Headlines like this strike a bad note with me. Sixty hasn’t felt very significant fitness-wise. I don’t feel very different than I did at fifty, to be honest.
Yes, I need more rest and recovery and a good night’s sleep. I am much more cautious about what I eat and when. So a bunch of things around fitness activities feel more fussy, but my energy for the activities feels about the same. I still love the way movement feels when I do it and I love how it makes me feel after.
When I was 58 I felt the same way about 60 talk. See Sam has 60 in her sights! – FIT IS A FEMINIST ISSUE. There I talked about my reaction to Carolyn Heilbrun’s book The Last Gift of Time: Life Beyond Sixty. The last gift of time???
Anyway, I’m not exactly a superfit sixty but sixty doesn’t feel all that different than fifty for me. How about you? Are you getting close to sixty and expecting big changes? Are you sixty and feeling them? How’s the big 6-0 sitting with you?
When I was in my 40s, I spent a lot of time training for long rides, short intense rides, hilly rides, and yes, bike racing. Mountain bike racing was the most fun, and I also did some crits, some cyclocross races and a few road races (my least favorite).
For a while, I had a cycling coach, the marvelous and wise Steve Weller. He was in his 20s then, racing and also beginning coaching. He saw and appreciated my strengths (cornering, bike handling, general enthusiasm) and helped me improve on my weaknesses (sticking to a training regimen, developing high-end power and hill-climbing coping strategies).
I’m still on Steve’s email list. He sends out weekly posts about training, mental states and attitude, seasonal shift advice, etc. Last week’s post was about research on intense workouts featuring 30-second all-out intervals with 15 second breathers.
And then there was this one small mention of the grey zone. What’s that? Here’s what Steve wrote:
The grey zone is the intensity band between genuinely easy and genuinely hard. It’s not Zone 2. It’s not a threshold interval. It’s the moderately hard effort that feels productive — the group ride that’s too spicy on the hills, that solo endurance ride where you keep the power “comfortably uncomfortable” for two hours.
Those rides take some effort, they feel like a workout, and they’re definitely not easy.
But physiologically, this approach is a dead end. You ride too hard to truly build an aerobic base, but not hard enough to create a meaningful high-end stimulus. You accumulate fatigue without triggering the adaptations that will actually make you faster.
Yep, I can speak for myself that I’ve spent way too many minutes on the bike going harder than I might like, but not in a focused or intentional way with a particular goal in mind (other than to get this ride over with or keep up with folks who are faster or peppier than I am). All cycling coaches and all cycling training advice tells us that the grey zone is where motivation goes to die. We don’t get the benefits of focused threshold or top-end-power training, and we don’t get the advantages of long slow distance. We just get tired and then frustrated when we don’t see results.
Oh my god, I can so relate to this now, even though I’m not doing bike training.
Reading Steve’s posts, it was clear to that this is a thing I do in life as well. When I’m feeling behind or pressed by tasks and obligations piling up, I’ll often speed up a little, trying to catch up, but without a real plan or purpose or specific and reachable end point. Instead, it’s all about Go faster! Try to catch up! When will this be over? When can I take a break?
We all know that frantic flailing rarely works in any context, but it is an easy go-to move. Maybe there are other options.
Can I push myself to go hard for a short period of time, a particular goal in mind (e.g. finish that abstract, grade that set of exams, write that report draft, do that group family call)? Can I schedule in rest or relaxation or recreation for some amount of time (e.g. crafting, reading, watching a movie, calling a friend, taking a nice walk, swimming with my favorite toddler)? I’m thinking that yes, I can do that. I can do that more often.
The grey zone sounds scary, but really it’s just a place where we can’t see our way clear to resting or focusing. Let’s clear things up and see how that makes us feel. Thanks, Steve, for reminding me how to train for life as well as cycling!
To be clear, I love my job. I still find lots of what I do for work energizing and important. And I plan to work for quite a few more years yet.
But as friends start to retire– here’s looking at you Nat, Tracy, and Diane– I’m a little jealous of the freedom and flexibility that comes with not working.
It strikes me especially in the fall when we have glorious days but the evenings get dark so early. Wouldn’t it be nice to go for more weekday rides?
I suspect the challenge will be, when I get there, finding other people to ride with. I’m not a big fan of riding alone. I envy Nat who is both retired and who prefers solo riding.
