El Torcal, a going up trip.

We started the ride like this…

Rainy start.. see the mountains in the back? We were heading there…

Some switchbacks…

Some were intimidating..!

The roads? Excellent..!!! (most of the way) look in the back.. That was our destination..

At the top of our main climb.. "El Torcal" is an observatory, and you can see even Africa from there in a clear day.. today wasn’t one..

At the turn around point.. Now that was some climbing..!

At the sign point… Reference.. Look t-Bong I am using your present..!!!

Heading back was lots of downhill..!!! Do’h..!!! But in order to get to the main road and take some distance away from the ride we had to face this..

One of the guys cresting… Pain face anyone?? The view in the back amazing..!

To finish at this place that is amazing..! Cycling meeting point is the name of the place..!

And I am done for this week.. 385 km and 7300 meters of desnivel.. I am done..!

Thanks for reading and if you need any info leave a comment and I get back to you..

La Vuelta a España, trip to Alicante "Day 1"

So here is a few pics.. Day 1:

Our rides started like this every morning… Riding by the marina taking in some sun… ( I was accused of sun doping)

But someone else got accused of sock doping… Prove??

Villajoyosa has some good bumps all around it..

And the weather was amazing..! OK hot but amazing.. Look at thebongolian smile..!!! The kids is having fun..!

Yeehoo was keeping me company for a while till I send him looking for the others as I was soaking in my sweat surroundings..

I do not understand this pic… I am sure he was ahead of me.. He went around twice??

And there was socializing over German lunch in Spain… And plenty of water and other fluids… T-Bong the only brave one to have a beer..

My only KOM of the day came at the "who finish lunch first"

Best image of the TT??? Yeehoo taking a nap in the shade..!!!

Ice cream, smoothies and plenty of other fluids were extremely necessary…

We found Oleg..!!!!

Awesome view by the beach…

And that was it from me on day 1 in pictures in Spain.. And the strava link for the first day.. There was Team beer and Team sangria at night.. Remember those names for day 2… No pics of this.. I left the camera at home..

Hope you enjoyed this adventure and stay tuned for day 2 and 3 that are to come shortly...

Pablo

The Weekend Report guy

A ride with a friend in a Tuesday morning…

My friend Jose Luis is from Colombia, as a Colombian he loves cycling but his new job cuts his time on the bike a lot..! He gets out a few times a week or less then that when busy.. But today he could so I joined him on a ride with a little bit of everything...

Empty to low traffic roads heading up? Checked..!

Someone to chase? Checked..!

Someone to drop? Checked..!

Someone catching up to you while you try to take cool pictures? Checked..!

Screaming downhills where the tiny climbers have no chance? Checked..! (70 km/h, don’t show Katja)

Crossing little towns in the middle of the Sierras? Checked..!

All done before noon… 2 hours of fun on the bike.. 50 km and 850 meters of climbing… Also this ride puts me under 1000 meters behind my goal of 10.000 km for the year.. Who knows maybe I will reach it.. But I really doubt it.. Trip to Argentina coming up and no riding over there.. Well as far as I know..

The +Strava link to the ride is HERE if you like to follow me feel free to do so..Or join the club over there..

Thanks for reading and if you want me to take you for a ride around Coin get in touch with me..!!

See you next time

Pablo 

The Weekend Report Guy

And what about Sunday?

I felt like poop this morning.. Stuffy nose, hard to breath, was awake till 2:30 in the morning and had a few beers while cooking and with the people we had over.. When the alarm went off this morning I wanted to stay in bed so bad but I managed to drag myself out of bed to join my Sunday group ride and I think they are my friends.. Or at least there is a friendship.. Well it was a good day as I pedaled I felt better..

It looked like this when we started..

The guy in green was his first road group ride.. He is a mtbiker so has plenty of stamina..

We were heading over that bump ahead..

The view as we climbed the first part…

This other guy got the visit of the man with the hammer… He was beat..!

After the long climb we stopped to fill the water bottles at Carratraca’s water fountain, it comes straight from the mountains.

And after a long downhill and some assistance to the guy that blew up… My well earned reward..

