09.04.08
NYC Century training
In the past week I was able to get three good training rides in on my fixie to prep for the NYC Century this Sunday. Two and a half weeks ago, I was still sick with a sinus infection and coughing up a lot of sputum. I wasn’t sure if I was going to get over it in time to get enough training time in, but I was able to get 62, 68, and 76 mile rides in with little spinning/recovery rides in between.
Yesterday’s 76 mile ride was the longest ride I’d ever done on a fixedgear bike. When I left the house at 10:30, it was so overcast that my GPS had trouble acquiring satellites. Not too long afterwards, it started getting pretty hot and sunny. As someone dealing with cGvHD, I have to be careful about being out in the sun too long. While my skin seems to be a little less sensitive to sun than it was last year, I’m still sensitive. To prepare myself for being outside for several hours while riding the century, I figured that tanned skin would fare better than untanned skin, and I’d be less apt to burn. Last year, I seemed to fare pretty well, but I was totally paranoid the entire time. And it was sunny and hot last year. So, for the last two weeks, I’ve been intentionally going out in the late morning with my exposure to the afternoon sun spanning through to as late as 3:30. I got tanned each time with no real adverse effects that I can see or feel. (One of the scary warnings I received right after my BMT, when the possibility of acute GvHD was high, was “explosive GvHD”, in which a sunburn could lead to death within 14 days.)
As it turns out, this Sunday might be wet and rainy with hurricane Hannah hitting Long Island by early Sunday morning. I probably won’t have to worry about the sun, but if it’s rainy, there’s another GvHD related risk that might crop up. Pneumonia. Also, I was hoping to ride my fixie, but it only has one brake, the front brake, that I use only when I can’t stop the bike in time with the pedals in typical fixedgear fashion. But as my condition with GvHD persists, I try hard as possible not to crash or injure myself since this can lead to a GvHD flare-up or other bad immune system related problems, such as organ failure. So, I might default back to riding the Zion, which I rode the last two years. It’s got disc brakes and is a better “bad weather” bike.