NYC Journal

I played with my steel IBIS today. It is presently rigged as a 1x11 XTR full rigid with a 2.5 wide tire on the front and a perhaps 2.25 on the rear. The 2.25 is a very tight fit. These overwide tires actually are effectively a 27 inch tire on the front, and a 25 inch tire in the rear.

I have 11-42T cassette and a 30 tooth chainring for a low below 20 inch gear. Kinda dumb and not so practical. I see about 20 inch gear to be about the lowest gear that is practical.

Some future tweaking will happen. I’m kinda excited. I like the almost fat tire Cush, and because I’m a lightweight that might be enough. On the downhills I ride the breaks and curb my speed to avoid crashing, loosing control, and getting injured. My goal really is just trying to stay on the pedals.

On the guitar front I’m experimenting more with finger style. I kinda good with a pick. I love the volume and piano tone I can get that in a way is my signature. Finger style on the other hand has different dynamics, a different tonality, and a profoundly different feeling. For me finger style is a totally different instrument.

Finger style also requires slowing down. It also has its own set of difficulties to conquer. I like the challenge and the difference.

So my approach now is like say learning Spanish and Italian at the same time.

From DU, I learned how I have to stay active actively. Also buying a RV is cited as a retirement mistake, but in my case I don’t think it will be a mistake done on an impulse. The Van life kinda suits me and is who I am.

I certainly have to dig in and learn about the specialty oils required and specified by Audi and Mercedes. I have not had the time. I looked into the maintenance schedule on the Audi, and it is past due for a spark plug change.

I figure from the maintenance schedule they must use platinum plugs due to the service interval of 40K miles. In the past the service interval for platinum plugs was 25K-30K miles, but this was back in the day when they were kinda new in the late 80’s.

Obviously I’m out up to date…

Cal
 
You probably need standard European Spec 5w20 or 5w30 oil. Mobil1 is good stuff and it tends to be available in 5qt jugs pretty cheaply. Most important is your oil filter. I need to change my oil and the tranny fluid in the Fiesta ASAP. I'm about to roll over to 100,000 miles and I'm using the high mileage Mobil1 Euro spec (even though my car is essentially a Mazda) as it exceeds all requirements. No need to buy expensive Royal Purple or Amsoil, unless you have a buddy with an Amsoil dealer account. Oil is oil, buy synthetic oil is better than dinosaur oil; regardless, if changed at the appropriate interval, your engine should last a good amount of time. If you really want to be anal retentive, you could do a detergent flush with some Marvel Oil or LiquiMoly engine flush, if VAG indicates that your engine can handle it without harm. These days, auto manufacturers seem to want to divest themselves of any responsibility for their products unless the owner has every single issue handled at the dealership. Just another waste of money and a con job on the part of the auto industry.
Phil
 
Phil,

The Audi has a turbo, and so does the Mercedes.

What about any specific specifications or additives?

I am aware of the better detergent action and other benefits of synthetic oils. What you are suggesting is a much more generic approach.

On my ratty cars, my $200.00-$300.00 specials I did not use synthetics. The detergent action on those worn engines would of led to mucho oil leaks by eliminating accumulated sludge.

On my ZZ3 Chevy crate motor I utilized Mobile 1. On modern cars it only makes sense to me to use synthetics. They just are the better oil.

The Audi is a 2015, and now it has 44K miles on it.

Cal
 
Phil,

I got my head out of the sand and looked things up. Mobil 1 SAE 0W-40 fits the VW 502-00 spec for my year Audi. Pretty much a low ash oil synthetic.

I was scared and overthinking things.

At the dealer they replace, or say they replace a seal on the oil plug.

I check my oil level and pretty much my engine does not consume any oil, at least at my 7K intervals. I got the oil changed every year even though I had less than the 10-12K interval. To me oil is cheap compared to a new engine. The current oil has about 7K on it now. Been driving a lot more.

Back in 2015 there was a run of 2.0 liter engines that came OEM with faulty rings. These faulty engines consumed a quart of oil with every tank of gas.

Cal
 
Since last fall I've been commuting a lot more by bike. Consistently been riding a fixed gear since last fall, the first being a Raleigh Competition GS from 1981, the second being a 1952 R.O. Harrison Madison, which is a track bike. In January I made up my mind to compete in a race before I turn 50 years old. I happened upon TWO nearly identical racing bikes, the first nearly give-away frame is a late 80s Puch Mistral Ultima SLX (Columbus SLX tubing), which is a Bianchi production racing frame; the second is a 1994ish Concorde Aquila TSX (Columbus TSX tubing). I have had well over two bikes worth of Suntour Superbe and Superbe Pro groupos, which I decided to use to build these two bikes. The Puch is still unfinished as I need to order a set of spokes for my wheelbuilds. The Concorde is done and I've ridden it a bit and absolutely love it. Wheels are Sampson titanium hubs laced to Mavic MA40 rims. I'm still using downtube shifters and a 7 speed Suntour New Winner freewheel, simply the most reliable you can get.
On Monday I took it out to Valley Forge and by the end of the day I had about 60 miles under my wheels. Lately, I've been getting up and on the road before 7am to beat the heat.
Here's a photo from the inaugural ride a couple weeks ago, just out to Falls Bridge and down west river drive then back.
Since that photo, the rear derailleur has been changed to a later edition Superbe Pro made for indexing, and I'm moving to a different saddle which will sit on an American Classic post.
http://gallery.leica-users.org/d/549447-2/PXL_20240618_120444472.jpg

