There’s a lot to be said about 2020, for better or for worse.
Fear not - I’m going to say almost none of it here. Almost. No - this one is just a review of the past year in cycling. And to be clear, only my past year in cycling. I’m sure there other, very informative sources on the status of the industry, or of cycling in sport, or what have you. But when it comes to cycling, my own riding is my sole point of expertise.
Distance
My goal for this past year was to get to 2000 miles. This seemed a reasonable, achievable increase from my ultimate 2019 total of 1722 miles (well, technically 1722.34, but who’s counting...).
It’s not a huge increase to go up from 1722 to 2000 miles, but riding takes time. And while it’s definitely one of my favorite ways to spend that time, that means it competes with other things like, oh, say, work and eating and sleeping. 1722 had been challenging to squeeze into my existing schedule, so it seemed an achievable increase. And I do always try to remember that I need to compare myself to myself.
Of course, 2020 brought along significant changes that none of us predicted in December of 2019. Most of the changes have been pretty awful, and that’s been well detailed elsewhere. But as we all saw, staying close to home and staying distant from others was a major boon for cycling in general, and this was true for me as well.
In my case, I was one of the fortunate few that I was able, and allowed, to do my work from home. Let me say first that I fully recognize this puts me in at a level of blessing that many others were not allowed, and I am very appreciative of that. And, given that, it seemed like it would be wrong not to take advantage of what it offered in terms of opportunity.
In many ways, what the change in work style illustrated for me was the amount of time spent getting to and from work sites, distinguished in this case by its absence. Time not spent on the road in my car equated to available time for riding, particularly in the longer days of the summer. It also meant opportunities for shorter rides over lunch periods that I would have otherwise spent with co-workers. This latter part I missed, and miss still. The driving, well, not so much.
All of which is to say that my mileage for 2020 came out to 3005.48.
This is obviously well past the 2000 mile goal that I set for 2020, but of course that was set against an expectation of a typical year. The other numbers surrounding it reflect the realities of the situation as well:
- Number of rides: 184 - up from 121 in 2019
- Average distance per ride: 16.33 miles - up from 14.23
- Total ride time: 226 hours, 7 minutes - up from 137 hours, 16 minutes
- Average time per ride: 1 hour, 13 minutes - up from 1 hour, 8 minutes
While I’m happy with the improvement, and have certainly benefitted from the additional exercise it’s involved, in some ways it is hard to see it as much of an accomplishment. It’s more an artifact of the difference in the structure of the year than anything else. Although I was pleased that I managed to squeak that last little bit over the 3k mark - that took some actual work, with multiple short lunchtime rides over the month of December. The effort there ended up with 23 rides for the month - the highest month of the year (though not the longest distance, given the necessity for shorter rides). I do ride year round, but I’d be lying to both you and myself if I didn’t admit that the number of rides usually drops in the winter months. By way of comparison, I had only 10 rides in December of 2019.
Machines
2020 was my first full year with my Catrike Expedition.
Valencia at Rend Lake
This Atomic Orange machine first arrived in late July 2019, and very quickly became, as intended, my primary machine, replacing the blue Catrike Pocket that had been my entry into recumbent triking.
I note here that the Expedition is my primary machine, and this is absolutely the case. According to Cyclemeter, I’ve now ridden the Expedition further in the past 18 months than the lifetime totals for either the Pocket, or for the ‘87 Cannondale SR400 that had been my primary ride before getting the Pocket. This is notable, given that I had the Pocket for over two years prior to getting the Expedition, and I first started tracking rides in Cyclemeter on the Cannondale in 2010.
That said, I did get out on the Pocket a few times this fall. While I had resized it for MLW, I had to take the Expedition in for a shifter repair, and she graciously allowed me to borrow it since my trike was going to be out of commission for a couple of weeks.
Of course, I do still have the Cannondale and could have ridden it for a couple of weeks.
Cannondale SR400 waiting… and waiting…
It is perfectly functional - in good operating condition and ready to go at any point. It still occupies a point of prominence in the garage. But this year, like in 2018, I rode it exactly one time.
That event was in April, and I distinctly remember it because it is literally the only ride I can remember wishing was just over before I got to the end of it since I was a kid (and those childhood situations generally involved trying to navigate gravel on the way to or from a friend’s house - riding for transportation and out of necessity, as opposed to enjoyment). The Cannondale was just not a pleasant riding experience compared to the Expedition. I seem to be getting a little spoiled.