After that stop for beer and some chips with jamon serrano I headed for another few km since no one was home and I forgot my keys… At the end of the day my ride looked like THIS

I am starting to offer these kind of experience to anyone coming to Málaga.. If you would like to join me for one of my rides feel free to contact.. Comments will be the first step and we take it from there..

Hope you like this report and see you next time..

Pablo

The Weekend Report Guy

What not to do?

This is part of the weight update series.. So lets say that last week I was doing great..! Was controlling my portions.. Burning more then what I was consuming.. Drinking plenty of water and eating fruits and vegetables...
I was a good boy.....!!! Then Sunday came along...

You know one of those Sundays when you have a BBQ, hell I was the one cooking to begin with..! So how you can stay away from the delicious food?? Specially if it is a BBQ..! that is my weak spot..!!! MEAT..! 

Come on..! Tell me you are not wishing you were there with me last Sunday? On top of all this yummy sausages and meat there was plenty of stuff to go around and snack on.. Cheese, pickles, chips/crisps and who knows what else... So by the time the food was actually ready you were snacking away about 1000 calories..! And now was lunch time..!!?? 

So I was almost full by the time the first piece of meat left my grill.. And the owners of the house never let my cup be half empty.. Every time I turned around someone was filling it with nice Spanish cold beer...

This means that I had at least another 1500 calories just from drinking beer..!!! Are you keeping track of the calories? Good..!!! I didn't..!

In a normal day I am suppose to eat no more then 1600 calories during the day in order to lose my 1 kilo a week.. I am not going to lie to you most of the time I am over that amount but I compensate by going for a walk or riding my bike.. so everything is in check..

But Sunday was a special day and when you are a guest at a party and the food is crazy good you can't be rude and say no.. You have to eat... Well you don't have to but I love to..!!!

Besides these meat is something I really love.. Argentinian Asado..!!!

So my wild guess is that I ate about a kilo or more of that beef.. and is another like 2500 calories.. So I was way over my budget for the day.. And to finish it up there was chocolate cake and other sweets followed by more beer and stronger stuff for the ones that like that sort of thing.. I had more beer..

To culminated today's report let me tell you that the scale said I was 97.9 kilos on Monday morning.. That was an increase of 1.5 kilos from the week before..!!! It only takes one day of eating out of control for me to gain what cost me so much to lose..

Now is time to restart (I did Monday already) the battle and cut back on all the good stuff to reach my goal of 90 kilos at some point in life..

Hope you enjoyed the what not to do post.. Share if you know someone struggling with this..

See you next week?

Pablo 

The Weekend Report Guy

A quick spin + Photos

When you are short of time there is little you can do.. But you always can do something.. So we met earlier then usual and headed out with the guys...

The weather was certainly different then our usual sunny sky.. El tiempo estaba diferente..No habia un cielo soleado..

With the low clouds everything looked different.. Con las nubes bajas todo se veia diferente.. Our target was the white building at the top.. Nuestro objetivo la construccion blanca en lo alto

And we were getting closer.. Y nos acercabamos mas..

Primero a cruzar por Tolox... But first we had to cross Tolox

Do you remember Tourbecco? This is Vueltecco!? Se acuerdan de Tourbecco? Este es Vueltecco..!?

The start of a good hard climb. El inicio de una buena y dura subida..

Y al llegar a la cima... And when we reached the top..

Thanks to our +BELGIUM  friends for taking the picture. Gracias a nuestros amigos Belgas por tomar la foto.

After the las picture was a fasts downhill to our homes.. No more pics...For now.. Despues de la ultima foto era hora de descender hacia nuestras casas asi que no mas fotos.. por ahora..

+Strava dice que hicimos esta VUELTA/RIDE according to Strava. Not bad for a day in a hurry.. Nada mal por un dia a los apurones..

Hope you guys liked the short report. Espero les alla gustado el corto reporte.

Thanks for reading and sharing - Gracias por leer y compartir

Pablo 

The Weekend Report Guy

The Weight Update.

