Pilot's Operating Handbook for Life

Moving the blog

2015-05-04T14:42:00.001-04:00

After more than 6 years (and with my blogging slowing greatly the last few years), I've decided it is time to move this blog. I may eventually redirect this URL to the new location, but not just now. I probably won't be blogging much more, but it is on a system completely under my control now. I'm moving the blog to wordpress.clausing.us. I've imported all my old posts over there, so nothing is lost and probably no one but me is actually reading this so, probably no one cares, but there it is...

Xav 2004-07-02 - 2015-05-01

2015-05-01T14:14:00.001-04:00

Almost 5 years to the day after I lost my cat, Smokey, this morning (after midnight last night), I lost my other cat. Okay, Xav came into the house as Erin's cat, but he adopted me relatively early on. He was just shy of his 11th birthday.

Flight Log-2015-04-12

2015-04-12T21:51:00.001-04:00

Well, I now have 2 flights in this calendar year (a flight review and an IPC) and am again IFR current (though the picture below shows I am very rusty and in need of more practice). Another 1.6, 1.5 of it under the hood, so no sightseeing today. The weather was finally beautiful, after having the 1st 3 attempts cancelled due to weather. Temp 16°C, winds calm to 160@04, alt. 30.16, clear. It was a little bumpy at times at altitude which contributed to some of my difficulty hand-flying these approaches, but the later ones got better. First ILS22@KZZV including once around the hold after parallel entry, followed by VOR4@KZZV, followed by VOR22@KZZV, and finishing up with GPS27@KVTA.

Takeoffs & landings: 1
Approaches: 4
Time: 1.6
Total time: 226.0

Flight Log - 2015-01-05

2015-01-05T20:29:00.004-05:00

After more than 14 months without flying, I finally got back in the air today and completed a flight review, so I am again legal to act as pilot-in-command and carry passengers. It was pretty dang cold, temp -9°C, winds 270@10, alt 30.51, clouds clear (at start, high clouds were moving in by the end). I need to knock some rust off, but Harold (the instructor) actually complimented me on the smoothness of 2 of my 4 landings (the other 2 were fine, too, just not as nice as the 2 he commented on). Not bad after so much time off. Next month I'll get an IPC (instrument proficiency check) and become instrument-current again, too.

Takeoffs & landings: 4
Time: 1.0
Total time: 224.4

The year in riding 2014

2014-12-31T18:01:00.000-05:00

Sigh... Ok, I did some longer rides this year, I didn't come close to my plan to ride 2000 miles this year or to ride 3 days/week. Having said that, it wasn't a bad year, just not what I had hoped for. It turns out I was mistaken, I thought I had only riddent 1107 last year, so I thought my final ride to bring me to 1112 put me over last year, on closer examination, I guess I rode 1115 last year, so I ended up 3 miles short of last year. I had 6 rides of 50+ miles,

Of course, the "highlight" of this year was my collision with the deer. I guess I didn't really write about that here, so let me summarize. I was 42 miles into what I had planned to be another 60+ miler doing about 22mph on a flat-to-slightly downhill stretch of Palmer Rd, when a 6 or 8 point buck came bounding out of a corn field on my right, one hop and it was right in front of me with no time to react. I'm glad I was on my recumbent and not on by road bike or I suspect I would have been hit by the antlers instead of having them pass 6 or 8 inches in front of my face. Also, fortunately for the deer, I was on the big chain ring or I think I would have ripped its abdomen open. The buck absorbed most of my momentum so that when I went down, I had some road rash on my right shoulder, elbow, hip, and knee and a cracked rib, but did not rip the shorts or jersey. The only real damage to the bike was a bent large chainring and the fairing was destroyed. This was day 4 (Tuesday) of what I had planned as 8 straight days of 60+ miles, I took it easy thereafter, I rode 26.5 on Thursday and then the Pedal with Pete 47 miler on Saturday.

Anyway, I'll summarize my year again as I have the last several. I actually did one more organized ride this year (6), than the last 2 years, but ended up with fewer total rides this year than last.

