The Retirement Thread

[Deleted member 1258]

I Got the wordle in four.

 

[SpokeyDokey]

It's good that you are back and raring to go, but your original post was a bit worrying...

The fact is that 'crap' cyclist that you think you are, you could probably outride most of us in this thread, and probably 4/5 of the people on the forum! That tells me that your real crapness factor is low but your thinking about cycling may not be quite right.

Coincidentally, Katie Kookaburra posted this video yesterday which addresses the subject...

Ah, the lovely Katie. I mean that, she comes over as a genuinely nice young woman who I hope to meet one day. We follow her a lot and I did watch this earlier in the week agreeing with much of what she says.

I understand what you're suggesting about my thinking. I have thought quite seriously about changing my style altogether and just pootling around the Ribble Valley but I'm not ready for that yet.

I ride regularly with 3-4 other pensioners every week and we do all genuinely appreciate cycling for what it is. We're happiest when we gravel ride, all day, picnic, cafe etc. but three of us have an undeniable competitive streak, not with each other but against ourselves. It's very difficult to explain, I can't really.

I'm at my happiest solo bike touring but sadly those days are gone.

I enjoyed that and it kind of sums up the way I am starting to feel these days. Acceptance of my limitations and trying to take it as easy as the body needs and enjoy it.

Good video and I can relate to much of what she said.

Mid-60's now, and whilst ambition had not entirely faded, I starting asking that 'why am I pushing myself' question when I was around 60.

Why push harder in the gym? I'm never going to look like the trim 6-packed person I was in my 20's.

Why carry on with hard technical scrambling routes in the mountains? I had done all I ever wanted to do and with motor skills declining the risk factor was increasing.

Why worry if I only average 12-13 mph on my bike? My 18-20 mph days were long gone.

And does it really matter if I don't ever do a 20+ miles & in excess of 10000' of ascent/descent on a mountain hike?

My answers were that none of it matters at all.

My best 'everything' was behind me re the above and I decided to chill.

I no longer keep meticulous records of my physical fitness activities and just enjoy them for what they are and appreciate that I am able to do them at my age.

***

On top of that, whilst I accept that keeping fit is important, I would not want to be obsessive about physical activities in retirement.

Retirement to me is all about relaxing, chilling and having fun with my girl.

I had enough of pushing myself during my corporate career - all that striving for promotion, more money, better cars etc. It got us to where we wanted to be now but it was utterly exhausting at the time.

So, we just want to kick back and enjoy the time we have left and that, for me, includes shedding the shackles of 'pushing on' and challenging myself.

I accept that we are all different and each to their own etc. 👍🙂

 

[PaulSB]

Great post @SpokeyDokey

 

[gavroche]

Salut tout le monde.
The sun is out today but still a bit nippy. We took Molly and two of her brothers to Angel Bay , put some fuel in the car and now ready to go to our daughter's near Stoke on Trent as they have a get away week end in Bristol from tomorrow till Sunday night. I will be staying at her house with her boyfriend till they come back.
When I bought some petrol earlier, I noticed that nobody was wearing a mask, only me, why? Covid has not gone away and is still very present.
I can only assume that people don't seem to have any common sense . Shame.

 

[Dave7]

We have just had 2 Nuthatches on the peanuts.
Not sure what is happening but we recently had our 1st Goldfinch in years and now the 1st Nuthatches for years.

 

[Deleted member 1258]

Lol!

During a party at the end of some international naval war games a Russian, an American, and a British admiral were having a drink on an American aircraft carrier.

They were talking about the bravery of their sailors.

The Russian said,

“I will demonstrate the bravery of our sailors.”

He calls a sailor over and says,

“Jump off the ship. Swim under it and climb back up.”

The sailor promptly salutes and jumps off the flight deck, swims under the ship, climbs up the davits and stands in front of the admiral and salutes.

The Russian says,

“That, gentlemen, is courage."

The American says,

“That's nothing.”

