BIKING 101: FROM 104 KILOGRAMS TO 108.47 KILOMETRES

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I did it! Broke the 100 km barrier yesterday. Needless to say, I am so happy and satisfied. One year and seven months ago I was 104 kg, and the most I could do was walking for 7 - 10 minutes. Tu pun dah mengah giler, lidah terjelir sampai perut. High blood pressure, borderline diabetes, a high cholesterol level of 7.8, gout etc, etc were all lingering around then. Alhamdulillah, beat all that just with regular exercises.

I never thought I could ride for more than 100 km.

THE RIDE AND ROUTE

This time I chose the France's side of Lake Geneva to conquer since I am very familiar with the route here in the Swiss side. My goals were to;

i. Check out the lake route there since I am planning to ride the whole length of Lake Geneva.
ii. Break the 1ookm barrier. The furthest I rode was 60 km.

I was nervous the whole day on Friday just thinking about he ride. I don't know whether I have the stamina, endurance and the will to do it. I prepared myself by drinking a lot of water and ate high protein and carbohydrate food. Strictly no cili api.

Things that I brought along.

i. Passport
ii. ID
iii. Spare Tube
iv. Pump
v. Multi Tools
vi. Power Bar
vii. Water Bottles
viii. GPS
ix. Ipod
x. Camera

I retired early to bed to make sure I had enough rest.

FIRST LEG: GENEVA - EVIAN

I set the alarm at 5.00 am, since I wanted to leave at 6.00 am, but somehow woke up at 4.30 am. Tried to sleep a little bit more but then decided to get up and went through all the stuff again. After a quick shower, started my ride at 5.40 am. Here, the sun rise before 6 am during this time of the year.

Rode through Geneva to get the other side of the lake. It was really quite except for the occasional traffic and the early morning public city workers. Did not see other cyclist.

Evian-Les-Baines lies 44.5 km away. I rode on normal speed, bearing in mind I had a long way to go. The road was clear, and once in a while a car passed me by. No big hills to take on except for a few low mounds. Arrived at the Swiss/ France border after the Swiss town of Maison Neuves, which is about 12.3 km from Geneva.


Entering France, I found out that the road condition was quite bad. It worries me a bit and I had to look out for pot holes. The uneven surface slowed down my progress and pace. Traffic was still light. The day was getting warm and I stopped near Filly to take off my windbreaker since I was sweating profusely. I have been riding for almost one hour. On both side of the road, farmlands stretch for miles. Theres a lot of farming machines lying around the farms, some with weird shapes and quite huge. I continued the ride towards Thonon, about 11 km away.



In Thonon, riding through the town, I lost my bearing and was not sure which way to continue. I asked an old man who was just about to get into his car, "Monsieur, Evian?" with my right hand pointing down the road. He was startled but quickly recovered and said "Oui, oui". I guess that meant I was on the right track. And sure enough after a few kilometres, I saw the road sign to Evian. Good.




I arrived at Evian at around 7.50 am. I headed out to the Evian lake front and took a rest. The first leg from Geneva to Evian took me about 2 hours and 10 minutes of the 44.5 km route, more or less. Ate 2 power bars for breakfast. Evian seems to me like a standard tourist town with a lot of hotels by the lake. Saw a lot of tourist buses. It was still early. Not too many people around the park where I stopped. And yes, this is the place where the world famous Evian mineral water came from. A friend of mine told me to visit the place where I can get free mineral water, straight out of its source, but I decided not too, since I dont have a lot of time to search for it.

SECOND LEG: EVIAN - BOUVERET- VILLENEUVE

This leg consist of a long climb since the road was cut at the very foot of Chablais Alps.

After a 20 - 30 minutes break, I left Evian for Le Bouveret, Switzerland. The road started its ascend immediately and this continued until I arrived in small village of St Gingolph. Its not to too difficult to cycle but keeping my neck comfortable was the real challenge and it started to get stiff and sore. It bothered me a lot. Met a lot of other cyclist along this stretch of the route, but they were heading in the opposite direction. Perhaps it made much more sense, since the road was downhill the other way. Argggghhhhh!