Tomorrow morning should be in the mid-60s so it'll be a great day for another 50+ miles.

Phil
 
In the old days spark plug gaps opened up with mileage. Electrodes got eroded.

With platinum plugs that erosion does not happen. Back in the day I use to re-gap my plugs and change out the point every 3K miles.

Now with electronic ignitions and platinum plugs this retuning is not necessary.

My driving is mostly highway. I’m not a tailgater and at 65-70 mph I generally maintain about a car length for every ten MPH. At my last inspection I inquired about my brake wear. There was 37K on the odometer, and basically on a scale of 10 pretty much my brakes wear was rated a 9, meaning I still have about 90% of the rotors and pads left.

Now I have a goal of exceeding 100K miles without a brake job. Now I understand they don’t cut rotors anymore; they replace them.

Living in NYC keep me out of car ownership for about 2 decades. I had the Jeep in NYC in Greenpoint and Williamsburg, and then I had it in storage, but had to let it go.

Understand that the 1966 C-10 is a bit of a replacement for my old Jeep Scrambler (1984 model year, half cab, Corvette engine, Ford 9-inch rear, Lincoln Continental rear disc brakes, 2 inch Rancho suspension, big tires…)

Cal
 
Phil,

You are where I wanted to be doing 50-60 mile rides to build a base so I build up to doing weekly Centuries.

I lost a lot of momentum doing childcare and with supporting “Maggie’s” book writing and release. Now I am trying to catch up.

I’d be curious of how stale you got, and the level and amount of training you needed. Sounds like you got there by either doing it every day or as much as possible.

I’m a lot older than you, and of course you were a much more of a contender and serious racer. Of course I can’t compete, but a gauge of your training here would provide wisdom and insights that might help me in my goals.

My goals: loose the weight I call flab so I officially can be called a skinny bitch again; and to try and get my heart rate and blood pressure back into 60-70 over a hundred range for cardio fitness with a resting BPM of less than 50.

I believe all I need is a strong base and lots of distance.

I do know that building physical strength is EZ-PZ for me. I just have those genes, but my cardio fitness will help fight the decline that is the fact of just aging. My goal is simply to have a great quality of life as I age.

I don’t want to live like my father did in pain and somewhat immobilized.

Cal
 
Cal, the standard period for oil change is 6 months, not a year. Once that oil is added to the engine, it has a 6 month estimated life span regardless how little it is driven. It's expensive in the short term but an engine from VAG is far more costly. A couple years ago, when we were looking at a newer vehicle, I found a great Audi 6 cylinder wagon for cheap. The problem was that the owner would discuss everything except the timing belt. The car had just over 100000 miles and should have had the timing belt changed. With no information about the belt, I had to walk away from the awesome car because if it needed a timing belt, that would be over $3000 because the engine needs to be completely removed from the car for a mechanic to do it.
Phil
 
A thought came to mind, here I sometimes complain about “Maggie” maintenance, but truth be told is early in life I was a caretaker at an early age, and that started at the age of 13. I kinda took care of my little brother and my dad who was 67 when I was 13.

5 years later my dad became paralyzed due to a spinal blockage.. They operated on him, and eventually sent him home. I was 19 working part time, going to college full-time, and taking care of my dad as best I could.

This was hard. My friends thought I might of died because I kinda disappeared. I did the best I could and was pretty overwhelmed. My dad was an invalid.

I mention this because the fact is I am kinda trained to be a caretaker. It may be a bit dysfunctional but taking care of Maggie and her needs is basically leftover from my early life. Part of this I’m trying to say has a deeper meaning and value.

Cal
 
Phil,

Your report on oil life-span is news to me. WOW.

I thought I was being prudent at 7 K miles and change oil annually regardless of even low mileage.

One one hand synthetic oil had a selling point of extended mileage intervals. Know that I changed my oil envy 5K miles on the Jeep. One reason is that I drove that truck hard. It was fun. LOL.

I’ll look into this further. Like you say oil is cheap, but a new engine is not.

