Tuesday night bike time trial

The first 8 mile bike time trial was last night. It went well, which was a relief since I was worried that I'd slowed down a bit since last fall. My time was 17:45 (27.0 mph), which is 13 seconds slower than my personal best, and pretty good for me. Weather was good, just a little headwind going toward the finish.

Several of the local fast guys were there. I was 14th overall, first in age group.

Results of 8 mile TT, April 14, 2009

Savings accounts & rate chasing

It has been getting more challenging to earn a decent interest rate on savings. So I've had to use more creative approaches to earn interest on the promotional 0% money that I borrowed from my credit cards.

A number of smaller banks have recently started "Rewards checking accounts", the best of which pay interest of 6% on balances up to $25,000. The catch is that they require typically 10 to 12 debit card transactions per month, in order to get the high interest rate and no fees. I've recently opened a bunch of these accounts, and now I find that I need to make about 52 debit card transactions per month. To do this, I've been paying the phone bill on-line every weekday, $1.01 at a time. That gets me about 20 transactions. Pumping self-serve gas a dollar at a time is also good; this is best done when the cash register is staffed by an apathetic looking teenager, rather than someone who looks like they could be the actual owner of the store.

For some reason the best rates seem to be at small banks located in the rural south. I've recently opened rewards checking accounts at Southern Missouri Bank, Heritage Community Bank in Arkansas, and my favorite, "Redneck Bank" in Oklahoma, which has the motto "Where bankin's funner!". Their web site is pretty good. If you mouse over the outhouse, the door opens. Best experienced with the sound turned on.

Link: http://www.redneckbank.com

Yes, they are a real bank. More frugal tips to follow!

Painted gourds

"Capuchin with Clementine" was completed in December 2008 by Lisa Hoffman, and was created to resemble the paw of a Capuchin monkey holding an orange. The sculpture was created from a winged gourd, three-dimensional and acrylic paints. This is one of only a few pieces that have been released from the artist's vast personal collection. The gourd currently resides in a private collection, in a location that will remain undisclosed for security reasons.

Bike race: Lost Faculties vs. Lance Armstrong

Yesterday, Jon and I (of team "Lost Faculties") competed in a bike race in Gruene, Texas. It was 16 mile time-trial, on River Road which follows the Guadalupe River. There were about 150 entrants, including Lance Armstrong, as well as many of the top state and local riders. Riders started at 30 second intervals for about an hour and a half, except the last few riders started a minute apart, and Lance started last with a 3 minute gap. The out-and-back course was more difficult than previous time-trials I've done, with a lot of small hills and turns, so it was hard to get going fast and easy to lose speed. Lisa came to watch, and also Jon's wife Sylvie and daughter Coralee.

Sylvie took pictures!

Team "Lost Faculties" before the start, clearly not intimidated by Lance's presence:


Lining up for the start, with my "sunflower wheel". My start time is 30 seconds behind Jon. We didn't plan it that way, it just happened.

Jon in the starting gate:

Me in the starting gate. Always aware of safety, notice that I only clip in one pedal before the start signal. :-)

Lance approaches the start line on his white "Trek" bike, surrounded by fans:

Lance tried to intimidate the Lost Faculties by wearing a black skin suit and scary looking helmet:

Lance in the starting gate:

A picture of me, somewhere out on the 16 mile course. Remembering to keep my head down:

Lance finishing:

Results are posted! Lance won the day, but both members of team "Lost Faculties" made the top 20 overall, and made the first page on the results list along with Lance. I was 10th, in 37:06, which put me among several of the top local riders, and less than 4 minutes behind Lance. Jon was 20th, in 39:05. The 2nd and 3rd place finishers were the top two in the Texas state 40K time-trial championship earlier this year, so Lance is in good enough form to hold off the top riders in the state.
Click the image to enlarge and make readable.

Lance may have been the overall winner, but I did manage to win the "age-group prize" for first old guy! They didn't let me keep the flowers, what's up with that?! But I did get a cool medal.

Other statistics: Lance averaged 28.9 mph, and I averaged 25.95 mph. I noticed that most of the top local riders were about 2 mph slower here than in the state 40K championship, so this was not a fast course.

Here is a link to an article on the race in Cycling News, with full race results and more pictures: Link to article

Also, here is a link to an article about the race in the San Antonio paper: Lance getting back in gear

Longhorn triathlon

The Longhorn triathlon was last Sunday. This was a huge race, with over 2000 participants, which is amazing for a half-iron distance on a hilly course. I finished about 68th overall, in a time of 4:40:35. I was the first over-50-year-old.