He calls over a PO and says,

“I want you to jump off the bows. Swim under the ship to the stern and then return."

The PO salutes, jumps off the bow, swims to the stern, and climbs back up to stand in front of the admiral and salutes.

The American says,

“That, gentlemen, is courage."

The British admiral says,

“That's nothing. Sailor, come here."

The matelot comes to attention and salutes.

The admiral says,

“Sailor, I want you to climb the highest mast on the carrier, jump off, swim under the boat from bow to stern and then from beam to beam then climb up the mast and do it again."

The matelot looks at the admiral and says,

“You can p!ss right off, sir!”

The admiral turns to the other two and says,

“And that, gentlemen, is REAL courage."

 

[welsh dragon]

We have just had 2 Nuthatches on the peanuts.
Not sure what is happening but we recently had our 1st Goldfinch in years and now the 1st Nuthatches for years.

We get lots of nuthatches here. First little birds they are

We get goldfinches as well

 

[ColinJ]

Kept thinking how much that road would be when covered in ice

I think that one would have to be gritted otherwise it would be very iffy.

There are some more remote north-facing roads on the hills above which get covered in black ice. One is particularly bad.

It climbs steeply up the hillside to the top left of the picture. In the winter the sun never rises high enough to clear the surrounding hills.

I risked a winter ride round there once and found that climb unrideable due to ice. I had to walk my bike up on the grass verge.

When I got to the top I was about to remount and head for home when I spotted a car speeding towards me... I dropped the bike, stood in the middle of the road and waved frantically. The car screeched to a halt and I saw a young couple in the front seats. The man jumped out and very aggressively asked me WTF I was playing at. I replied that I thought that he probably did NOT want his car to slide off a river of black ice at 40 mph and tumble 200 ft down the hillside into the valley below! He gulped, apologised, and got back into his car...

Morning. I’ve had a long lie The bed was just so cosy and it’s not cosy outside! Sun is out now though and coffee is finished so I am off for a wander.

No, THIS is a long lie in! I am letting my body do its own thing while I get over the virus, and that resulted in 8 hours sleep!

I watched that insomnia programme last night and it reminded me how unhealthy my normal sleep pattern is. I will have another try to sort it out.

Enjoyed that. I really need her as my personal mentor!

There are lots to watch when you can't find anything you like on TV!

Mentioning Katie Kookaburra again, she's based in my general area. I've followed her for a long time and think she's very level-headed offering a lot of good advice while passing on her experiences to people. To my mind she talks about the cycling many of us enjoy. Every now and again she rides a relatively local road we don't know and we file these away for future use - usually it's a climb followed by a great ride across the tops, which is the joy of climbing.

She loves the Ashworth valley climb on the western fringes of Rochdale. My local cycling pal Littgull also vouches for it. We had planned to ride up there a couple of years ago but Covid scuppered it.

Time to get up!

 

[PaulSB]

We have a local population of 30-40 Jackdaws, about 10-15 stay all year round the others come back every spring. Very handsome birds but noisy.

Each spring after the first grass cut the dead moss is exposed on the lawn. A couple of days later the Jackdaws descend on the lawn and start pulling out the dead moss. I can only imagine it's to line their nests. There were five at the same time yesterday.

We've had gold finches and bull finches in the garden for the first time in years.

 

[SpokeyDokey]

I think that one would have to be gritted otherwise it would be very iffy.

There are some more remote north-facing roads on the hills above which get covered in black ice. One is particularly bad.

View attachment 638060

It climbs steeply up the hillside to the top left of the picture. In the winter the sun never rises high enough to clear the surrounding hills.

I risked a winter ride round there once and found that climb unrideable due to ice. I had to walk my bike up on the grass verge.

