Nothing Beats a Nice Loop

In life, familiarity can breed contempt but in cycling I believe it breeds confidence and strength. A great training ride is a key element to a happy cycling existence. Luckily, I just found mine on Long Island. I've pieced together some sections from a few rides I've done to create a nice 12 mile loop. The good news is it's twice as long as my prior training loop (Central Park) and the better news is it's 1% as crowded. On the downside, I need to drive 20 minutes to get to it and I'm still a bit skittish about parking at NYIT (although I was successful yesterday).

This "Old Westbury Training Route" as I've named it, gives me some nice options as I can create 24 or 36 mile training rides depending on my mood and what my upcoming ride schedule is looking like. Generally speaking, your mid-week rides should optimally be about 1/3 the distance of your longer weekend rides. Thus, 24/36 mile rides are perfect training for my typical 60-80 mile Saturday rides. Additionally, I've found a few nice hills just off this route if I want to do some hill training.

Instant Classic

I'm only about 30 pages into The Catcher in the Rye but I'm really enjoying the book. I found a page that does a great job illustrating Salinger's writing style and Holden Caulfield's point of view. Holden pays a visit to the house of Mr. and Mrs. Spencer on the way back from Pencey School, from which he was just expelled. Mr. Spencer is one of his teachers.

Enjoy.

Parking Dilemma

Armed with the powerful motivation that starts with each cycling season, I decided to head out for a ride in relatively brisk weather today. I left my house around 11am in order to catch what was likely going to be the warmest part of the day (low 40s).

As I pulled into the Westbury High School parking lot, I saw the security guard who pleasantly let me park there a few weeks ago. I decided to take nothing for granted so I pulled up to him and kindly asked him if I could park there for a bike ride. He gave me a stern no, stating there's no parking during school hours. I referred back to last time and he hinted it was after hours (he's right, it was). I asked him if there was anywhere else to park and he indicated it was a difficult area to find parking.

I left the lot in search of street parking. But all the side streets are very narrow and didn't appear to have any room. I saw a mail carrier and asked him where I could park -- he said there aren't many spots but pointed to an area maybe I could try. I didn't feel comfortable parking where he suggested.

I decided to cruise around a bit to find parking but everything was so tight and residential -- my excitement about cycling on Long Island was starting to fade. If I couldn't find a place to park mid-week, how was I going to do training rides? Just as I was about to give up, I saw a cyclist riding on the street so I pulled up and asked him about parking -- he lives in the area so he never needs to park. He also acknowledged how difficult parking was but suggested a municipal lot over by the LIE.

I found the lot but unfortunately it was for the town hall, courtroom and police department. I decided to go in and ask the cops what the town parking regulations were and where I could park. "No street parking in the whole town of Old Westbury", one cop said. "So I'm screwed, huh?" I asked. The cop then hinted that while it was 20 minute parking in their lot that they wouldn't break my balls if I left my bike there for a few hours to ride. But that they didn't want it turning into 50 cyclists parking there every day. I appreciated his kind offer but it didn't seem sustainable. The second cop suggested I check the colleges on Northern Blvd.

I pulled into the New York Institute of Technology and found a lot about 1/4 mile into the campus drive. I didn't see any signs for permits so I asked a few students. They all said that permits were required but that it's never enforced as half of them don't even have them ‎stuck in their windows. This felt like the spot to park, but it was almost 1pm and I was getting hungry. I decided to go home and try this lot the next time I ride. If it works out, the New York Institute of Technology is actually a great spot to park because it's on the route of the training ride I've been doing.

I'm also going to check with members of the LIBC to see if they have any suggestions for mid-week parking.

Literary Classics Revisited

My frequent library visits and search for interesting new books have actually made me yearn for the classics.

I'm starting with The Catcher in the Rye. Oddly enough, the library has only two copies and they are both in horrific shape. Not sure what this says about my first reading choice but I'm definitely enjoying the first few pages. Salinger has an crisp and deliberate writing style. It's matter of fact but insightful at the same time.

I'm thinking my next book will be A Separate Peace by John Knowles, however I'm flexible. Let me know if you have any suggestions. If nothing else it would be nice to know if anyone actually reads this blog or if it's the literary equivalent of a tree falling in a forest.

What a Difference a Year Makes

Just a refresher that the SIG is a 12 week progressive Saturday ride series that starts with a 40 mile ride at about 15mph and ends with a 100 mile ride at about 19mph. Last year, I could barely finish the 40 mile ride at a 15mph pace. I started out in the first group but go dropped (quickly) as as I was dropping from group to group I had leaders (who didn't know I was a leader - but who could blame them, I sucked) yelling at me "keep spinning your legs" to which I yelled back with the limited breath I had "I'M A F*CKING LEADER!!!!" as my legs twitched and buckled.

This year, the captain of the SIG program introduced me as a guy who has ridden his bike around the world and "it's early in the season so he's not much to look at but trust me he'll form into a great rider later on". OUCH. Well embarrassment is a great motivator. I was in much better shape this year. In fact, I was borderline strong. I guess the spinning has paid off, which is great.

I'm really motivated to ride this year. Each year it feels like I enjoy the start of the season more and more. With my semi-retirement status, I'm thinking I should be able to break last year's mileage mark of 3,600 miles although I don't want to pressure myself too hard.

Here's to a great ride season.

Stimulate This: Immovable Object (Entitlement) Meets Unstoppable Force (Boomer Deflation)

The problem with our society and economy really comes down to three things: entitlement, entitlement, entitlement.

You see, the wealth game is over and our standard of living has seen its greatest day. It will not increase from here -- it won't even stay the same. The sooner we can come to grips this with as a nation, the better. Only our sense of entitlement stands in the way.

For the past 25 years our incredible economic prosperity and resulting wealth creation was driven by the surge of the Baby Boomers. The Boomers are the greatest ponzi scheme of all time. They have moved through our economy like a rat through a snake, resulting in too much infrastructure and astronomical asset prices that haven't correlated with underlying economic fundamentals for years. Like every bubble, people thought this growth was going to persist forever. Irrational exuberance at its best.

But Americans feel as if they are entitled to wealth and a resulting ever improving standard of living. The problem is that wealth is a residual function of economic growth and capital allocation. You can't create wealth out of thin air, particularly when you are reliant upon external capital to support it (and your consumption). As a general rule as it relates to stimulus, anything the government does to directly support wealth (e.g. buying mortgages or preventing foreclosures), will be throwing good money after bad. It's a classic case of the tail wagging the dog.

"Stimulus" should be directed toward fixing the structural anomalies that have emerged in our economy. Financial services have become a huge unproductive bubble in our economy driven by the equity bull market, ridiculous concept of retirement (to be addressed in another post) and the financing of assets (which have mistakenly been assumed to always go up in price). The government needs to help transition people that leave financial services into other parts of our economy that will drive real economic growth (and wealth) in the future. Trying to keep the finance game going will also wrongly entice people to try and stay in the game.

Wealth creation through assets and investments will only resume once our infrastructure and asset prices have reset to a post-Boomer equilibrium and a new demographic group starts to pressure our infrastructure. This should happen somewhere after 2020. Until then, expect deflation and plenty of it.

Just One Ride

That's all it took to restoke the cycling fires inside me. I'm really excited to explore the North Shore of Long Island by bike this year. Further, I'm amped up to find a big touring trip. I really don't know where, when, how or for how long it might be, but I'm very open to the idea and am doing some exploring on the subject.

Until then.