Ride 2 Recovery Honor Ride - 36.24mi (58.32km) in 2:22:28 = 15.26mph (24.56 km/h), Erin rode the first half, some hills right after the rest stop
Tour de Cause, Adventurer course - 64.70mi (104.12km) in 4:52:01 = 13.28mph (21.37 km/h), I paid for lack of base mileage, the hills (~1900 feet of climbing, max grade of 9.8%), and the heat (it was up near 95°F). I lost 0.6mph just in the last 15 miles because my legs felt like jello.
Delaware County Friends of Trails (DCFT) - 64.54mi (103.87km) in 4:22:23 = 14.76mph (23.75 km/h), I hadn't ridden in the 2 weeks between the Tour de Cause and this one, but at least there were fewer hills (only 1055 feet of climbing), though half the climbing came in the last quarter of the ride. This was to be the start of 8 days of 60+ mile rides, it didn't end up that way.
Pedal with Pete - 47.56mi (76.54km) in 2:53:37 = 16.44mph (26.46 km/h), I cut this one short rather than do the metric because of the thunder I heard at the rest stop, I just beat the rain back to the finish.
Steve Barbour Memorial Ride - 60.61mi (97.54km) in 3:44:34 = 16.19 mph (26.06 km/h), humid (foggy at the start)
Ride Deaf - 64.93mi (104.49km) in 4:19:16 = 15.03mph (24.19 km/h), very chilly and windy (didn't reach 60°F until last 8 miles, and headwind for the first 36 miles)

Total # of rides = 36 (down from 43 last year)
Total mileage = 1112.80 miles (down from 1115.10 last year)
Total time = 72:22:41 (down from 73:16:41 last year)
Total climbing = 19,281 ft (up from 18,033 last year, but down from 21,660 in 2012)
Avg. speed = 15.37mph (up from 15.29mph last year)
Avg. time of ride = 02:00:38 (up from 01:42:15 last year and 02:00:08 in 2012)
Avg. length of ride = 30.91mi (up from 25.93 last year and 29.64 in 2012)
Rides over 20 miles = 28 (same as last year)
Rides over 29.75 miles = 16 (down from 18 last year)
Rides over 50 miles = 6 (up from 2 last year and 2 in 2012)
Rides over 01:30:00 = 23 (down from 24 last year)
Rides over 02:00:00 = 10 (same as last year)
Rides over 03:00:00 = 6 (double the 3 from last year)

Ride Deaf 2014

2014-09-14T08:46:00.001-04:00

Yesterday, I rode the Ride Deaf Challenge metric century. It was very chilly at the start. Not just the temperature, but the wind. Also, it didn't help that for 15 of the first 20 miles, I had a very full bladder which made climbing torture. Temp 50-68°F (didn't reach 60°F until last 8 miles), strong wind from NW (meaning headwind for first 36 miles), max grade 5.7%, 1323 ft of climbing, HRM zones 3-5 2:56. 64.93mi (104.49 km) in 4:19:16, avg speed 15.03mph (24.19 km/h), max speed 28.5 mph (45.9 km/h).

Steve Barbour Memorial Tour 2014

2014-08-23T19:03:00.000-04:00

This is a ride I've never done before. They run 3 distances, a metric century (actually 60.6), an 80 miler, and a century. I chose to ride the metric. It was very humid today, by far the most humid ride of the year, the fog took over an hour to burn off, temp 68-86F, wind from NE @ 7, max grade 4.1%, HRM zones 3-5 3:11. 60.61 mi (97.54 km) in 3:44:34, avg - 16.19 mph (26.06 km/h), max speed - 32.1 mph (51.7 km/h). My goal was to complete the ride in under 4 hours and I accomplished that with plenty of time to spare.

Pedal with Pete 2014

2014-08-02T13:38:00.000-04:00

I went out with every intention of riding the metric century despite the encounter with the deer earlier this week (maybe I'll do a separate blog post on that later), but when I heard thunder at the 24mi food stop and my knee was beginning to stiffen up, I decided discretion was the better part of valor and decided to try to beat the rain back to the finish (which I did), so I ended up doing the 47 miler again (for the 3rd year in a row). I actually really like the ride and it is pretty flat. This year, despite the crash earlier this week and being even heavier than last year (by 2+ lbs, making this the heaviest I've ever been for an organized ride :-( ), I shaved another 3:23 off my time, so I guess I'm in half way decent shape. The temperature was perfect and I was under an overcast (as the rain tried to catch me) for the last half of the ride, so conditions were nearly ideal.

