Our new gym buddy!

We’ve been doing well keeping up with our training, making sure we’re covering at least ten miles every other day and our 30 mile training rides every other weekend.


Even though the blossom has bloomed, the nights are still not as long as we’d like to take our training totally outside – plus it’s also necessary to work out with weights to strengthen our muscles and core. When we haven’t made it outside we’ve been in the gym.


After our first month of visiting the gym, we found a new friend tucked away in the circuit room of the YMCA – Expresso Experience machines. These are totally awesome as it’s a bit like a computer game where you can see where you ride:



You even move the handles and gears.


Obviously it’s not as good as the real thing – but there’s no traffic lights to stop for, which means you can keep you heart beat up and you can choose great routes with lots of hills! You can create a log- in and race against yourself etc, but I’m happy setting the pacer to my last ride and beating that.


Last night I moved up to the challenging routes, and it took me 40 minutes to ride 8 miles! It was such amazing workout, but I was literally dripping afterwards.


I’m starting to realise that during all my previous visits to the gym before starting this challenge, I wasn’t really properly working out - sitting on a bike while watching the TV and hardly breaking a sweat.


Well I sure am sweating now! We are both going to have to start taking a towel with us when training; I had to go to a pilates class afterwards looking like I had wet myself. Not pretty.


Double thumbs up for Expresso!

We will be cycling the Pacific Coast Highway from Vancouver to Tijuana over six weeks starting in August 2012 to raise money for Leukaemia & Lymphoma Research. Please show your support by sponsoring us here, leaving a comment and sharing our blog.

Improving my Cadence (and I’m not talking Club Penguin)

It’s amazing how quickly our fitness has improved.

Our first training ride, I was going uphill at less than 4 MPH and in the lowest gear possible – last night I was hitting some in 5^th gear.

OK, OK to you cycle pros out there that might seem nothing, but it’s a vast improvement in a few weeks.

DJ Cadence Club Penguin

What is Cadence?

For those of you that don't know, in cycling (not music like DJ Cadence above) , cadence is the number of revolutions of the crank per minute – basically how quickly you turn the pedals. 

On our last ride, Dave said to me “you might want to try increasing your gears, as your little legs are going round like the clappers.”

As I wasn’t that confident I had been keeping my gears either low or mid range. Realizing this, I’m actually burning excess energy being in a lower gear than I would be in a higher.

Turning up it up a gear (or 5)

I flicked up to 3 and 7 and I was like – wow that’s so much easier. I know that I couldn’t have rode in that gear when we first started, but as my muscles have strengthened (must be all that chocolate milk) I can.

You can really feel the resistance in your legs. I’m actually now slightly worried about what I’m going to look like at the end of this ride.

I was reading a blog from another couple who rode from Vancouver to San Diego in 2011. In one of their last posts Lucas said Amy’s thighs had DOUBLED in size – jeez!

Perhaps I won’t be able to wear my hot pants on the beach in Tijuana after all... 

We will be cycling the Pacific Coast Highway from Vancouver to Tijuana over six weeks starting in August 2012 to raise money for Leukaemia & Lymphoma Research. Please show your support by sponsoring us here, leaving a comment and sharing our blog.