Way back when, when I was a “beer journalist” I thought, one day, that I had broken my foot. I set up an appointment with my doctor, Dr Ralph Yates, and went in, After listening to my description he had me take off my shoes. At one glance he said, “You’ve got gout.” “No, it hurts too much.” “Yes, but you have gout. We can get an x-ray so you are assured, but you’ve got gout.” I limped down to the x-ray place and got one. One that showed there was nothing wrong with my bones. I had gout.
We discussed treatment. It has been nearly 20 years since then. All I remember is that of all the treatments only one made sence to me: exercise. I bought a bicycle, a Bike Friday. (Yes, the place that Kent works at today.) And I started to ride. My commute to work was five miles. This, bicycle commuting, was a path to curing gout. With commuting I no longer had a choice about to get my exercise or not. I had to go to work. I was a bicycle commuter so I had to ride. And so I did.
Talking with a brewer he volunteered to ride with me on a long ride sometime. I heard about RACC, Ride Around Clark County. They had a metric century as one option. The brewer had suggesting a half century, 50 miles, as the long ride. I countered with a metric century. He liked that, I was upping the distance.
I did that ride. And others followed, Monster Cookie, that was one that I completed. There were other rides that I completed. And many that I did not complete. But I kept plugging away at it. Then one day I rode a 60 miles to celebrate Del Schaffenberg’s birthday. Afterwards, I wished him well and left. I had a ride I was hosting. It was an Ice Cream social for Slug Velo. We went to three or four ice cream places. We did not drop anyone. That was a thing about Slug Velo rides we made sure everyone was welcome and nobody, not anybody, got dropped. I had ridden a metric century before the Slug ride. Metric Centuries had become normal, just time on the bike.
Last week I walked seven miles, a mile a day. Well I do it at two miles an hour. This is a lot like when I started bicycling. Slow, not very far. With a full year of not going to the hospital for the first time in four years I am setting goals for my walking. Get my pace up to three miles per hour. And to resume the goal I had when I went into the aortic valve replacement and stayed there for six weeks. I had a goal of a half marathon, 13.1 miles. I was up half of that quickly and then 10 miles. I was set to complete the half marathon in early October. Instead I was just being transferred to rehab location after a month in the hospital.
It is easy to see the distance goals, The aerobic conditioning is tougher I do not know how much I can increase my speed. But I have it anyway.
Those are my physical goals for 2021 On a base of a mile a day at two miles per hour.
— Michae1Rpax :: rkmm/48