Nevertheless, climbed all the way to St Gingolph. The view was breathtaking and I could see the other shores of Lake Geneva, running parallel with the road I was cycling on. The France and Switzerland borderline cuts through right in the middle of St Gingolph village, dividing the sovereignty and to a certain extend I guess, its people's loyalty. Interesting.

I left France and entered back into Switzerland in St Gingolph and proceeded to Le Bouveret. A few more kilometres and I will arrived in Villeneuve, the next stop. I rode through the farmlands there, stopped to take some photo of the Chablais Alps I just left behind before crossing the river Rhone. The Rhone emptied into Lake Geneva before continuing its course again at Geneva to the Mediterranean.

Arrived in Villeneuve for a well deserved break. Its been a long 28.8 kilometres. Neck hurt like hell!

THIRD LEG: VILLENEUVE - MONTREUX - VEVEY

I rested for about 30 minutes in a park at Villeneuve lakefront. Called and confirmed with a friend was going to pick me up in Vevey, the final destination of this whole ride.


Again, my neck was hurting badly, while other parts of my anatomy seems in good condition. A little sore on my behind as expected after a long period on the saddle. Did some stretching to loosen up the muscles. Applied muscles pain reliever cream to the back of my neck to temporarily relief the pain. Ate another 2 power bars to boost the withering energy and drank a lot of water to avoid dehydration.


Posted an update in the Facebook. My Iphone battery was dead and so did the Cyclometer, the Iphone GPS application to track and record the ride progress. From here on, I would have to depend on the Cateyes to tell me about distance and ride time. Made a mental note on my head, to check out Garmin GPS, which has a reputable battery usage of 15 hours.

I push on to Montreux, 4.9 kilometres away. En route, there was one small hill to conquer, and I continued to ride to Vevey.

What I didnt know, a friend who live in Vevey read my update in the Facebook and he decided to look for me and joined in. I was concentrating to take on the hill near Vevey when he found me and yelled "WOI!" from the other side of the road on the opposite direction. I told him Vevey was my final stop to which he replied "Lets ride until Lausanne. Its only about 2o kilometres away. And you could break the 100 km barrier". Total distance at Vevey was 89 km and seriously, I was tempted to continue riding to Lausanne. We went to Starbuck and discussed the ride plan. After much thought, and a high sugar content drink (cant remember what it was) I decided to push for Lausanne, with painful neck and all.

FOURTH LEG: VEVEY TO LAUSANNE

Applied some more of that muscle pain reliever cream to block the pain and proceeded slowly to Lausanne. The friend was already an veteran rider and he rode slowly to accommodate my tired pace. Its already in the afternoon and the day was getting really hot. I glanced over to the France's side of Lake Geneva shore that I rode earlier in the morning and realized it has been a very long way. 10 kilometres into the ride I noticed that the Cateyes has clocked over 100 kilometres, Yelled at the top of my voice "WOHOOO! YES!, YES! YES! A CENTURY! I DID IT!" Upon hearing this, my friend joined me in celebrating the achievement by chorusing similar kind of excitement much to the amusement of the people on the road side.

After 18.4 kilometres we finally arrived in Lausanne and headed out to the Olympic Park, where another friend was waiting to pick me up.

THE STATISTICS

Total Distance : 108.47 km


Time : 4 hours 43 minutes and 54 seconds.

2 bottles of water.
4 power bar.
1 Starbuck drink of I dont know what.
7-8 sticks of Dunhill
A lot of under the breath mutterings of " I CAN DO THIS, I CAN DO THIS!"
2 friends.

NOTE :-

I am 41 years old, was 104 kg a year 7 months ago, AND I JUST CYCLED 108 KILOMETRES.