DCFT 2014 - 64 miler

2014-07-26T15:08:00.000-04:00

My 3rd organized ride of the season already. Of course, having spent the last week at Dad's to celebrate his 80th birthday, I haven't gotten any more riding in since the last organized ride (where I already paid dearly for the lack of miles).Temp 62.6-87.8F, moderate wind from S, shifting to W. HRM zones 3-5 3:37. 64.54mi in 4:22:23 (14.76mph). First hour I averaged 14.7mph, 2nd hour - 16.1mph, 3rd hour - 14.6mph, 4th hour - 14.1mph, last 22 min - 12.6mph. I have some words for the sadist who designed the course where nearly half the climbing was in the last 1/4 of the ride. There was a stretch about 10mi from the finish where I felt like a sprinter on Hautecam.

Tour de Cause 2014 - Adventurer course metric century

2014-07-12T17:44:00.000-04:00

I haven't ridden anywhere near as much as I had hoped for the last 6 weeks and I really paid for it after the rest stop at 49mi today. My legs just felt like jello and I ended up losing 0.6mph in that last stretch. There was more climbing in the first 7.5 miles than what I have in my 30 mile loop (which I've only ridden once this year). The temp ranged from 64°F at the start to reading 95°F at the finish, though it was probably just 89-90°F. HRM zones 3-5 3:05 though it was a little flaky right after that second rest stop and was reading in the 90s-low 110s for a while when I'm sure it was in the 140-150s. 64.7mi in 4:52:01 for an avg of 13.28mph, max grade 9.6% (even worse than the Lancaster County Covered Bridge Metric from 2012 where max grade was 7.8%, though that had 1200+ more feet of climbing than this one in total).

Ride 2 Recovery 2014

2014-05-24T16:29:00.000-04:00


Erin & me at the rest stop

Erin and I rode the Ride 2 Recovery Honor Ride this morning. You can read all about it over on their website, but essentially, the ride is about supporting wounded veterans, which is appropriate on Memorial Day weekend. It is also a good reminder that as we celebrate those who gave their lives in defense of our country, there are many who made it home, but not necessarily all in one piece and not all those wounds are visible. Remember, in 2012 (I haven't seen the statistics for 2013) more active duty members of the military died due to suicide than died in combat. I still thank God daily that Shane made it back from his two tours with no visible scars. It turned out to be a beautiful day to ride, temp 60.8-84.2°F during the ride itself, though it was only about 50°F as we were putting the bikes on the car. Winds were light. Because Erin was with me (and because, with the lousy weather the last couple of weeks, I'd ridden a grand total of once in the last 2 weeks), I decided to ride the 35 miler rather than the 70 miler. If you click through the widget below, you'll notice several very slow miles in there, mostly on the hills shortly after the rest stop. I obviously had some issues with some of the hills (and the fact that my weight was actually the highest today that it has been in over a month due to eating out several times this week and no exercise to speak of), though overall, I did still average 15.3mph, 36.24mi in 2:22:28 (I spent the 45 minutes at the rest stop waiting for and then sitting with Erin). I raised a little money for the cause and the website remains open, so perhaps I can reach or beat my goal, please consider helping out at http://www.active.com/donate/columbus2014/JClausing.

The year in riding

2013-12-31T23:04:00.000-05:00

Just like last year I did a fair amount of riding this year. I wasn't as successful in losing weight by riding this year, but I did enjoy myself. This year I rode a bit further than last year, but only had 2 rides of 50+ miles (and neither were over 53) and 5 organized rides again (same number as last year). I mostly rode 2 days a week (usually Tue & Sat), next year, maybe I'll try for 3 (add Thu).

BikeMS Central Ohio Challenge 50 miler - 52.74mi, 03:41:22, avg = 14.29mph, some rain and thunder in the middle of the course
Pedal with Pete 47 mile route - 47.47mi, 02:57:01, avg = 16.09mph, rain for the first hour of the ride, but beat last year's time
Tour de Donut "Full Donut" - 30.71mi, 01:43:43, avg = 17.77mph, a race where 5 minutes gets deducted for every donut eaten, I finished 2nd in raw time in the recumbent division (4th in donut-adjusted time)
CHA Pedal for Pets - 45.00mi, 02:56:42, avg = 15.28mph, very chilly 45°F at the start
Ride for Reason Alzheimer's ride - 47.93mi, 02:59:48, avg = 15.99mph, very poorly marked route

Total # of rides = 43
Total mileage = 1115.10 miles
Total time = 73:16:41
Avg. speed = 15.29mph
Avg. time of ride = 01:42:15
Avg. length of ride = 25.93mi
Rides over 20 miles = 28
Rides over 29.75 miles = 18
Rides over 01:30:00 = 24
Rides over 02:00:00 = 10
Rides over 03:00:00 = 3

