Slow Spokes

This was my first Slow Spokes ride. The ride was from Lucky 32 on a Sunday afternoon. This ride was orginized by Winnie. The ride was to consist of three loops on the same 7 miles route mostly on on-road bike-paths. There were 4 or 5 of us. Winnie, Zonda, John(who I now know as Pugslyyy) myself and one or two others who I do not remember - sorry. I thought 7 miles with a rest in between each - no problem.

This was mypre-ride comment -

Hey - Great - I plan to be there.

Well riding the ATT which is almost flat and riding those bike paths which were for me very hilly at the time was two different things. I quit after the first loop which was suppose to be an option but I think it surprised everyone when I did it. Truth was I could barely keep up with their 12 mph or less pace and it had consumed everything had to do that. Everyone was very nice and as they rode off I sat down to rested before I loaded up the trike to go home. I really enjoyed riding with those folks but was displeases with my performance. They did not seem to mind my trike and either did not notice or did not care about the electric assist. I continued to ride mostly on my own but looked for small hills to climb and continued to eat according to the plan.
This was my post ride comment -

Was nice to meet you all and ride with you - I had a great time - thanks
Ashby

Riding and wanting to ride more

January 2009
I took Turtle to the American Tobacco Trail, this is the same trail I had had my first two rides on but this was the paved section. I was riding when the weather permitted around my home but this was a nice pretty Saturday and I wanted to ride. I rode the trail one and a half times - 20 miles and was on the trike for over three hours. I was so tired when I got to the van I had to sit there on the trike and rest. When I managed to pull my self up I was wobbly on my legs for a bit and had to just stand there a while before I could step over the trike. I recovered after a little bit and load up the trike and drove home. My legs were real stiff when I got home but I unload everything, showered, ate and went to sleep as usual. Sunday I just rested. I did a little stuff around the house but did not ride - the weather was not great again and I felt I needed to rest. I was still eating properly or at least hopped I was - I still did not have a scale - it was hard to find a 400 pound home scale at the time. All I could find on the web was a $200 plus dollar one. I joined the NCBC - North Carolina Bicycle Club hopping there might be some rides I could do - everything on the website was either during the day or had an average speed way above what I could do.

Begining to ride - again!

November - December 2008
I was unsure at how other cyclist would think about riding with someone on an electrical assisted bike - at the time I got it I was so slow that I did not think it matter because I never expected to ride with anyone else. Because it helped me and made me feel a bit safer I continue to ride - I could still only manage 6, 7, 8 to 10 miles rides at first even with the Bionx, but they began to get faster. I would do the ride but finish faster. I was riding the same distances getting home and being totally exhausted. I usually set the assist level to One or sometimes Two because I did want to get stronger - sometimes on long flats I would turn it off. I would do one of my routes and get home park the trike in the garage and go inside, then I would make myself shower before I sat down because I knew once I sat down I was not get up for a while. Then I would eat a little something - remember I am still eating the way I learned from Jenny so I was careful with what and how much I ate - did I mention portion control yet - learning this really help me - I did not have a scale so I could not tell how I was doing but I was trying. Then I would recline in my recliner - with my meal I would have take some pain killer which were given to me by my doctor because of my attempts to exercises and how much pain I was in at the beginning. Then I would rub Mineral Ice on my knees because they would be sore and it helped and then I would fall asleep for several hours. And this was from a 8 to 10 mile ride - I hated that is was so short a ride but I was so pleased that I could ride again and I would feel real good when I woke up. My knees would hurt but my legs did not hurt just got a little stiff of a day. The weather limited how much I was able to ride but I rode when I could. Gradually I began to get better. A number of years ago before before health interfered with me riding to be honest I allowed job and relations issuses interfere with my riding before my health did but once the health issues came up I had pretty much stopped and when the did gang up on me I could not ride for quite a while - When I live in and around New Orleans I was a active member of the Crecent City Cyclist. I really enjoyed that group and miss them now.

The Bionx System

The Bionx systems it not just a motor you put on a bike and it will run you around. It is a true electrical assist. It has a computer and will only applies power to the rear wheel while one is pedaling the bike. It senses the amount of torque one applies to the wheel through the petals and compares it to the speed one is traveling and then applies additional power to the wheel motor, when the bike reaches the speed to program wants the bike to be moving based on the torque on the wheel the motor applies less and less power until it is not doing anything.
The Bionx has a speed limiter and reduces it assist at 19.5 mph and stops completely at 20 mph. The system is configurable. It can add as much as 350 watts of power to the wheel motor. Most people of any reasonable fitness can produce about 300 watts of power on a bicycle and can sustain about 200 watts output for a long time depending on their level of fitness. The Bionx has four levels of assist. Level One adds up to 35% of additional power to what the cyclist is applying to the pedals. If the cyclist is applying 100 watts of power to the bike the Bionx would add up to 35 additional watts. The important point here is 'up to' - the assist does not just add 35 more watts but based on the torque applied by the cycles the Bionx will add just enough to move the bike at the speed the Bionx thinks it should be moving based on the torque on the wheel. Therefore the amount of assist is constantly changing based on the speed of the bike, the torque applied to the wheel and the assist level set at the console by the cyclist. As I said before there are four levels of assist and they all work the some way except they apply more or less assist base on the level. Level Two adds up to 75% assist, level Three adds up to 150% assist and level Four adds up to 300% assist.
The Bionx has another feature that is especially useful to trikes. When the keyed brake is applied the Bionx switched to generation mode. This turn the motor into a generator and recharges the battery but also slows down the bike acting as a brake - since all tadpole styles trikes I have seen do not have a rear brake this it very useful when descending because there is no brake induced steering which can occur during descents when using the front brakes.
This system is expensive and adds 15 pounds to the bike but it lets me climb hill faster than 2 mph and that help me keep up with others cyclist.

The Bionic Turtle

I will do almost anything to be able to ride. My second ride I went back to the same bike trail but a different section - I thought it was a paved section but I was wrong. This section was worse than the first, it was mostly railroad ballast size stones and it was over grown and very hard to ride on. I was however determine and managed to ride about 6 miles - it took me 4 hours but I did it.
I was beginning to believe that I was just going to be very very slow but as long as I could ride it would be OK. While researching trikes before I bought the Tour I ran across something I had never heard of - Electrical Assisted Bicycle - with my current experiences to date I began to think that is it would work on the trike it might let me ride faster and longer distances also I felt at the time I would always be riding alone because I could not image riding with others when I was riding so slowly. With some of my health issues I also thought it might be sort of a safety thing - giving me the ability to get back from a ride if I got sick out there. ( It has gotten me out of trouble three times so far, twice when I got sick and one when my chain broke)
After some research I ordered a Bionx 350PL system with a 20" wheel. It took me a good deal of work to figure out how to mount the battery but I did and everything seemed to work just fine. I rode it around my neighborhood a little but it was dark and I did not have a light on the trike - then the weather turn bad and it was several days before I could ride.