The swim went fine, I took it pretty easy, and came out about 65th overall, and first in age group. On the bike I just rode comfortably for the first 20 miles, then gradually picked up the pace, and rode from miles 40 to 56 very hard. The course was a single long loop, which kept it from being crowded. I could usually see 1 or 2 other riders, but that was it. Average speed was 22.5 mph for the 56 miles, which I was very pleased with, given the difficulty of the course. The run was two loops of 6.55 miles each, with 6 hills per loop (yuk!), one of which was very nasty and steep. I ran well and did not walk one step. I even ran through all the water stops, so I actually went the last hour and 44 minutes of the race without drinking. This seems nuts now that I think about it, but I did drink a lot on the bike, so I guess I was pretty well hydrated before starting the run. I averaged a little better that 8 min per mile on the run.

Results for men 50-54 age group. (I'm first)

Link to full results. (over 1900 finishers!)

I felt good the whole way on this race, so I am going to write down what I ate, in case it is useful in the future:

3 hours before race: 2 cups coffee and 2 chocolate Cliff bars.
Before start: Plenty of water.
During the 56 mile bike: 16 oz. of cold coffee in my bike bottle, then lots of water.
During the 13.1 mile run: nothing.
I was very thirsty at the end, but OK. Temperature was about 70 at the start, low 80s at the finish, windy, partly cloudy, with low humidity.

PS - I received some race photos. Below are: On top of big hill at mile 55 of bike; bike-to-run transition; mid-way through the run.

Rate chasing news

The yields on Fidelity's and Vanguard's tax-exempt money market accounts have recently increased dramatically, especially in the last few days. For example, the yield on the Fidelity tax-exempt municipal money market fund (FTEXX) is 5.88% (!!) compared with 2.70% on Select Money Market (FSLXX). FTEXX has, in principle, a stable $1.00 share price, although this is not guaranteed.

Here is an excellent article on the Vanguard web site, explaining the very high current yields on tax-exempt money market funds: Link. If the Vanguard article is correct, it looks like FTEXX should be safe.

So I shifted our savings that were in FSLXX into FTEXX. I guess I'll see how that works out. I think Fidelity will be very reluctant to let the share price drop below 1.00; I think their reputation practically depends on it.

Tuesday night bike time trial

The last bike time trial of the season was Tuesday, and team "Lost Faculties" did pretty well. I did the 8 miles in 17:43 (27.1 mph) and my training buddy Jon did it in 18:17, which were good rides for both of us. Next up for me is the Longhorn triathlon on October 5th.

Results of 8 mile bike time trial (I'm 5th place)

Investment comment

The recent stock market ups and downs have caused me to think about our investments. I've decided not to make any changes for now. So this means that we remain invested in a fairly diversified way, but with an overweighting in international stock mutual funds. Because of the rules of our 401K and 403b retirement plans, we are mostly restricted to Fidelity mutual funds (largest holdings are FEMKX, FSIIX, FICDX, FSTMX), but we also have a Vanguard REIT index fund (VGSIX) and some CREE stock, which is a semiconductor company involved in LED lighting. With our regular (non-retirement) savings, we are "rate chasing", taking advantage of various promotions and bonuses at a variety of banks and credit unions scattered around the US. This gets us a high and safe yield on our short-term savings.

A good source of information for rate chasing can be found at the Bankdeals blog. This is where I found out about the Wachovia way-2-save accounts (9% yield for the year if opened last Feb.), WaMu savings-for-success (6.5% yield if opened last March), a Patelco credit union 7% CD special, and several others. I check Bankdeals a few times a week, the web address is http://www.bankdeals.blogspot.com

Its been a pretty rough ride lately, but I am cautiously optimistic that if we just stay the course and don't sell into panics, then things will eventually work out.

Anoli lizards

Our yard is almost filled with native plants, with very little regular grass. So we have lots of butterflies, spiders, bees, anoli lizards, and the occasional possum and raccoon. I particularly like the anoli lizards, which hunt insects. The males sometimes display pink skin on their necks.

Prairieman half-iron triathlon

After a couple of good races in a row, I had a tough one that did not go entirely as planned. The 1.2 mile swim and the 56 mile bike went fine, and the 13.1 mile run started out OK. But I wilted badly on the last 9 miles of the run, I think due to not coping well with the heat. I struggled to finish in 4:59, 15th place out of about 175.

Positive things about the experience were I had an excellent bike ride, doing the 56 miles in 2:25, riding easy and finished the bike with fresh legs. Also, I was first in my age group. I am realizing that it is not easy to put together a good half-iron triathlon on a hot day. So I will be sure to appreciate it when I do get it to work next time, hopefully at the Longhorn triathlon on October 5.