Also the service intervals from Audi is measured by milage not time.
Cal
 
Cal, of course you don't have to worry about your timing belt with such little mileage, but I was just using that anecdote about how expensive Audi/VW are to do anything more than a regular tuneup. In the end, we got the Fiesta hatchback which gets better fuel economy and is WAY cheaper to maintain.

As for my fitness, I'm an odd duck. I have always "run hot", meaning that I've always had a high average pulse. Back when I was on the Temple U team, I would regularly hit over 200 bpm and I was told that I wasn't supposed to due to my age. Well, since then I've slacked off on biking but have gotten back into it much more seriously lately and I still have a high max pulse. On my ride out to and from Valley Forge, it was reasonably hot on the way back but overall a beautiful day. My average pulse over 3 hours (I was warming up and lollygagging at the beginning) was 181 which I'm not supposed to be able to do using the 220 - age, I'm just a little over. My doctor said that's not really accurate, especially for someone who has previously trained and raced competitively, so she said there is a 20% margin of error in there, which can put my average sustained closer to 190. My max on that ride was 193 and I saw that my running average sustained was just about 170, which is still high but not hazardous at all. Physiologically, we're all different and there are some loose guidelines for metrics, but in a nutshell, it comes down to comfort. If I'm comfortable pushing it, then it's healthy. If I notice anything off or feel off, then I slow down. That's really it.

Phil
 
Phil,

The milage on the Audi is low now, but I figure 110K is not that far away to a car that could go 200K. Pretty easy to say that the A4, unlike my Jeep gets babied and pretty much goes highway. In the fall when the 2025 models comes out my A4 will be a decade old, but it does not look it because it has always been garaged.

I still walk a lot to put off short trips. When I commuted to NYC I walked about 2 miles to catch the train, and of course 2 miles back. Grand Central to East 72d I walked also. My commute had over nine miles of walking.

I smoked for 15 years. At age 32 I quit and got serious with biking. My assets are my strength to weight ratio and a high threshold of pain. At Brookhaven National Labs I got a Radiation physical at work. Part of that measured lung capacity, and even though I was an ex-smoker I still had average lung capacity.

Also don’t forget at 5’10” at my fighting or racing weight I’m pretty close to 150 pounds. Point being I don’t have a lot of tissue to feed or weight to carry around. Kinda have a stealth body.

My cardio vascular system though seems to be highly efficient, and I seem to have more than my fair share of vascularization. I also seem to have an abundance of fast twitch muscles. In high school I was a fast runner and could run the 100 meters in about ten seconds.

In sports I was all about acceleration. In about 2 steps I would be at full speed.

When I was ultra fit doing 300-500 miles of road riding a week, I got a physical and my blood pressure was something like 50/80 and my resting pulse in the high 40’s. The nurse asked me if I felt alright. This was after a full day’s work.

I would wear a heart rate monitor to bed and upon waking, remaining reclined I saw my pulse sub 40 in the high 30’s.

I tend to rely on my strength. I tend to push gears and I am known to stand a lot out of the saddle. Mountain biking I kinda use a bike like a stair master.

Of course my mountain bike style dose not go so far on the road. Chris my friend on Lawn-Guy-land who owned the bike shop I frequented said I destroy chains. Pretty much after a few rides my chains would get stretched.

I went on a ride to do the Viaduct. Pretty much it was not a fast ride, but it ended up being a long ride for me because I absolutely had no base. Pretty much it was threshold of pain to climb the hills, and pushing gears with strength.

Now I am old… Let’s see what an old man can do who has no base. How good is muscle memory. How valuable was the time of serious riding?

BTW a hematologist explained to me that many endurance athletes are borderline anemic. Kinda counter intuitive. Pretty much heavy training wears out red blood cells, so they die young instead of living for 90 days.

My CAD causes me to be borderline anemic. My heart and cardiovascular system has to make up for this deficiency.

In your case your heart just pumps more blood.

Cal
 
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I guess here is my challenge.

I bought a 2015 A4 with 16K miles on it. In December I will have owned it for 4 years, and currently it has only 44K miles on it. With a car wash it could be mistaken as a new Audi A4.

So with proper and timely maintenance it could go to 200K miles. I know that is way in the future, but if I get to 200K that still is a ways off. I could still be driving this sedan when it is about 25 years old.

Pretty much I find value in this, and I think it is possible, especially because this car mostly sees highway miles on more or less open roads. I like the A4 so much that it would be a hard car to replace. On long drives, especially if I add Textron the fuel injector cleaner I use once a month that is an octane booster, I get 29 MPG doing 65-70 on open roads.

Of course because of the turbo I only use Mobil Premium.

I realized today that diesel fuel is about or at times cheaper than regular gas. WOW.

I also figure this likely is better for the planet eco wise. That is to get 200K miles.

Cal
 
I kinda feel like a new man after yesterday’s lite workout. I didn’t push too hard, but just enough to push me in the right direction.