YOU CAN DEFINITELY DO IT TOO!

BIKING 101 : HOW IT ALL STARTED - PART II

Arriving in Geneva, I continued to ride the GT MTB during weekends. I noticed that theres a lot of people cycling but most of them use road bikes which is of course much lighter and faster than the MTB.

Since I had achieved my target weight at 80 kg, I felt confident enough that I have the stamina to go riding for longer hours and distances. After months of scouting around for a good and affordable roadbike, I decided to buy a Colnago. No Ah Chai this time, (damn!) so I had to do a lot of research and talked to a lot of sales people at the bicycle shop (using a lot of body language and hand signs plus a lot of guessing since they dont speak a word of English and I dont know French at all!) .


HOW TO KNOW WHICH IS THE RIGHT ONE?

Roadbikes comes in different sizes and according to heights, theres the S, M, L sizes. Ladies requires a different bike frame because of the percentage of the woman's body proportions of longer leg length relative to torso length. Seriously. My love one had to shorten the handle joint a few times because of that. And thats how I knew.


The correct saddle positioned is very important and must be correctly positioned. Usually the people at the bicycle shop could do the adjustment or read the tips about this here (I am sure Ah Chai didnt know about this. Hmmm...).

SO A NEW ROADBIKE, SO WHAT?

With the new bike, I need these:-

i. Cycling Shoes - Paid CHF 167.00
ii. Cleats - Came with the shoes.
iii. Pedals - Pedals was not included with the bicycle. Bought a CHF 60.oo Shimano roadbike pedal.
iv. Cycling shorts with paddings - a must, or suffer the excruciating butt pains CHF 189.00
v. 1 long sleeves cycling jersey - Spring time, its cold. CHF 40.00 ++
vi. 1 short sleeves cycling jersey - for summer CHF 50 something I think.


Riding a roadbike was a totally different ballgame from the MTB. It took me a few days to be comfortable with the new riding style. I watched a lot of `how to ride a roadbike' videos easily available from You Tube. And read a lot of cycling blogs for cycling tips.

So there.

I am still new at this, okay (the cycling, not the blogging). If my facts are wrong, please dont be shy to point it out.

P/s: Mr Udinese. Pueh hati?

BIKING 101: HOW IT ALL STARTED - PART I

I took up biking/ cycling in January 2009. Thats only about a year plus to date.

HOW DID I GET INTO THIS?


I was doing my 'power walking' rounds at the majestic PICC then (in all seriousness, PICC do resembles the alien that Fox Mulder and Dana Scully frequently encountered in the X Files tv series), when a group of people whizzed pass me riding their MTBs. I thought to myself, "Now, that looks like fun". I was referring to the seemingly effortless and smooth movement of the group, which to my tired eyes, looks like they were gliding on the road. (I was dead wrong of course in my assumption. Cycling, like other physical sports, requires a lot of stamina, energy and kederat). That encounter with the MTB bikers sparked my interest in cycling considering:-

i. I already know how to ride a bicycle,
ii. I was bored stiff with my everyday power walking routine (I cant run yet at that time, and was still a fat and overweight person then),

So I went back home, searched for a bicycle shop near my house and bought one GT MTB for me and a Jamis MTB for my love one from Ah Chai's Kedai Basikal Dan Barang-barang Dapur Lain. For information, besides selling the usual MTB, road bike and other cycling accesories, Ah Chai also sold barang-barang dapur lain of course, and to name a few, periuk belanga, dapur tanah, cili kering, ikan masin, gula, milo and serbuk teh. Oh...... and the ever popular multi purpose and comfortable toto was on display too in his shop.


A good MTB price average was around RM 1,000.00 to RM 2,000.00. Its cost more for those top of the line models. I did not pay any particular attention to the brands since I sort of jumping into this on impulse and did not have any idea whatsoever what model or brand to buy. I just asked Ah Chai and put my trust on his experiences and judgement (selling barang-barang dapur) to recommend to me what he thought best. Imagine my relief when researching the Internet after I bought those MTB's, that both GT and Jamis were listed in Wikipedia with links to their their impressive websites and information. These two models even won awards.