Ride for Reason 2013

2013-10-12T17:55:00.000-04:00

I rode my last organized ride of the season this morning. It was called the Ride for Reason, a fundraiser for Alzheimer's research (if you want to contribute to my effort, you can do so at http://act.alz.org/goto/jclausing). It was chilly at the start, but nowhere near as cold as the CHA ride last month. Temp 54-75°F, light wind from the ESE which meant headwind relatively early in the ride. I have to say, the folks at the Trek store didn't do a very good job marking the roads for this one. If I hadn't uploaded the route onto my GPS, I'm not sure I would have been able to find the route. I think I can count all the arrows I actually saw on the rode on 1 hand (certainly on both). They were purple and very difficult to see. Having said that, it was a great day for a ride and a relatively nice route. The distance was supposed to be 47 miles because the original ride 25 years ago was 4700 miles, I missed one turn (added less than 0.1) and ended up riding 47.93. See the details here or below.

Flight Log - 2013-10-04

2013-10-04T17:45:00.000-04:00

I had every intention of a making a much longer flight, but by the time the plane was free and I got to the airport, there were showers and possible embedded thunderstorms moving in our direction, so I decided to just do the requisite 3 trips around the pattern to be current and go back for the previously planned flight another time. Temp 28°C, winds 270@04, alt 30.05, few at 4500, overcast at 6500 when I started, lower than that when I finished, just 25 minutes later.

Takeoffs & landings: 3
Time: 0.4
Total time: 223.4

2013 Pedal for Pets

2013-09-14T14:01:00.002-04:00

I had registered to ride this one last year since this is for the shelter where Shane & Jen volunteered at the time, but something came up late and I wasn't able to ride it. This year, it was pretty darn cold at the start (especially considering that we reached 92°F earlier this week). Temp at the start was 45°F and got up to 66°F by the end of the ride. There was a light wind out of the SW. 45.0mi in 2:56:42 (15.28mph).

http://ridewithgps.com/trips/1798136

Tour de Donut 2013

2013-09-09T22:06:00.000-04:00

Rode the Tour De Donut Ohio on Saturday. It was perfect weather and a very nice course. This is why I love these organized rides (or, in this case, race), I was able to ride with/draft off some other riders (especially nice when I hit the headwind the last 5 miles). Temp 64-84F, wind from W. 30.71mi in 1:43:38 (17.8mph), my fastest ride of the season. I was 2nd in the recumbent division in raw time (1:54:47 including donut stops, 9:50 behind the winner in the division, scroll clear to bottom of this page) which put me in the top 90 overall out of over 1000, but only ate 3 donuts (5 riders in the division ate 12 or more which knocked an hour off their times), so didn't finish in the top 3 (I was 4th, scroll down to bottom of this page) in donut-adjusted time in the division. :-(

http://ridewithgps.com/trips/1766618

Flight Log - 2013-08-15

2013-08-17T22:36:00.000-04:00

Got a little cross-country flying in on Thursday. Temp 22°C, winds calm (at surface, a little bumpy at altitude), alt. 30.14, clear. Added 2 new airports, I10 (Noble County) & 4G5 (Monroe County). Hand flew most of the flight, the auto-pilot still seemed a little squirrelly (it couldn't hold a course at all when I last flew --in June-- with Harold).

Pedal with Pete 2013

2013-08-08T17:15:00.001-04:00

And my second organized ride of the season was the Pedal with Pete Cerebral Palsy ride. Despite rain for the first hour, going 0.6 miles further than last year (due to where I parked) and weighing 10 pounds more than last year, I managed to cut 3 minutes off my time. It was a fun ride.

http://ridewithgps.com/trips/1558867

Bike MS Central OH Challenge 2013

2013-08-08T16:03:00.000-04:00

Erin and I rode the Bike MS Central OH Challenge a couple of weeks ago. I just found the pix online today, so I'm going to put some of them up here along with a link to the ride info itself. Erin had a mechanical problem just past 15 miles, but still managed to make it to the 2nd rest stop at 30.8 miles before calling Sherry to come get her.

http://ridewithgps.com/trips/1516040

Flight log - 2013-06-12

2013-06-12T16:54:00.002-04:00

Finally after almost 11 months, I finally went flying again. It was a pretty nice day, though it got rather warm toward the end. Temp 30°C, wind calm, alt 29.92, very hazy, 1.6 on the Hobbs. Hold at APE, followed by 3 approaches VOR-A@KVTA, GPS28@KLHQ, GPS27@KVTA, with 2 landings at KLHQ and 2 landings at KVTA. Happy to be back in the air. Hand flew nearly all of it, the auto-pilot appears to be on the fritz. IPC completed, so I'm legal to rent, legal to carry passengers, and legal to fly IFR. KVTA is in the top middle with the red, yellow, and green (landings and trips around the pattern). The hold is the purple loop at the top left. KLHQ is at the bottom left (landing and trip around the pattern). That little bump in the middle was when I turned on the autopilot heading back to do the GPS28@KVTA and it tried to do S-turns around the actual GPS track. Harold is going to have the auto-pilot looked at by the maintenance people.

