Running Out Of Gas

Last Saturday, I decided to challenge Kyley to a hike up a steep hill to get to some score hot springs. On the drive there, the Outback Sport decided it wanted to present a challenge of it's own to me. The story goes... I have no way of knowing how much gas I've got left in the tank at any given time since it came from Florida and went through the sulphur catastrophe of 2001 that ruined a lot of gas gauges. Anyways, the only way I know when to fill 'er up is when the average gas mileage that the car gets times the size of the gas tank (now proven to be EXACTLY 12.7 gallons) equals the distance I've driven. Lately, the gas mileage has been going down due to cold temps and more city driving, but this tank proved to be especially nasty. Even with bad gas mileage, it should get at least around 320 miles. Not this time, 298 was all I got out of it. Just as we popped over the top of the Horseshoe Bend hill, it sputtered. Put, put, put and caaaapoot. Lucky for me, it was all down hill! Only one problem, there's a flat section in the middle of the grade on the way down to H.B. Out I got to push along State Highway 55 for just a few feet. That was sketchy at best, but fun in a crazy kind of way. Rolled into town and thought to myself of a Mitch Hedberg line "I don’t know how to fix a car. If my car breaks down, and the gas tank does not say “E”, I’m f***ed. But if the gas tank says “E”, I get all cocky; “I got ths one, don’t worry about it. Lemme get out the toolbox, AKA. ‘wallet.’” So I got all cocky and busted out my toolbox, AKA wallet. First, I had to hop a ride from a local to the gas station since there's a hill through town that a ton of metal on wheels doesn't seem to want to go up without any controlled explosions going off in chambers with pistons (your Bill Nye lesson for the day if you happen to be under the age of 10 or so).

N e ways, once we got to the hot springs, we were pleasantly surprised to see only two other cars, which is crazy low numbers at mile marker 4/skinnydippers h.s.

If you wanted proof that I'm a road cyclist and not an ultimate fighter, here it is:

Sometime I'll take a pic of my flexed quadricep instead of the upper body white out... okay, so you don't want to see that either right?

Here's where it is:

Also, I hooked up the indoor trainer for the first time this winter on Wednesday. War Of The Worlds was only so-so for a motivator when riding the trainer. Did a couple one leg drills. For those interested in how boring this ride was and get all wigged out over power data, here you go.

Yup, I only use the default software since I only like to use the powermeter as a motivator and to even out efforts. I know how fit I am and in which ways from using a couple age old methods called intuition mixed with trial and error; seems to be working so far. As you can also see in this graph, I had to stop a few times to turn up the volume or crank up the fans.

Oh yeah, a couple weeks back, Rumps and I went for a 16-ish mile hike (gps died) around a similar course I did one blog back. It was like a winter wonderland since the snow fell after a cold rain and stuck to everything.

Have fun over your holiday break... over 'n out