BICYCLE DONE, WHAT ELSE DID I NEED?

1. Cycle computer- RM 30.00 - RM 50.00. Cateyes. Polar is good too according to a friend of mine.
2. Gloves - RM 15.00 above. (Yang cikai punya jer, I was broke after buying the MTB's)
3. Iron Mag helmet - about RM 40.
4. Bicycle tyre pump - Cant remember what the price was(or was it because Ah Chai gave it FOC?).
5. Spare tube - RM 8.00
6. Water bottles - RM 10.00. Bought two for 15.00 after much haggling with Ah Chai.

WHERE TO CYCLE?

With its good road system and highways, Putrajaya is definately a safe and an excellent place for newbie cyclist like me. Not too many traffic is a plus point too. And no, I did not go anywhere else since Putrajaya was just near my house and I was too lazy too find/ drive to other places.

To angkut both mine and my love one MTBs, I got myself a bicycle carrier. And yes, I bought it from Ah Chai (again). The price was about RM 125.00 discounted (and seriously, Ah Chai was making lot of money from me alone!).


Putrajaya was an interesting place to explore. With a MTB, I gained access to those parts of the administrative capital not normally visited. I discovered pathways and shortcuts, got to meet with the hordes of gardeners who kept it clean and also found out that there are actually a lot of Putrajaya Holdings security guards scattered all over Putrajaya stationed at their makeshift guard posts under the bridges or near the unused public toilets.


My last biking adventure in there was the Feb 2009 Putrajaya Critical Mass (PCM). I wrote a post of the event in the my old defunct blog Nasi Lemak And Nescafe Tarik. PCM is still going strong and just celebrated their 2 years anniversary.

At that time, I could only ride for about 20km - 30 km (tops) since I was still in the process of shedding my weight.

I got posted to Geneva in May 2001 and brought the GT MTB with me.

To be continued in Part II

BIKING 101: GRAND SACONNEX - LAUSANNE

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After a few weeks of hitting the 50 km mark on the Nyon route, I decided last night today I will try to go for Lausanne, which is about 59 km from Geneva.

GRAND SACONNEX - NYON

I started cycling at 6.40 am. My intention was to beat the crowd, since usually, from 8.00 am onwards there will be a lot of cyclist on the road. The weather was nice, no rain and at 6.40 am the sun has already came out, shining. The good thing about going out this early was that, theres virtually no traffic at all on the road. It was quite and peaceful.

I am quite use to this route since I cycled every week to Nyon and back. Met with a couple of riders who obviously started much more earlier than me.

After 23 km, and 55 minutes later, I arrived in Nyon. Decided to stop in a park by its waterfront for a break.

NYON - GLAND

Put on my Ipod Nano, and with Iron Maiden songs playing in my head, I headed out towards Gland, 4.8 km away. Traffic was still light. Just one hill to conquer along the way.

GLAND - ROLLE

This 6.8 km stretch was quite straight with a lot of vineyards on both side of the road. Met a lot of other cyclist which seems to appear out of nowhere. A lot of small hills and elevation.

ROLLE - MORGES

This section of the route is the most challenging, since this 15.1 km route were dotted with hills after hills, elevations after elevations to take on. I felt tired and at times could feel my legs and my hands went numb. I could feel the increasing pain at the back of my right knee. My neck and back stiffened with every round of cycling. My mouth was dry and I was struggling to beat those hills. There were a lot of instances I considered to stop to take a break, but shaking off the temptation, I forced myself to continue. I too, reminded myself that if the fat, out of shape and never exercise in his whole life Eddie Izzard (Britain's stand up comic and actor) can run a full marathon everyday in 52 days, there is no reason why I cannot do this.

