Worldly Wanda Tour de Fremont, 60+ mile ride completed! Details here!

For my second year in support of a good cause, I signed up for the Worldly Wanda Tour de Fremont. Both supporting a non-profit group based locally in Fremont that helps promote gender equality, and allowing to ride a challenging path, Saturday was quite an event :) Sometimes it can be tough for some folks to be able to wake up early on a Saturday morning, cycle to Lake Elizabeth and being a beautiful journey Touring the Tri-City area and San Jose, however this brave soul did ;)

I met a lot of friendly folks along this journey, each one of us sharing a common goal-- To finish in one piece. All shapes, sizes and genders were participating in this event, and they even had events for the less crazy-- i.e. 4 mile, 10, 20, and 40 for those who are building up their endurance. One thing to note was their path this year was modified from last, which included less populated roads = good thing (last year I felt myself competing with the 4-wheeled, all-metal bumper cars)

All in all, it was a great tour, a wonderful test of my endurance, and a breathtaking view of the Bay Area during springtime-- What more can one ask for? It was an opportunity for one to find peace within themself, with the surroundings near them, and with the energy all around us-- It felt mutually satiating :)

After all that hard work and climbing up hills (which is another topic I would like to write about sometime in the future), the treat of fresh made, piping hot chili with cheese and onions was awaiting at the finish line, back at the start line.

This is something so wonderful to be a part of, physically rewarding, and beneficial for the local charity-- a win-win situation. Count me in for next year's 60-mile and beyond!!

PS: Here's the link for all the Garmin details (including my health stats and GPS map of the trail) located here:

Garmin Connect -Activity Details for Untitled

more geeky info....

Specifics about the linux filesystem and filesystem refresher (IBM):

http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/linux/library/l-linux-filesystem/

Information on what an inode is:

http://www.linfo.org/inode.html

How I feel at the moment:

http://icanhascheezburger.files.wordpress.com/2010/03/funny-pictures-cat-waits-for-meatloaf1.jpg

Post-Sierra thoughts

We hit up Sierra-at-Tahoe this morning with a group of good friends. For the old-schoolers, Sierra-at-Tahoe used to be called Sierra Ski Ranch back in the day ;)

Sierra has a special place in my memory, as the first place I learned to hate skiing and snowboarding :P Especially since the "easiest" run was the almighty Sugar-and-Spice, which they should aptly rename it to "Leg torture and hatred for all beginners" or something of that effect-- Anyway, I'll save the Sierra war-stories for another time. Some memories of how terrified I was as a beginner at Sierra some 15+ years ago, and how the perspective has changed since then.

Today-- I was accompanied by some good friends who were practicing their 'leafing' (going down the mtn in a side to side motion keeping on one side of the board) as well as carving; They were able to keep up their own with going down the Blue squares :)

The weather was great, not too hot (like last time), not too cold, and the snow was just right-- Not too much powder, and no ice = happy campers. All-in-all, it wasn't a record-breaking number of times we took runs, however what we lacked in quantity we comped for quality-- These were a great group of folks to board with, especially when goofing off!

Maybe the next time I head up I'll try a black diamond once or twice, remember how it was like to once fear it, now have some capability of being able to conquer it one run at a time :)

Back into the swing of things tomorrow, start of a new week, and a Monday. Hopefully I can make it up the stairs at work :P

Good night folks -- Ant

Post-Kirkwood thoughts

Good morning folks,

Just thought I'd share my experience from skiboarding yesterday at Kirkwood. If you're like me, skiing, snowboarding, skiboarding all take a toll on the legs. Most of the backside runs yesterday tied out my calves, hamstrings, and quads to the point past LT (lactate threshold) and basically had jelly legs.

In preparation of the remaining part of this season and into next year, I'm looking forward to build more leg endurance. Came across this site and thought I'd share:

http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/legpower.htm

It doesn't look easy; Then again nothing that is good for us ever is ;-)

For now, cardio, cycling, lunges, squats, and now one-legged pistols are chalked on the list of exercises to do.

We'll see how things progress...