Are you a cyclist retired from paid work? How did you find people to ride with? Is it really as good riding on weekdays as I imagine?
My cycling distance goal for the year was 3000 km . I’m at 1278 km, and there are only 13 weeks left in the year. I’d have to ride more than 130 km a week to make it. That seems highly unlikely.
If I change my annual goal to 2000 km for 2026, and I’ve ridden 1278 so far, that’s 722 left for the year. Can I do that?
Yes, I can! There are exactly 13 weeks left in the year, so that means I would need to ride 55.5 km a week.
What’s the plan? I usually bike to school two or three days a week, and that gets me about 15 km. And then there’s Zwift. See you in Watopia!
Sarah, Mallory, Rob, Susan, Sumaya and I were all part of the Parkinson’s Spinning Wheels Tour ride from London to Stratford. Mallory, Susan, and Sumaya drove support vehicles and Rob, Sarah, and I, and about ten other riders, rode bikes.
Here’s Susan in Stratford Today talking about the ride and her role in it.
“Susan Fullerton is a former cyclist who helped with the logistics of the event. She was diagnosed with Parkinson’s nine years ago, and she says it’s really impacted her life.
“I’m no longer able to work. I moved out of Toronto to Guelph, to be close to my family, as I don’t really drive very much,” she shared. “I have quite bad tremors, and something called dystonia, where I freeze; my toes curl, and I have trouble walking, but I’m fairly well managed on medication.”
She was a part of a clinical trial where they opened her brain and put drugs in the brain to help stop the progression of Parkinson’s, and she thinks it really helped.
“I used to not be able to smell very much at all. And I can smell some things now,” Fullerton said. “I came home from the surgery, and I could smell my cat litter, something I hadn’t been able to do for a number of years, so one of my friends sent me flowers because she said I should smell something better than cat litter.”
When it comes to Parkinson’s, there are a lot of misconceptions.
“I think most people think of old men with tremors, and they don’t think it’s happening to, people in their mid-30s, so it’s not just old people; it’s young, middle-aged, and old people,” Fullerton said. “People think it’s only tremors, and there’s so much more, and the other thing is, it’s not just physical symptoms. There’s the anxiety, depression, and the other thing is that stress is one of the biggest contributors to the progression of your disease.”
The ride is really about raising awareness of Parkinson’s and celebrating community, but it’s also a fundraiser. You can donate here if you like.
“More than 120,000 people live with Parkinson’s in Canada, a number expected to grow significantly in the coming years. At Parkinson Canada, people with Parkinson’s are at the centre of everything we do. Parkinson Canada funds critical research, provides information and support, increases awareness and advocates for improved healthcare outcomes for people with Parkinson’s across Canada. With the support of our sponsors, partners and the Parkinson’s community, we continue to invest in research dedicated to finding a cure and improving the quality of life for all people affected by Parkinson’s.”
The route was about 65 km and the day was gorgeous. There was sunshine and temperatures starting out at about 10 degrees and ending at about 15. There were also hills, but rolling hills mostly, so fine. And wind. The wind was less fine.
We regrouped for the final ride into Stratford and our highlight of the day was riding into the park, complete with trumpets and a fanfare. Thanks Mary, Larry, and Phil for the welcome!
Video of our arrival at the park, with a very Stratford welcome and a trumpet fanfare!
I rode about 40 miles the other day. That used to be a shortish ride.
Today it was, then suddenly, it wasn’t. I got too hungry & hadn’t packed any reasonable amount of food. I had a cookie, but somehow, that just wasn’t going to take care of things. So I stopped at the grocery store after calling my husband & sister to come along & rescue me, along with stuff for a very early dinner. I’m not sure why I couldn’t get this right; it’s not all that hard. I travel with a medium-sized Camelback, which helps me drink enough, and has plenty of room for nuts (and cookies) and, if I expect to be out at a regular mealtime, a peanut butter sandwich or something like it. And perhaps a nice sparkling water.