The last hill to conquer in this section was near Aubonne, and I breathed a sigh of relief since the town of Morges lies just a few kilometres after that.

I arrived in Morges in high spirit and felt elated.

Lausanne was next.

MORGES - LAUSANNE

The final leg of this route is about 9.7 km.

At first I planned to stop for my second break in Morges, but since Lausanne was just abut 10 km away, I decided to push through. I was taken aback when I found out the road to Lausanne had long stretch of elevation, three hills in sucession. To translate, I had to climb uphill 7 kilometres non stop. There was no other choice, of course, so I gathered all my energy, (baca Bismillah sikit) put my head up, changed the gear to the lowest possible and cycled slowly up the hills. Very slowly.

At this juncture, 5 other cyclists overtook me. They really seems like almost flying. I took a glance at their legs and noticed that it looks like batang kayu balak, compared to my own. I think I could see the blood vessels popping out out everywhere on their well tuned leg muscles. I comforted myself by thinking that they have been doing this for years and after all, I had already clocked over 50 kilometres from Geneva and they just started. Plus maybe they even lived nearby as well.

I managed to pull through and arrived in Lausanne in one piece, happy but tired. Met with a friend who drove all the way from Geneva to pick me up.

And no, I did not cycle back. Like I said in my previous post, my goal was to cycle to Lausanne . I did not say anything about cycling back to Geneva.

Hehe.

Maybe next time though.

THE STATISTICS

Total Distance : 59.11 km
Climb : 105 km
Calories burned : 21, 361
Air sebotol
2 Power Bar
2 batang Dunhill
Ipod Nano and Iron Maiden songs.
Age : 41 years old
November 2008 body weight: 104 kg
Current weight: 83 kg

And.... oh, if I can do it, there is no reason you can't.

BIKING 101: GIRO IONOS

Received my long awaited Giro Ionos this morning.

In case you are wondering why I ordered 2, the other is for my love one. Sort of His and Hers item la. Anyway, its Mothers Day yesterday. Well, I am sure my love one would love something ladylike, perfumes or flowers for example, but I am sure she'll love a Giro Ionos cycling helmet instead as a Mothers Day present, for that matter.

Cool, right?

Can't wait for my next ride.

BIKING 101 : GRAND SACONNEX - DIVONNE (FRANCE) - NYON (SWITZERLAND) - GRAND SACONNEX

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Last Saturday, my love one and I did a 50 plus km route. We rodeto Divonne (France) from our home, then headed out to Nyon and rode back to Geneva via the lakeside road.

GRAND SACONNEX - DIVONNE

We left home at 9.15 am. Weather was at its worse as usual around 6-7 degrees Celcius. The strong wind made it feels much colder. We rode at a leisure pace since we dont want to burn out all our energy taking into account there were many more km's to cover.

It was a smooth ride until we turned into a gravel road in a forest. My love one asked me, "Ni betul ke jalan ni, macam trail je?", I answered " Betul la ni. Ikut GPS ni ada jalan." My confidence in the modern technology was tested more than once as we rode deeper into the forest, not meeting any kind of traffic, except for a few campers and because of the fact that we were traveling on an unsurfaced road. The mystery was finally solved when we saw a road sign that depicted a horse. Damned! I thought to myself "Jalan kuda!". Checking my GPS, I told my love one that this will finally merged into a normal road. My love one remarked. "Mountain bike ok la jalan ni, roadbike boleh pecah tayar". Fortunately, nothing untowards happened.

After 5 km, we finally emerged from the forest and continued our way to Divonne, France.

We reached the Swiss and France border, took out our camera and captured the obligatory pose. Arrived in Divonne in high spirits and took our first break.


DIVONNE - NYON

Ride was smooth, with the occasional traffic. I have to say that probably the best thing about biking in Switzerland is that cyclist are given priority on the road by other vehicles. We dont have to constantly looked behind our backs since the others, will give a wide space when overtaking. And if they cant, there is no honking for us to get out of their way. They rather wait patiently behind my love one and me and will only overtake once the other side of the road was clear.

