Birthday Rides!!! 67km of Fun at 67 Years Old

The Ben Franklin Bridge, connecting Philadelphia and Camden

For my 67th birthday, I rode 67 km in four separate rides, mostly on hills across half of Pennsylvania.  On May 1, I drove to Philadelphia, stopping about halfway on the 80-mile drive, at the intersection of Pa. Routes 23 and 10.  Just south of that crossroad is a 2.5-km hill I really like. Usually when I travel to Philadelphia I am on a train, but since I was driving I could stop, and ride up and down this hill. 

After that ride, I drove to center city Philadelphia, parked on the Delaware Water Front and rode for a few hours.  I rode back on forth across the Ben Franklin Bridge, then across the city to West River Drive. This four-lane road is closed to traffic on weekends from March to October, but now it is closed to cars all the time.  I rode with walkers, runners and other riders with a lot of space to stay far apart.  I went all the way to City Line Avenue before turning around and taking a different way back to the Delaware River, and riding the Ben Franklin Bridge again. 

On the way home I pulled off the Turnpike at Morgantown to ride the Rt. 10 hill again--faster up and down than the morning. 

Today, May 2, I drove to a small town near Gettysburg to visit my son at a job site where he is working. He is part of a crew that is hanging overhead doors on a loading dock.  They were just finishing hanging 60 doors this week.

Then I drove to Fort Loudon and rode up and down Tuscarora Summit.  I rode the five-mile climb faster than I have since before knee replacement in March of last year.

What better way to celebrate my 67th birthday than riding 67 kilometers and climbing 1200 meters? 

Three Tankmen, Три Танкистa--A Soviet Song About a Tank Crew

There are not a lot of songs about tank crews.  The 75th Anniversary of VE Day is very soon. Here is a song about those of us who are Tankmen: Танкистa!

“The Three Tankmen”

It is a very famous song. It was made in the time when a large danger of a war with Japan was real. 
Japan militaries acted very impudently so the two border conflicts - in the region of the Khasan Lake 
in 1938 and in the region of Khalkhin Gol (in the West it is known as “Nomongan conflict”) in 1939, - 
occurred. In both the conflicts Japanese invasions on Soviet territory (Mongolian one in the second 
case) were repelled by Red Army. It looks like the song was made on the basis of the events in the 
region of the Khasan Lake.

This song was sang in the famous pre-war movie “Tractor men”. A former military gets the post of 
the team-leader of the tractor men’s group, tightens up discipline and learns his subordinates to 
prepare to be drivers of tanks in the case of an enemy invasion.

This song stayed very popular and during WWII. I read memoirs of the WWII veteran who recalled 
how a Soviet tankman played on a bayan and singed this song in a captured German town in 1945.

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“The Three Tankmen”

(Translated by Andrey)

Some lowering black clouds move on the state border,
The inclement land is filled by silence.
The high banks of the Amur River are securing by
The sentries of the Motherland who are standing there.
The sentries of the Motherland who are standing there.

A firm covering force is placed there against an enemy.
A valiant and strong unit is standing
Nearly the border of the Far Eastern land - 
It is an armored shock battalion.
It is an armored shock battalion.

Three tankmen, three merry friends, 
They are the crew of a combat vehicle,
Live there like an inviolable firm family –
And the song guarantees that it is true.
Three tankmen, three merry friends, 
They are the crew of a combat vehicle.

Some thick dew fell on grass,
Wide fogs fell on a ground.
Samurais decided to cross the border 
Nearly the river in this night.
Samurais decided to cross the border 
Nearly the river in this night.

But the intelligence reported exactly
And the powerful unit was given by an order and became to move
On the native Far Eastern land -
It was the armored shock battalion.
It was the armored shock battalion.

Tanks were rushing, raising a wind,
The redoubtable armor was advancing.
And Samurais were falling to a ground
Under the pressure of steel and a fire.
And Samurais were falling to a ground
Under the pressure of steel and a fire.

And all the enemies were eliminated - and the song guarantees that it is true, -
In the fire attack
By three tankmen, three merry friends,
Who are the crew of a combat vehicle!
By three tankmen, three merry friends,
Who are the crew of a combat vehicle!

1938

Two Rides, Two Days, Same Time of Day, Completely Different Rides

Riding the same route, the exact same roads, every day on a bicycle can be an entirely different ride each time.  This is certainly true of a group ride where who is on the ride dictates the pace.

For the past month I have been riding alone and settled into riding the same 25-mile out-and-back ride four or five days a week.  I ride just a little east of due south out of Lancaster for nine rolling miles, then up a three-mile climb. I turn around in a parking lot at the top, descend a different hill and go back to my home in the city on the same road just west of due north. 

Yesterday, the wind was out of the North NorthWest at 17mph, a perfect tail wind.  I felt good and rode hard out of the city and up the first long climb and all the way to the top of the three-mile climb at the end.  Eight miles into the ride there is a speed indicator telling people to slow down for construction.  It is on the far side of a bridge and slightly uphill.  Yesterday I first lit the sign up at 22mph then was down to 20 as I passed it.  By the time I stopped at the turnaround, I had covered the 12.5 miles in 48 minutes with more than a thousand feet of climbing. The ride back was a slow slog in a headwind. On the steepest part of the 3-mile descent, I only reached 37mph. 

There are 14 Strava segments on the route, seven in each direction. Yesterday, I made five PRs on the ride south. 

Today, the wind was 10mph out of the SouthWest.  It was a grinding headwind. I rode hard up the the big hill, but it was just over an hour when I reached the turnaround point.  On the way back my top speed was 51 mph, but with the wind 45 degrees off of a straight tail wind. I did not have any record segments on the way back. At the construction sign where I went 20mph and 22 yesterday, I first lit the sign at 13 mph, then 12 today.

Same road, consecutive days, about the same temp, but such a different ride.  Using my heart rate as a relative indicator of effort, yesterday I set all those PRs and had a high heart rate of 143. Today my highest heart rate was 155.