Right now I am trying to get back to longer rides of 60 miles or more. We are seriously considering two different tours next spring/summer: a couple of weeks exploring Japan, probably free-form, mostly organized by a friend who has been there several times; and/or, a ride along what Adventure Cycling calls The Transamerica Trail. That one could be quite a challenge. Although I have ridden the northern cross-continent route and the southern one offered by Adventure Cycling, I have chosen not to ride this one. I still don’t want to ride the whole thing. Why? Well, up until recently, it was because I didn’t want to take on the winds, mostly in Kansas, and because I am frankly scared of the dogs in eastern Kentucky. The winds on that open prairie state are almost constant, but can change directions quite a bit. I am small, my bike is light; my bike touring doesn’t include camping, so I don’t need to carry all that equipment. I have already experienced winds strong enough to push me a foot or more from where I thought I was riding, and in one case, 90 degrees from where I’d been heading. I just don’t want a sudden gust to come along and send me out into the traffic lane. I have ridden in Kansas, loved it in many ways, but all the way across? Nope.
The dogs are notorious among touring cyclists. There’s an area where there seem to be no restrictions on keeping them behind a fence, and they act as if they’ve been bred from Prohibition-era dogs that were schooled to keep the inspectors at a good distance from the stills hidden in the Appalachian hills. Bloggers write of using horns, water sprays from bottles, shouting, bear spray (but what if the wind is heading your way???), getting off & putting the bike between you & the dog (but if there’s more than one dog…). Anyway, I choose not to take that one on. I have ridden in western Kentucky. It’s lovely.
There was one other concern. The pass across the Rocky Mountains is high. Over 11,000 feet. I have ridden up Haleakala on Maui, a bit over 10,000 feet, and I really feel it when I get above about 8500 feet. How can all these people make it across? Why do none of them even talk about the reduced oxygen?
I read lots & lots of journals on crazyguyonabike.com. I finally realized: they spend a week or two on the ascent. I do the beach-to-summit in one day on Haleakala. Oh. Maybe I could do it. So we are seriously considering giving it a try. We would ride from somewhere in Oregon (Coast? Bend? Doesn’t matter much; we’ve ridden both those areas quite a bit) and finish in Pueblo, Colorado, where the land flattens & becomes the Great Plains.
Which explains why I need to remember my peanut butter sandwich on my longer rides starting now.
Bio: I am a lifelong Californian. My mother and father were not born here but moved to the state as small children. I have two grown daughters and five wonderful grandchildren. I spent my working life working at, and eventually running, the family insurance business. My father had introduced many employee benefits – sabbatical starting in 1970, optional four-day work week in 1972, elimination of all official work time rules in 1974. Adults like to be treated as adults, and people tended to stay a long time, so it was a very pleasant working environment with key elements of trust and respect. I also served on a couple of independent school boards, one a strong academic school serving grades 6-12, one a school designed to start helping city kids who had suffered the ongoing effects of racism & poverty to find opportunities they might not as easily discover without support. I live at a Lifetime Care Community where I serve on the finance committee and chair the sustainability committee. I also plan to join the newly formed fitness committee. And for fun, I have ridden my bicycle across North America. Twice.
On September 22, Car Free Day encourages motorists around the world to give up their vehicles for a day. Car Free Day aims to see what life would be like without cars on the road.
Part of this day will be easy for me.
On October 22nd I’m taking part in the Parkinson’s Ride from London to Stratford, Ontario. You can join our team or sponsor us here.
But the bit I can’t do is the car-free part, which is kind of the whole point. Because we need to get back to London to get our car and then drive home to Guelph.
But you? Are you in Toronto? You should go to the bike ride and picnic advertised above!
“We are partnering with Chosen Chain and the Bicycle Mayor of Toronto. They will be guiding us along a 15 km route through the heart of the city to discover some amazing car-free spaces which are connected to bike lanes and transit. Thanks to our sponsor Leone Murray LLP, food and refreshments will be provided.”
What: 3rd Annual World Car Free Day bike ride and picnic.
It’s organized by Femmes & Friends.
“Femmes & Friends is a collective of women who enjoy riding bikes and want to share that joy with others. Our events aim to create a welcoming environment for women of all ages, abilities, identities, incomes and mobilities to gather for fun bike rides without fear of judgment or competition. Allies are welcome.”
I read Sam’s post this morning, the one about gradual loss of fitness due to aging. Or perhaps not exactly driven by aging. What is the reality?
I guess I get to speak as one who is definitely older (soon to be 75). My own experience strongly suggests that you don’t have to lose much.