Yup, I'm still alive

2013-05-05T16:48:00.002-04:00

As I commented last year, I don't tend to post here much lately, but I am still alive. As you can see from the sidebar, I've started riding again this year (about a month earlier than last year, though I have no plans at present for a century this year), but have not flown in far too long, I hope to rectify that this week. I still do plan to start posting more stuff here, but have had some issues with motivation that I hope to explain shortly.

The year in riding

2012-12-15T16:15:00.000-05:00

I know I've been really bad about posting here. There are things I've wanted to write about, but I just haven't been able to make myself sit down and take the time to actually do it. So, I figured I'd do a brief wrap up of my year in riding. As you can see from the sidebar at left, I've done more riding this year than I have in a few years. I had some motivation, Bill (my brother-in-law) started doing triathlons almost 2 years ago and we had talked about doing a half-marathon together in 2011, but due to knee problems, I was never able to really start training for that. As a result, we revised our goal to doing a century in 2012 (my second, first since day 1 of TOSRV in 1997, his first). We (I) decided we'd do the Hancock Horizontal Hundred since this is a very flat century that I've wanted to do for more than a decade. I didn't really get into the training routine until late May, and then in June I started having back problems (see my upcoming Christmas letter for more explanation) and had to switch from the road bike to the recumbent. I never really rode more than twice a week (with 1 or 2 exceptions) and I had breaks at inopportune times (like the Alaska cruise two weeks before the century), but I still managed to ride 830mi in 2012 including 5 organized rides (plus one more that I registered for, but then couldn't ride). Below are some of the highlights & interesting numbers.

Tour de Cause "Challenger" course - 41.69mi, 03:16:30, avg = 12.74mph, rainy and lots of hills
Pedal with Pete - 47.61mi, 03:00:15, avg = 15.85mph
Lancaster County Covered Bridge Metric Century - 66.46mi, 04:43:12, avg = 14.08mph, very hilly
HHH - 100.85mi, 06:17:54, avg=16.01mph, really tough headwind section just after lunch, but fortunately found a group to ride with
Trek Breast Cancer Ride - 42.54mi, 03:00:04, avg = 14.17mph, I had hardly ridden in a month

Total # of rides = 28
Total mileage = 830.02mi
Total time = 56:03:44
Avg. speed = 14.81mph
Avg. length of ride = 29.64mi
Avg. time of ride = 02:00:08

Rides over 20mi = 20
Rides over 30mi = 11
Rides over 01:30:00 = 18
Rides over 02:00:00 = 8

50@50 final update

2012-11-01T17:16:00.000-04:00

There are a couple of other things I'd like to post on, but I'll save that for another time (mostly because I still can't bring myself to sit down and write about how fed up I am with this election season).
I accomplished my 50@50 goal when Sherry and I took our Alaskan cruise at the end of August. It was a great trip and our first cruising experience was great as well.

Flight log 2012-07-13

2012-07-13T17:45:00.000-04:00

Flight review complete. Temp was a very pleasant 23°F, but the wind got ugly for the final 2 landings. Winds 140@13G22. Alt. 30.19. Did the GPS28@4I3, cirle to 10, followed by 2 touch and goes, followed by VOR-A@KVTA, circle to 9, touch and go, and full stop. I used Foreflight on the iPad for the approaches, no paper plates in the cockpit.

Flight log 2012-05-18

2012-05-18T20:06:00.001-04:00

I got checked out on the new G1000 C172 (I last flew the old one 3 or 4 years ago) today. Next flight I'll have Harold help me get used to using the iPad with ForeFlight on the cockpit. Temp 24°C, wind 100@07, altimeter 30.11, clear. Just local flight, but the plane was up at Knox County (4I3) while they resurface the runway at KVTA. 1.0 on the Hobbs, beautiful day to fly. The AMOD didn't lock on before take off, so I don't have the Google Earth track this time.