The route to Nyon was flat and straight all the way to and this is where we picked up some speed. We met a lot other cyclist, but compared to us, I think they are almost pros, unlike me and my love one, a newbie. They were really cool and flashed their smiles and nodded their head while some of the friendliest one shouted `Bonjour' greeting us.

We took a rest in Nyon and ate a banana and power bar each to boost our declining energy.

NYON - GRAND SACONNEX

This is the last leg of our 50 km ride, so we were a bit excited. There were a couple of steep hills along the way and we took it all in our stride. The good thing on this lakeside stretch was that there are special lane for bicycles. We could concentrate on our riding without that constant fear to watch our backs.

We arrived in Versoix and took our last break before heading home. We finished the 50.11 km ride in 2 hours and 21 minutes.

BIKING 101 : GRAND SACONNEX, - FERNEY VOLTAIRE - GEX - MEYRIN - GRAND SACONNEX

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I just finished a 35 km bike ride. (I am naming this route as The Gex Loop, hehe).This is the first time I manage to ride above the 30 km mark after over a year swan diving in this sport. As I mentioned before, my usual will be around 20 - 25 km.

Actually, last week, I mentioned to a friend, Mr. AAT, that I want to try this new route, but only in the next few weeks time, since I and my love one wanted to familiarize ourselves with the new road bike. We wanted some time to built a bit of stamina too.

Yesterday, discussing about our next ride, I talked about the possibility of trying the Gex Loop with my love one.

Akula : Ala, total 35 km. Semalam kita buat 23 km. Tambah 12 km je. Lagi pun cuaca sejuk, tak panas.
Akula's Love One: Ok, no problem.
Akula : Lagi pun jalan landai, takde bukit. Abang dah riki.
Akula's Love One : Ok boleh la kot.

GRAND SACONNEX - FERNEY VOLTAIRE (FRANCE)

We started off at 11.00 am. Weather was cold, around 7 degress Celcius. No sun. Not much difficulties since this route was very familiar to us. A hill hear and there, the rest was easy.

FERNEY VOLTAIRE - GEX

The road started to climb from Ferney Voltaire towards Gex. Halfway riding uphill my love one started to interrogate me on my info gathering.

Akula's Love One : Wei Abang sayang! Kata LANDAIIII! Ni apa yang landai?

I offered an excuse.

Akula : Eh mana tau. Naik keter tengok landai. Elok je rata jalan ni.
Akula's Love One : LANDAIIIIII sangat lah ni kan.
Akula: Ok, ok salah riki. Sorry yek.

(Lesson learned : Object in the rear view mirror may appear higher than then they are. Especially road surface).


We rode uphill 12.6 km all the way to Gex. (With a lot of huffing and puffing, I might add). Took us quite a while.

GEX -MEYRIN (SWITZERLAND)

We took a little break when we arrived in Gex. (Actually, 2 breaks before we arrived in Gex. Gex was the third. Its over 12 km uphill ride ok. Non stop pedalling!).

Right after leaving Gex, on our way to Meyrin, there lies a huge and long hill to climb ahead of us. I changed the gear to the lowest setting available and seriously, it took all my effort and energy to conquer it. Mengah giler. Rasa nak tercabut nyawa. Napas terus pendek, tercungap-cungap. And my love one, although a bit behind, also managed to beat this monster hill. We high fived (tengah tercungap) on top of it. Happy giler!

Weather was damned cold! It was made worse by the fact that around this time, it rained. Sejuk giler! 2 more smaller hills along the route with the Jura Mountain Range on our right side and its all downhill all the way to Meyrin.

Easy.

On the downhill part of course.

MEYRIN - GRAND SACONNEX

We were back in Switzerland at the Meyrin border crossing. We took it easy, since we were nearing our destination. For information CERN (European Organization for Nuclear Research), made famous by Dan Brown's novel, Angels and Demons is located here.