As I may have mentioned before, I enjoy reading bicycle tour journals on the website, crazyguyonabike.com. At the moment, I am following a woman in her 70s who, with a group of friends, is riding the famous Land’s End to John O’Groats route. They have, so far, ridden 865 miles and climbed a total of 59,101 feet. Four days to go. Yes, I typed that correctly. There are four who joined this organized tour together; three of them brought their e-bikes, and one is riding a road bike with no assist. The e-bikes are limited by the restrictions airlines put on the batteries: apparently you can bring a spare battery, which has a much smaller range, but cannot bring the main battery (fire risk). So they are confining the pedal assist to climbs, some of which are close to 20% grade. Are these women professional athletes? Well, I don’t see anything like that in the journal. Looks to me like they are just women close to my age doing a seriously challenging tour.
In my own case, so far my only real restriction is bone-on-bone arthritis in one knee. It was diagnosed 13 years ago, and with good PT, it is only recently that I have had to adapt anything. I can’t do anything that requires me to bend that knee much. It has recently pretty much ruled out running. But in terms of strength & effort, things haven’t changed much. My heart rate seems to be about what it has always been. I can climb the hills on my bike – can let that go for a while & get it back. My activity schedule – I don’t think of it as a workout schedule, although there are plenty of workout elements – is my idea of fun now that I am retired. So, last week I rode my bike 100 miles, am working back to having at least one 60-mile day most weeks; walking with friends several hours most weeks; bird watching; some yoga; some specific strength training; a couple of replacements for running, including some rowing machine time and some fast walking up steep slopes; and dance classes, 4 1/2 hours in a typical week.
I think back to my parents and grandparents. Fitness as we now consider it was nothing anyone talked about. Especially for women. One change that’s almost hard to believe now: my father felt he had to give up tennis (never played much anyway) after one of his friends had a terrible heart attack. No doctor told him vigorous exercise was a good idea. They were in their late 40s. But he was always a brisk and enthusiastic walker until he suddenly was unable to keep his balance (after he died, we learned that he had several minor strokes; they must have hit the spot that controlled his balance). My grandparents on one side travelled a lot, must have walked a lot, but never did anything like the gym time we now do, and running had not yet become a common activity. My other grandparents, well, my grandfather was never active, but my grandmother was always busy, always scooting back & forth between our house and theirs. Again, nothing we would recognize as fitness-related, but definitely more activity than most her age and era. She lived longer than the others and was active until within a couple of months of her death.
I look at their various activity levels when I think about my own. They make me realize how much difference our activities can make in our ongoing ability to maintain and improve our health and energy levels. When I launched my major fitness endeavour, over 25 years ago, my doctor asked how I found the time & energy for all I was doing. “Using energy creates more energy,” I told him. “May I quote you on that?” he asked.
Does aging even exist? Well, yes. There are definitely some changes I don’t love. For me, it is drier, more sun-sensitive skin, and a pickier digestive system (not bad, just don’t get along with a couple of things, mostly garlic). And flexibility has never been good for me & it is a bit worse, but workouts can really help that. My current assumption is that, as long as I am feeling well, keeping it up is the best choice. I feel stronger than I did 30 years ago.
Bio
I am a lifelong Californian. My mother and father were not born here but moved to the state as small children. I have two grown daughters and five wonderful grandchildren. I spent my working life working at, and eventually running, the family insurance business. My father had introduced many employee benefits – sabbatical starting in 1970, optional four-day work week in 1972, elimination of all official work time rules in 1974. Adults like to be treated as adults, and people tended to stay a long time, so it was a very pleasant working environment with key elements of trust and respect. I also served on a couple of independent school boards, one a strong academic school serving grades 6-12, one a school designed to start helping city kids who had suffered the ongoing effects of racism & poverty to find opportunities they might not as easily discover without support. I live at a Lifetime Care Community where I serve on the finance committee and chair the sustainability committee. I also plan to join the newly formed fitness committee. And for fun, I have ridden my bicycle across North America. Twice.
The National Capital Commission has opened several swim spots that are proving very popular, helping turn Ottawa-Gatineau into much more enjoyable river cities. The first was the River House, which opened in 2023. I wrote a bit about it here, after my first visit. Last year, it opened another one on Dow’s Lake, and this summer we got spots at the Museum of History in Gatineau and one at the base of Kiweki Point, right where the Rideau Canal empties into the Ottawa River.
I hadn’t made it to Dow’s Lake last year, or visited the new spots this year, so last week I headed out by bike with my friend Florence so we could try them all before they closed for the season.
