Tuesday, February 26, 2013

A different kind of bike race

I am nervous and excited. It is the same feeling I get before a bike race, but Greg and I are going to try a new kind of bike "race", at least new to us. Our bike race will cover 5000 miles for 100 days, starting March 1st in Crescent City, CA.

We will post short updates to this TMT blog; and, if you want more detail you can follow us @ gregandheidibike.blogspot.com. We would love to have people come ride with us; so, if you can, check out where we are and come ride some (slow!) miles with us.

Happy cycling,
Heidi

Wednesday, February 20, 2013

Friday, February 15, 2013

Trainer season

Trainer time again
Old legs complain. What to watch?
"Lost Girl" season three!

Wednesday, February 13, 2013

Tuesday, February 5, 2013

Biking to Work Helps Kids Concentrate

This is an interesting post from The Atlantic Cities that gives us another reason to support the Wisconsin Bike Fed's Safe Routes to School program (as if we really needed one).  Kids who ride to school concentrate better!

http://www.theatlanticcities.com/commute/2013/02/kids-who-walk-or-bike-school-concentrate-better-study-shows/4585/

Saturday, February 2, 2013

Wind trainer, weights, skiing and beer brewing - it must be winter in Wisconsin

Jim Merrifield

Time once more to get ready for the season ahead. Try to hit that magic combination of ingredients - weight lifting, XC skiing, intervals, yoga, rest and perhaps more importantly, beer brewing. After all, I want to come into the season looking forward to racing every weekend for the next whole lotta months. I do not want to be burned out and as an "aging athlete", it is no longer about trying to come into the new season fitter and stronger than last season. It is more about hanging on for dear life to what little is left. But how best to do that? I have never found a winter devoted to XC skiing to get me there, fun though skiing is. Weights and wind trainer sessions have been more effective - but boring and can readily lead to burnout. Especially if I obsess about - what is the workout of the day? In years past, I had a coach to do the thinking for me. That made sense for a while and kept me from over-thinking it all. Now I am on my own, and while I have a pretty good understanding of what works for me and how to read my training performance, it is way too easy to overthink it all. Better to obsess about something that is easier to control and less critical (in some respects at least) - beer brewing! It satisfies the former chemist in me (PhD in organometallic chemistry) and has put me on a quest or 4 - to clone some of my favorite beers. And I like complex beers. So far, I like my barley wine (enough to give it a name - Essence of Mirth) and my smoked lager is killer. Working on a Delirium Tremens clone but am not close yet. One of my current works in progress that I am reasonably pleased with is a Belgium quadruple bock. I have pretty much settled on the grains and hops but am playing with fermentation temperature profile and yeast combo. Here is what I have so far after 4 attempts:
2 gallons water heated to 155 and added
1 lb Caramunich
0.5 lb Biscuit malt
0.3 lb Aromatic
0.25 lb Special B
0.25 lb Chocolate malt
0.5 Victory malt
Steeped at 150 for 60 minutes. Sparged with 160F (about 3 pints)water and then added
12 lbs amber LME
Heated to boiling and added
1.5 oz Styrian Golden pellets and boiled 60 minutes
At same time added 1/8 lb dark raisins, 1/8 lb dried cherries, 1 long cinnamon sticks, about 15 cloves and about 15 peppercorns, all in a boiling bag.
15 minutes from end of boil added 0.25 oz Styrian Golding and 0.25 oz Hallertau
1 minutes from end of boil added 0.25 oz Styrian Golding and 0.25 oz Hallertau
Added 1lb hard dark rock candi and then cooled with chiller
Added 2 gallons cold water to fermenter and filtered wort in.
Added 1 lb dark Belgian candi syrup (180L)
Bring final volume up to 5.25 gallons
Pitched yeast (Wyeast Trappist HG 3787, Belgian Ardennes, 3522 and Belgian abbey, 1214) at 66F.
Initial SG = 1.098
3 days at about 68 then ramp the fermenter up to 80F and then allow to come back to 68.
Bottled about 1 month later - SG = 1.020 Best aged for at least 6 months.