We arrived safely at our home.

Conquering a 35 km ride for me is very special and a great achievement, since not too long ago, I was this 104 kg overweight, obese guy. Never dreamt that I could do this.

And I am proud that my love one finished this difficult route too.

Well, I am 41 years old, and I just cycled 35 km.

BIKING 101 : GRAND SACONNEX - VERSOIX - GRAND SACONNEX

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Went biking with my love one just now.

The route that we took was from Grand Saconnex where we live, to Versoix and back, for a total of about 23 km.

Although the sun was shining bright, its still cold, and the temperature stayed around 6 degrees Celcius through out the ride. We hardly broke a sweat because of the cold weather. Kalau kat Malaysia dah berpeluh giler dah.

There a lot of people who went biking and we exchange dthe universal acknowledgment when we passed by each other by smiling and nodding our head slightly. Seriously, its the same everywhere. Including in Malaysia. Some Swiss that passed us by in their car would also offer encouragement when they saw us struggling to ride up hills.

Since this is the first day that we really pushed ourselves biking after the long winter hiatus, its a little bit tiring. This is also the first time we rode our road bike, switching from the MTB, and we still had to adjust ourselves to get use to the different riding style.

A little update, my love one got her new Colnago Primavera 2009 roadbike 2-3 days ago. Its the same model as mine, but much cheaper. The 2010 models is on the way, so the shops here are selling all the previous year's bicycle stocks at a heavily discounted price. Which is really great since there is absolutely no way we could afford to buy a Colnago back in Malaysia. A friend of mine grabbed a GT Aggressor MTB 2009 yesterday for a fraction of the original price. Can't complain about that!

Tomorrow, we planned to ride a different route with our friends in Meyrin.

If the weather permits, that is.

BIKING 101 : CYCLING HELMETS

The bike helmet that I am using right now looks like an overgrown mushroom on my head. I mean seriously.

I am sure the manufacturers must have taken great pains and effort to design a safe and secure helmets with our safety in mind. However its is my opinion that the designs looks like shit.

Like I said, an overgrown mushroom.

Having write that, in my search for the all round cycling helmet that not only focus on safety, but also comfortable and looks great, I came across Giro. Researching more information about this brand in the Internet, its actually very popular with the pros. Lance Amstrong and Alberto Contador wore Giro Ionos. Not that I am near Lance Amstrong standard by the way.

From Giro's website;

Ionos is the most ventilated and technologically advanced road cycling helmet Giro has ever created. Our proprietary in-mold composite sub-frame (I.C.S.™) provides the strength to support 21 of the largest vents ever carved into a helmet. These massive vents, coupled with an intricate network of internal channels, create a cooling system we call Wind Tunnel™ ventilation, making Ionos the coolest, best-ventilated helmet available.

The Giro cycling helmet's price is a little bit steep. Wiggle.co.uk sell it at USD 215.99 @ RM 706.99 and Giro website's price is USD 230.00 @ RM 751.87. In Switzerland Ionos cost about CHF 399.00 @ RM 1,228.99 which is way more expensive than the price offered elsewhere.

Its not widely available here in Geneva, and if I ever decide to acquire this one, it looks like I have to order it online. And starts saving.

In the mean time I shall continue my quest for a safe, secure and comfortable cycling helmet.

Oh, and the one which looks cool too, of course.

BIKING UPDATES

Right.

I was asked by one of the regulars here what happened to my biking activity.

Well, since its winter time for the past 3-4 months in Geneva, and I sort of taking a break from biking. Its also been snowing regularly, and its really not the best time to indulge in this kind of activity. Although there are some who braved the minus temperature and keep on cycling during the winter time.