It has been a hard week for me... The beginning of a journey is never easy.. To break the routine and bad habits is hard... To get away from those things that bring us comfort is even harder.. With all this in mind let me tell you that I managed to drop some weight..!!!

Seems proper to post a picture celebrating this achievement 

How much weight did I actually lose?

2.1 kilos in a week..!!! It was not easy... Took a lot of self control.. And exercise.. As I started last week I was at 98.8 kilos and was doing my eating the wrong way when it comes to numbers.. After a quick look at the numbers from previous days I knew something was wrong..Something had to change..!

So I went to +MyFitnessPal and checked all my numbers... Soon after that I realized that I had the wrong set up..!! I wanted to lose 250 grams a week instead of my (high) goal of a kilo a week.. So as you can imagine I was eating way too much and not moving around enough to burn all the calories I was taking..

Once that was changed it was time to have a talk with myself.. This has to stop..! You have to control the way you eat..And so I did...No more of 1600 calories a day was the goal... And to be honest I don't think it was a single day I was able to eat only that many calories.. I really enjoy eating.. And most of the days I was just under 2000 calories a day...

Wondering why...????

But that was already a treat after a long day in the saddle..(I really love riding bicycles) So are you seen what I did? You need a bit more of explanation? OK is coming.. But believe me most of my lunches during the week looked like this...

In order to eat as much as I do and still lose weight I was really active last week... And here is a short list of my physical activities:

Monday to Friday I walked an average of 10 km a day.. dropping and picking my son from school walking has a huge impact..! I burn close to 1000 calories with these walks.
Saturday and Sunday are my long ride days..Or at least I try to make that happen.. So I rode between the 2 days close to 7 hours...

So you see is simple to lose weight you have to eat only what your body needs.. Do you do that or you eat what you want? First do that and then you will see the body get all the extra weight off by itself..

Thanks for reading and sharing (?) 

See you at the next weight update

Pablo 

The Weekend Report Guy

Getting better... Mejorando

Today was a day where I wanted to go longer but then as I started riding I changed my mind... This late starts are not good for me and my life style since I don't really like to be home much later then noon... 

Number one reason is because I like to spend some time with the family all together since during the week everyone is busy with school and work.. 

And number two is that now that the Summer is getting closer the temperatures start to raise really quick after 12 o'clock... With that said I cut my ride a bit shorter then what I had planned...

What did I have plan? I wanted to do a 100 km ride since we moved to Spain this is a "pending" matter.. I do not like pending matters..!But today wasn't the day to set the score right... Maybe tomorrow..

So today's ride looked like this.... I mean the view..

As I took the picture above I could not help but to think of what life over there would be like.. 

The traffic was a bit heavy today as the motorcycles love to go all out around the bents of this twisting roads going up and down the hill... But it got heavier at some point.. And made for a great view..

And around the time I took the previous picture I heard some voices coming behind me... So I got company for the last 2 km of the climb... And they passed me with 500 meters to go on the climb.. But I was the winner because I could take this pic..!!

But remember I said I heard voices... So there was more then one person.. Here is the rest of the "amigos" that passed me on the climb and kept me company for a little while.. The shot is a place where I took a few pictures before..

We talk for a few minutes asked them where they were from and what they had planned for the day.. Our plans didn't match and I turned around to start my journey back home... 

As you can imagine most of the way home is all downhill so I put the camera away and enjoyed the speed and view around me... 

Here is another one of those houses that belong to a fairy tale history...

Then I stopped somewhere to take a few pictures...Stopped the GPS took the pictures and got back on the bike... Something missing?? Hmmm no, not really... All downhill for the next 10 km or so.. In my head I was good that will bring the average speed of the ride back up as going up was a drag..

After 10 km I looked at the GPS and I saw that the average speed was stuck on 22.7 km/h... Dammit..! Forgot to restart the GPS..! Lost about 10 km of the ride and a good portion of high speed downhills.. Oh well.. Lesson learned.. Leave the computer alone..!

After all the ups and downs of the ride including stops and pictures..... The numbers of the ride in  STRAVA 

Thanks for reading and sharing another story

Hope you liked the story and pictures

See you next time. 

Pablo

The Weekend Report Guy