Results of the Prairieman half-iron triathlon

Tuesday night bike time trial

I did my best time at the Tuesday night 8 mile bike time trial last night. The conditions were very good, almost no wind. My time was 17:32, average speed of 27.4 mph. So things are looking good for the triathlons coming up, at least on the bike. My training buddy Jon also did his best time (18:14.9), so it was a good night for the team "Lost faculties".

Results of 8 mile bike time trial (I'm 2nd place)

Wool capital triathlon

I did the 2008 Wool Capital Triathlon in San Angelo yesterday. It was a 1.5K swim, 40K bike and 10K run. I really like this race - it has a nice open water swim, scenic bike route, and the run is on what the race director calls "the dirt road from hell". This is a dusty road with no shade, hills, and not very good footing. So the 10K run times tend to be a bit slow.

I finished 2nd overall, and was the first masters (over 40) finisher. My swim was good, bike was surprisingly good, and run was a little slow. So I guess I could work on my running a bit more before the half-iron races that I plan to do in September and October. My total time of 2:10:31 was a minute faster than the last two years, so that was encouraging. The bike course was windy this year, I was 32:10 at the 20K mark on the bike with a headwind, and came back in 27:59 with a tailwind.

Results, 2008 Wool Capital Triathlon (I'm 2nd place)

A photo of me starting out on the bike appeared in the San Angelo local newspaper. Clicking on the picture enlarges it enough to make the text readable.

Texas state championship - 40K bike time trial

I did a bicycle race! It was the Texas state time trial championship, which was a 40K race in Pattison TX (near Houston). There were several hundred riders, all starting individually at 30 second intervals. It was a mostly flat out-and-back course, with a few small hills, and a fair amount of wind. I was hoping to finish under one hour, but I surprised myself and finished in 57:25, which was good enough for 2nd place in the Men's 50-54 age group.

Here are the results for the 50-54 age group:

Link to Results Men's 50-54 (I'm 2nd place)

And here is a link to the complete results for all riders: All results.

I was surprised to see that my time would have ranked among the top cat3 riders. I really like this time-trial riding!

PS - Craig Prejean Sports took pictures, and here are a few of me. The first one is just after the start, and the last two are approaching the finish. I go for the bright colors to be visible to cars.

Artifacts from 1972

I have two artifacts from the 1970s. The first one was found by my neighbor Ceci when she was playing frisbee golf last weekend. I hadn't seen one of these in quite awhile:














The next one is more difficult to explain. First, think of who ran against Nixon in 1972. George McGovern, of course. And McGovern's running mate was Sargent Shriver. So can you explain this "McGovern Eagleton" button?

The story of Lefty the butterfly

Lisa found a butterfly in our yard that was unable to get free of her chrysalis. So she helped the butterfly out. But the butterfly had only one good wing (her left one). Her right wing never did unfold properly. Since the butterfly could not fly, Lisa moved her from flower to flower so she could get food.

















Lisa discovered that Lefty likes to drink juice from apple slices. Especially when they are on a plate with a flower pattern. So Lefty is a well fed butterfly.

















Lefty stays inside our house at night, on a plant in the kitchen. During the day, Lefty stays outside by herself. She can always be found at the end of the day, near the flower that she was put on, since she only travels by walking. Sometimes during the day, Lefty is visited by other butterflies.

















Lefty has now been with us for 6 weeks, and she has become a very old butterfly. Her wings are a bit tattered, and her colors are not quite as bright as they used to be. But she does still enjoy drinking from a bright yellow "flower" that was made from a grape that has been put on a kitchen scrubby.
















Update, December 24, 2007. After a seven week stay with us, Lefty passed away yesterday. She spent her last day on a favorite plant in the kitchen.

Longhorn Triathlon

This was the last triathlon of the season for me. A 1.2 mile swim, 56.7 mile bike and 13.1 mile run. In Austin for a change, so that was convenient. This was a tough course! The swim was in Decker Lake, in 85 degree water, its been warm here lately. Rolling hills on the bike ride, not too bad. The run was hot and very hilly, up and down the whole way, with almost no flat ground. About one-third of the run was on trails. I think this course was tougher than Buffalo Springs.

I was first in 50-54 age group, in 5:01. I don't turn 50 for another 3 weeks, but this race used USTA rules, so its based on age on Dec. 31. I had a good swim, a good bike ride, but was kind of slow on the second half of the run.
Link to results for my age group (50-54 male).
Link to complete results.