As a result, getting a chain gobbler from TerraCycle to put on the Pocket is on my near-future to-do list. Then I can borrow it from MLW if needed (and if she’ll let me) without having to repeatedly re-size the chain. I like this idea also because there are circumstances where the Pocket is actually the preferable option. For example, when I take cars in to the shop, I’ll usually put a bike or trike in the car so I can get home. The Expedition fits well in my Mobile Trike Garage (Subaru Outback), but it’s a much tighter squeeze into our other cars. Being able to quickly set up the Pocket, with its smaller, more manageable frame, for those trips would make it an easy choice for those events.
...And would also likely further mothball the Cannondale. There’s a part of me that is a little sad about that, but a larger part that thinks it’s a natural part of cycling evolution...
Trips
One of the enduring benefits of rural life is that most of my rides start and end at my driveway. But I do enjoy periodically exploring trails and different riding opportunities. However, historically these often occurred for me as part of work trips - I would take my trike along for the trip, and at the end of the workday I would find a trail nearby to explore. But where the pandemic gaveth in terms of riding time, it took away in term of trips. This was further complicated by the fact that, as in many places, state parks in Illinois were closed as part of lockdown for most of the spring. But there were still a few opportunities:
- In the Before Times of mid-February we took a family trip down to the Orlando area. This offered me an opportunity to ride the Withlacoochee Trail and to try out an HP Gekko. As a bonus, the Gekko also introduced me to an excellent brand of mirror.
- At the beginning of May Governor Pritzker re-opened some of the state parks, so I took the opportunity ride further down the Hennepin Feeder Canal Trail, this time from Route 172 to just south of the Green River Aqueduct. I’d intended to ride all the way to junction of the feeder canal and the main canal, but a tree blockade and tire troubles conspired to prevent that.
- With the lack of travel, I started to find myself getting into a riding rut by mid-summer, and so I laid out some new, longer routes . Some of these were successful, and others less so, but in all cases I have seen much more of my part of rural northern Illinois than I ever had before.
- The Farmondo, which is usually the one group ride that I join for, did not happen this year, but the organizers of the Tour of Scenic Ogle County (TOSOC) pivoted and shifted the event into a virtual ride, so I joined for that instead. This ride got me my first metric century and offers up some of the most beautiful scenery in all of northern Illinois. I am generally a solitary rider, but I’m giving serious consideration to adding this as a second group event going forward.
- Lastly, I wasn’t able to do my usual Black Friday Ride along Military Ridge Trail in Wisconsin this year, so I decided to take the holiday to take a shot at getting further along the main Hennepin Canal Trail.
Valencia at Hennepin Canal
I had a couple of other areas of more technical and/or artistic exploration in 2020:
- The additional time on the roads around my home allowed me to appreciate the natural scenery, of course, but also to recognize patterns in the unnatural phenomena that also seems to be an unfortunate, perpetual part of the rural countryside (read: garbage. But fancy pictures of said garbage, so...).
Unnatural Phenomena
- I finally got my trike trailer finished. Well... mostly finished - finished enough to make it functional, to allow me to put it to some real-world work and, if I’m being honest, likely as finished as it’s going to get.
- In the territory of trike maintenance I seem to have finally sorted out how to properly set the alignment and adjust the derailleur on my Expedition. You might quiet reasonably say that this should be an area that any cyclist can manage, but my skills in this area are historically feeble, so any progress is a good thing.
Next Year?
Usually I wrap these up by looking at goals for cycling in the coming year. And usually, I start that with looking at mileage, but I’m honestly not sure what to think about prospects for next year. As I mentioned at the outset, I’m pleased with my distance for 2020, but in so many ways, that’s an artifact of what, hopefully for the world in general, was a temporary situation. But I also feel like I should be trying to at least maintain what I’ve arrived at. And I’ve set longer routes and learned more about managing longer trips than I’ve done in the past.
So hopefully it won’t seem like I am just satisficing by shooting for 3000 miles again in 2021. I mean, I am satisficing, but hopefully it doesn’t just seem that way...
And would like to do more by way of longer rides. I managed a half-century and a metric century this year, but only one of each. I’d love to do a century eventually, but I don’t think that’s realistic with my schedule, but I think it would make sense to fit in more outings in the 50-60 mile range.
I had set a goal for 2020 to explore more trails, but aside from Withlacochee and returning to Hennepin, that turned out to be a no-go. And I did not make it out to the I&M Canal Trail this year (I would have sworn that I did, but the last time was actually in 2019), so that’s going to be on my list for 2021.
And I’ll add on a final goal that also got shunted to the side from last year - fitting in stops at restaurants or taverns along my routes. This seemed like a good idea in the abstract last year, but I really look forward to embracing it in the coming year as things hopefully open back up.
So - let’s bid adieu (a good f*&king riddance) to 2020...