Here is my first update about the prep for the Seoul t Busan trip. Let’s first have a look at the milestones before I bring in today’s update:
- See how many kilometers I can fit in one hour of regular riding. The goal is to reach 20 kms.
- Push for a two hours ride while maintaining a 20 km/h average speed.
- 3 hours ride, 60 kms -> use that to go to the starting spot of the Seoul to Busan trail.
- See how I can manage keeping on going if the bicycle’s battery runs out.
Today, my target was to go for the first milestone, but ended up breaking milestone 1 and 4 at the same time.
I left in the morning to bring my daughter to the kindergarten. The goal was to drop her off and start a new tracking for a 1 hour ride in order to see what I can do during a single hour of riding. However, I forgot to turn off the tracking and instead of a single hour, I got the full ride recorded. This turned out for the best, because as I reached about 2/3rd of the ride, I ran out of battery on my electric bike. As soon as I noticed, I turned around, and headed back home. I still had about 2 km to go before I was supposed to turn around but I knew that I wouldn’t be able to pull off the full ride without battery.
Riding without battery was tough. This is a very heavy bike, and an even heavier rider. I had to take a short 5 min break to recover some energy on the way back, but against all odds (I’m severely out of shape), I made it back home. This allowed me to test 2 things:
- I am able to maintain around about 20 km/h, including all sorts of slowing down (red light, slow riders in front of me), when the battery is assisting me.
- I am able to continue without battery, albeit at a much slower pace.
With those two milestones down, and learning from today, it’s time to get a less ambitious milestone added to the list:
- Ride for 1 hr for 5 days in a row.
It has become apparent that this was a requirement before I can move to the 2 hours mark.
You can check my progress on Strava if you want to.