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I finally had a good riding weekend, after six weeks of lethargy and not much riding at all. I went with Randy, Mike, Robert, and Jeff, all very enthusiastic and just enough faster than me to push me a bit. I don’t normally use much energy gel on shorter rides, but today we only we 35 miles and I used two! The last ten miles I wasn’t even hanging on to the pace, I was just making it back, but it felt really good so I know I hadn’t bonked, my legs were just tired and didn’t have much power.

What happened to my reasonably frequent blog posts about cycling? How am I progressing towards my goal of 3000 miles this year?

Well, I could ramble on about it, but really, two main factors have contributed to me not riding much over the past six weeks. First there was the travel, followed by a busy patch at work, followed by the extreme heat of late July and most of August. I just don’t enjoy riding when it’s 95 degrees fahrenheit out. Second, there is the crushing let-down I feel from the ongoing doping scandals in cycling.

It’s very confusing even for a cycling fan who’s willing to read multiple-page articles from different viewpoints and stakeholders to try to sort it out; I’m probably thinking too much about it because my unscientific observations of the general public say they just mostly believe one way or the other, and they don’t worry too much about the evidence either way. I divide it in to several groups of stakeholders — the cyclists themselves, their teams and doctors, the sponsors, the anti-doping agencies, and the police. There’s so much vitriol between some of the groups, particularly the cyclists and the anti-doping agencies, I have no idea who’s right, if anyone.

I just like to ride my bike, I like to hang around with other people who like to ride their bikes, and when there’s a big bike race on, I want it to be entertaining. I want to see people crack under pressure, and I want to see them redeem themselves some day later. The Tour de France gave us a very human spectacle that way this year. I could just do without all these extracurriculars and the news they generate.

As for the part about riding my bike, I’m only at 1500 miles so far, so I’m WAY off the pace to make my goal of 3000 miles during 2006. There’s a chance I’ll pick it up quite a bit since it’s already a bit cooler than it was a couple weeks ago, though the days are getting noticably shorter so that’s going to be a concern. We’re still getting temps in the low 90’s, but at least it’s not tickling 100, and those few extra degrees make a huge difference to me.