We didn’t swim long at any of the venues but it still took us almost four hours to complete the route.
The first image shows the location of each of the swim spots and the Econ shows our route to get there. Most of the way was on NCC bike paths.Clockwise from top left: Diane jumps in at Dow’s lake, then at the Museum of History (with Parliament Hill in the background), Florence and Diane head in together below Kiweki Point (with the Museum of History and Alexandra Bridge in the background), and Florence and Diane at River House.
To finish off, we joined a couple of swim club mates for an easy loop around a small private lake. That took us to a little over 1800 M of swimming for the day.
Florence floats in the water as Diane collapses backwards off the dock on a lake surrounded by trees, with blue skies and fluffy clouds overhead.
Strava tells me that ride was my longest in 2026. In fact, it was about 26.5 km for the day (my phone died for the last bit). That makes it my longest ride since 2024.
My conclusions?
The new swim spots are great. In addition to clean water, plus some swim lanes and islands for floating on or jumping off, they all have decent bike parking, lots of chairs/benches with pleasant views, and places to get food and drink nearby.
Silly challenges like this are the best way to get me moving, especially with friends.
I’ve had a blog post in my head all summer about summer cycling and distance goals. It’s called “Is 50 km my new 100 km?’
In past years when I’ve done the Tour de Guelph in June, I did the 100 km distance but this year I picked 50 km. It seemed the natural choice. Now, I said I did that because we were trying to attract first-time riders for whom 50 km would be a reasonable goal that early in the summer, but also at the end of June, the Tour de Guelph was only my second 50 km ride of the season. It felt like the right distance for me.
July was a hot mess of family tragedy and wildfire smoke.
This month I’m struggling to find the time to ride 200 km. I chose that distance for my Great Cycle Challenge, thinking it wouldn’t really be much of a struggle. I thought that even if bad things kept happening and all my plans went to hell, I’d still be able to manage 200 km in a month easily.
My friend, former graduate student, and twitchy spouse of Natalie, Michel rode 600 km in a weekend recently. A weekend! 600 km!
Twelve years ago I rode 1300 km in August. I know, I know. Comparison is the thief of joy. but still.
Ten years ago I wrote, “What’s your favourite distance? I like 100 km because I can have a normal day after. Ride 100 km in the morning, done and dusted, and get on with the weekend. 160 km requires serious refueling and serious naps. Next thing I know it’s night and my Saturday is shot. How about you?” See here.
So, I know I’m older. But I don’t think this is about age.
I know what I have to do to make long-distance riding comfortable and easy. I need to ride more.
In the years I found the bike rally’s 660 km easy, it’s because I was a) regularly bike commuting, b) doing 30-40 km training rides one or two nights a week, c) doing a long ride on Saturday, often more than 100 km, and sometimes a recovery ride on Sunday, and d) doing bike vacations where we rode bikes every day.
Now I’m just bike commuting and doing an occasional 25 km bike ride on the weekend. No wonder distance goals seem hard.
I’ve realized it’s also an issue with my word of the year, expand. Yes, I’ve been swimming and skating and all sorts of other things but the only thing that makes you a better cyclist really is time on the bike.
What’s my plan then?
Well, I’ve signed up for the half bike rally next summer to raise money for the Toronto PWA–I’m planning to ride from Kingston to Montreal. This event is important to me because the money raised goes to help people living with HIV/AIDS. People who need food, wellness care, peer support or just to be in a place that is welcoming and safe for them. You can donate here.
I’d like to do the full distance, Toronto to Montreal, in 2028.
At some point, I want to ride 200 km in a day. Maybe that’s a Fall 2028 goal when I’m on research leave.
In the meantime, I’m looking for people to ride with in Guelph.
I’m looking for destinations for winter riding that aren’t Florida or Arizona, to be clear, aren’t in the United States at all.
Here’s my past winter rides:
March 2022 Alton Illinois. See here and here and here.
But while Trump is in office, I’m not going to the United States. I need another plan!
My goal for 2026 is 2,500 km, and I’m at about 1,100. There are 18 weeks left in 2026. That’s 77 km a week to meet my goal. But the problem is that the mileage goal alone isn’t motivational. I like achieving the goal when I fill my life with riding.
See you out there!
A reminder for all of us who have had tough summers:
