feel worse if I didn't do the ice bath. Mark arrived home on Friday night and it has been great to have him home. Not only do I have someone besides the dog to talk to, he makes a mean burger and a mean enchilada - I have missed him (and his cooking :) )

The weather finally cooled off tonight, so I baked up a storm. I've been going through baking withdrawal since our AC broke and it's been so hot - the last thing you want to do is run the oven. I made my mom's strawberry bread recipe (but in muffin form). These muffins have ALWAYS reminded me of summer. We (my mom, really) used to make them in the summers after we went strawberry picking. Strawberry season in NH is in June, so we'd always have these muffins around the end of school and when we'd go up to the lakehouse. Lots of good memories associated with my mom's strawberry muffins.

Next week looks like it will be a good week - lots of good training, my sister-in-law Allie is coming to visit, and we're planning on going to a winery and doing some stand-up paddleboarding next weekend!