The Numb Foot Solution?

I get a lot of my images for my blog by doing a google search.  This time I searched for foot pain and this picture came up.  Apparently, foot pain = creepy feet in googleland.

I went for my very first road ride on April 1, 2006 so tonight's ride (I'm writing this Thursday night and posting it Friday morning) marked 4 years as a cyclist.  I did my first multisport event in 2007 so I've been a triathlete for about 3 years.  

Anyway, I've logged every mile in Bike Journal and after 4 years of riding I've ridden 16,835 miles.  All but 40 of those miles have been with numb feet....okay, that's an exaggeration, but my feet go numb on nearly every ride and it gets very old.  

The other day I bought a pair of Specialized insoles because I have new shoes and I needed some decent insoles and I've heard good things about the Specialized ones.  They come with shims you can place under the front of your foot, and I gave them a try.  My feet didn't go numb on tonight's ride.  Go figure.  There's something to it.

It's only one ride, so it's a little early to declare it a solution.  But if it keeps working I will definitely be buying Specialized insoles for my other shoes.  

Tonight's ride was my first with my new insoles, and it was also my first with my new training wheels.  My new bike (pics coming soon) came with Shimano wheels but I had a set of Reynolds wheels I wanted to put on that bike so I took those wheels and threw a cheap powertap in them so I now have a set of training wheels with a power meter.  Now I'll get power on every ride.  It's gonna be nice.

The wheels were great.  Nothing special, but I didn't notice them flexing when I attacked a few climbs so I like them.  Basically, I have no complaints and to me that equals a good set of training wheels....not that I've ever had a set of training wheels before so what do I know? 

After blowing my big brick the other week, I was in a bit of a mood today.  This was my first big outdoor tempo ride of the year and I was determined to make it a good one.  I set out for 2 hours of tempo, and after 45 minutes I was averaging 251 watts.  This is where I screwed up a bit.  This was my first ride with my new Garmin on my tri bike (lots of firsts tonight), and with my water bottle mounted on my handlebars my bottle bumped the stop button on my Garmin and I rode for 30 minutes before I noticed.  I was watching my power and kept it around 250 so I don't think my average would have changed much.

After I realized what happened, I hit the start button and was able to get the last 45 minutes of data.  In that time I got my average up to 260.  Having lost some data, I went with a conservative estimate in my training log and put down 2 hours at 250 watts.  For April 1, I'm really happy with that.  And surprisingly, my legs felt really good after the ride.  I usually feel pretty worked over after a long tempo ride, but not tonight.  

For those who appreciate irony, I work for a scissors company and they sent out the employee purchase forms today.  After work, I cut myself with a cheap pair of scissors.  I don't think I've ever hurt myself with scissors until today.  I think I'll be placing an order.

Friday I have the day off work so I'm doing a long swim in the morning (4800 yards) and a long bike in the afternoon (probably about 80 miles).  The weather is looking phenomenal so I'm really looking forward to my ride.  Plus, I'm heading out on my new bike for the first time...another first.

One more thing: April 1 marks 4 years as a cyclist.  April 2 is one year after they announced the CT relocation, which lead to me and many others leaving the company.  Last year, April 2 was not a good day.  Tomorrow, I'm going to try to make sure it's a good day and I'll be able to look back and say it all worked out for the best.  

What a difference a year makes.