Let’s see what I can do today. Might go with 2 pound heavy hands to allow my legs to do more work, and use bigger muscles as they say. Today I can go harder, and perhaps I’ll add a strength element or a separate power workout that could be ambitious.

I noticed a big difference in the mirror as heavy hands tends to firm up the midsection. I likely lost some water weight from the sweat bath I did. Pretty much my shirt and underwear were sponges.

“Maggie” got stung badly by a yellow jacket yesterday. By tomorrow she has to get a power point together for the First Tuesday presentation we have to do.

With her it seems everything tends to be at the last moment. She is her own worse enemy as far as creating stress and anxiety. She wishes that she didn’t have to do this.

When will she learn?

Phil was correct. Looks like a nice sunny day with a blue sky. Temperatures in the 60’s, but it will approach 80. I see a gentle breeze in the trees.

I am concerned about my Social Security and the outcome of the election. Pretty much could be a game changer for me because of the speculated likely cuts if a certain party is elected. I will be of full retirement age by the time the November election happens.

I wonder if I might have to collect before I’m 70. That is my plan, but I might have to take my entitlement early to lock in my benefits to grandfather them in.

Know that benefits get increased by 8% for every year delayed after full retirement age. Pretty much they use an actuary table (statistics) based on an average life expectancy of 82. Using 82 as a number pretty much the same amount of money would be the same by age 82 and its just the payment schedule that is different.

The gamble is your real life expectancy, not the average. In my case I have a very high probably of living past the age of 100. After age 82 I would be actually earning more than my share of benefits.

Depending on your genes, health, lifestyle, fitness, family history… everyone is different. About half the population statistically according to the math will die before the age of 82, and the other half will die after the age of 82.

Currently the life expectancy dropped a lot. Many factors: opioid abuse; increases in suicide; the lack of medical maintenance and screening during the Pandemic…

I’ll do a search to verify the current life expectancy of an American: 2023 age 79.25; 2022 age 79.11; 2021 age 79.05; and 2020 age 78.99.

I figure when I collect Social Security that is when I’m really retired because I’ll be on a fixed income for the rest of my life.

Cal
 
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I just got back from another ride out to Valley Forge. I'm going to have to start going out with the "Bulldog" rides (more serious racers meet at a bulldog statue early on weekends then go out and do hills up in Montgomery and Delaware counties. The B ride does an 18-20mph average, and the A ride holds a 23mph average. Some of these guys also take a peleton onto Kelly Drive and keep up with traffic. I did that once with the Temple team and it was an intense rush. Holding nearly 40mph while riding the wheel of the guy on front of me and someone else riding my wheel behind was crazy.
Anyway, I had intended to do some sprint intervals, but only managed two. This because my friend joined me at the beginning and he was on a Cannondale E bike. When he arrived and I saw what he was riding, I thought it was going to be a hard ride for me, but we only did a 14-15mph average. I broke away a couple times to see what I could do in a sprint. I got the bike going 33.6mph on a half mile straight flat part of the path with a gentle tailwind helping. Max speed was 38.9mph, max HR was 193, average HR was below 160, but I felt like I was almost soft pedaling a lot of time. I'll chalk it up to aerobic fat burning distance. I know I could do a century at 15mph, I'm pretty sure. My legs still feel fresh. So I have endurance, I just need to increase my average speed past 20mph, that's my goal for the summer. If I reach that, then I should be able to stay on the trainer as well as commute to my future job (whatever that may be) until the 2025 racing season where I'll begin as a Cat 3 Master and claw my way up.
I just ate two cups of 0% fat yogurt with a couple handfuls of blueberries and raspberries. Gentle digesting high protein content.
Phil
 
Phil,

If you can do 50-60 mile rides every day for a week certainly a Century at 15 MPH average speed is readily doable.

I know from my training that long slow distance for me made me go faster. Perhaps this developed endurance?

Like you say, “Everyone is different.”

Also long slow distance is really great to burn off the fat. A different metabolism is involved.

BTW 20 MPH sustained average speed solo is mighty fast.

Cal
 
On my last ride to VF, I kept up an 18mph average, and that was the first time I had done that ride since 2009. I think I can pass 20mph this year, maybe even this summer, as long as I keep up riding. Sometimes the weather or just how I feel (my primary said I may have some lingering effects or long COVID) keeps me from riding. Right now I don't have a bike for the stationary trainer, but I'll build something soon to ensure I can have a daily cardio and aerobic workout. Deconditioning to previous fitness is like a 1:3 ratio that is really hard to get back to. If I take 4 days off the bike, it feels like I haven't been on in a month. The heat doesn't help, which is why I'm up before 6 and out on the bike before 7.
I think I'll try to tackle the Manayunk Wall this week, if the low temps and low humidity remain.
Phil
 
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