A full, head to toe, body warming accessories are needed if I want go biking which more or less includes full hand gloves, leg warmer, arm warmer, shoe covers, thermal jackets etc to keep warm. These stuffs are a really expensive to buy here. To acquire all those things in one shot boleh jadi bankrap, so pelan-pelan ler. By the way, I bought all my biking stuff online at wiggle.co.uk since it cost much less. And so far I am happy to report that I dont have any problems with all my orders.

The other update is that I finally bought a roadbike. A Colnago Primavera. Its a 2008 model and I got it on discounts, which was less about CHF 600.00 from the original price. I dont know how much this road bike cost in Malaysia. For newer and more famous bicycle models, the price tag is about CHF 4,000.00 (RM 12,868.79) to CHF 8,000.00 plus (RM 25,737.59). Boleh beli kereta.





With this new bike, I hope to clock a little bit more mileage than the usual 20-30 km with the MTB. Nope, I am not ditching the MTB. The problem with this is that my love one also want one! "Tak adil la, kalau ride abang pakai roadbike", she said. Well, no promises.

The other cool thing here in Geneva, bicycles is allowed on board trains for a basic fee of CHF 10.00. Since the railway line and network here in Switzerland is quite extensive, people ride their bicycles to the railway stations and hopped on the train (with their bike) to other towns. Its very convenient and cheap, plus its a good way to travel.

It is compulsory to buy insurance for bicycles which is about CHF 24.00 annually in case of accidents and other unforeseen circumstances.

I am also waiting for my bike rack Surco BT 3000 to arrive from the US. The normal one sold here won't fit the back of my CRV, since its spare tire holder was built a bit off the centre. This anomaly prevented my old bike rack to be hooked up. I cannot find a suitable one here in Geneva, and had to order it from the US. This model could carry up to 3 bikes securely and once it arrives, I planned to do some serious exploring on the many biking trails available around here.

Since I came back from Malaysia, the weather is still cold, but getting warmer every single day. I am planning to ride this new bike this coming weekend, if weather permits.

Thats it.

1ST BIKE RIDE

My love called me at the office to inform that our stuff has arrived from Malaysia.

Akula's Love One : Barang dah sampai. Diorang tengah unpacking. Pinggan mangkuk, kristal, barang makan semua ok. Tak de yang pecah.
Akula : Tak penting semua tu. Basikal ok dak?
Akula's Love One: Apala..... yang itu pulak tanya dulu.
Akula : Ituler yang paling penting. Yang lain asal sampai sudah.
Akula's Love One : Yelah. Basikal you ok. Tayar je lembik sikit.
Akula: Roger and out. Rajin-rajinlah mengemas.

So, yes, I did asked about my mountain bike first. :)

Last Saturday, I went for my first ride in Geneva. After much coaxing, my love one finally agreed to join me. We took off at 6.45 am, riding the back roads toward Versoix. It was a cold, cold morning. (Its so cold, I even thought that our ears has turned blue). Cycled over the Geneva - Lausanne highway and continue to ride passed a bison farm/ ranch (Thats right. Theres a bison farm/ ranch right in the out skirt of Geneva. If you dont know what bison is, just Google it.)

After 3 hills and 5 kilometres, we had to stop since my love one was not feeling well.

Akula : Huh. Pehal lak ni?
Akula's Love One : Semput, tak de stamina. Rasa nak muntah.
Akula : Cheh! Apara...kat Malaysia, 20 km selamba je. Siap pecut jauh lagi. Satu Putrajaya round keliling.
Akula's Love One : Ni dah lama tak exercise. You tak pelah, joging tiap hari.
Akula: Okler, jom balik, tapi ambik gambar dulu. Nak masuk blog.

Akula's Love One: !&!!&#@**#@*& (Censored). Hoi Cik abang! Ni tengah letih ni!
Akula : Jap la! Satu gambar je.

Here is the pic .

I have to turn my back (trying not to laugh) so as not to piss off the already tired and pissed off love one.

We (actually ... I) made it home, safely, after that. :)