When I got to the top I was about to remount and head for home when I spotted a car speeding towards me... I dropped the bike, stood in the middle of the road and waved frantically. The car screeched to a halt and I saw a young couple in the front seats. The man jumped out and very aggressively asked me WTF I was playing at. I replied that I thought that he probably did NOT want his car to slide off a river of black ice at 40 mph and tumble 200 ft down the hillside into the valley below! He gulped, apologised, and got back into his car...


No, THIS is a long lie in! I am letting my body do its own thing while I get over the virus, and that resulted in 8 hours sleep!

I watched that insomnia programme last night and it reminded me how unhealthy my normal sleep pattern is. I will have another try to sort it out.


There are lots to watch when you can't find anything you like on TV!


She loves the Ashworth valley climb on the western fringes of Rochdale. My local cycling pal Littgull also vouches for it. We had planned to ride up there a couple of years ago but Covid scuppered it.

Time to get up!

Top lie in! Every credit to you.

Hope the virus is gone soon.

 

[SpokeyDokey]

We have a local population of 30-40 Jackdaws, about 10-15 stay all year round the others come back every spring. Very handsome birds but noisy.

Each spring after the first grass cut the dead moss is exposed on the lawn. A couple of days later the Jackdaws descend on the lawn and start pulling out the dead moss. I can only imagine it's to line their nests. There were five at the same time yesterday.

We've had gold finches and bull finches in the garden for the first time in years.

We have around 20 or so Jackdaws about 25m from the house and they have roosted there for some years now - great to watch the fledglings in May (ish).

Clever birds but nasty buggers to lambs and other wildlife.

They are pretty fearless too - we watched transfixed a few years back watching around half a dozen mobbing a buzzard; a real aerial duel at quite a high altitude

 

[pawl]

If you're pushing yourself hard every ride eventually you're likely to end up feeling fed up with it, it happened to me, I was doing club rides every other Sunday, spending my Sunday mornings sat in the pack flat out following a wheel, fun at first, but after a few years I started to think "why am I doing this, surly theres more than this" I dropped down to a slower more relaxed group and after a while I stopped doing the group rides altogether and started riding solo, I was doing the spring reliability rides and I stopped those as well but did the occasional Audax and some charity rides, now I just pootle round when I get time and just try and maintain some fitness. Interesting comment from a friend of mine who was a very good time trialist, after he stopped he said to me at a cafe stop "I've got nothing to prove anymore theres no point in continuing".

That sounds really sensible Two years ago I looked at one of the local clubs They had two rides a fast group and a social group The rides went to the same cafe every week and had returned at around 1 P M


I do try to get out three or four times a week .I don’t achieve that I don’t beat myself up about it
I will admit to having a go occasionally to having a go at some Strava segments .Since I’m well over 75 it’s recorded in the over seventy group it’s just a bit of fun for me I don’t bother unless that segment is a tailwind section Naughty me

When I was 40 I joined the VTA .Gave up time trials when things began to get pricey Funny helmets ,dedicated TT bikes.I no longer bother with cycling magazines They have become to race Sportiieve
based All this Vo 2 max Output in watts all goes above my ageing head

Like you I ride to keep a reasonable level of fitness and enjoyment consistent with my ageing legs

 

[GM]

G'day y'all...Another busy morning, lunch finished and now it's walkies time. Bright sunshine at the moment but a sleet shower is looking ominous.

Just made it with Wordle too many options.

It's Son's birthday today so a little celebration later, Belgium beer might be on the menu

Enjoy the rest of your day folks!

 

[pawl]

Good video and I can relate to much of what she said.

Mid-60's now, and whilst ambition had not entirely faded, I starting asking that 'why am I pushing myself' question when I was around 60.

Why push harder in the gym? I'm never going to look like the trim 6-packed person I was in my 20's.

Why carry on with hard technical scrambling routes in the mountains? I had done all I ever wanted to do and with motor skills declining the risk factor was increasing.

Why worry if I only average 12-13 mph on my bike? My 18-20 mph days were long gone.

And does it really matter if I don't ever do a 20+ miles & in excess of 10000' of ascent/descent on a mountain hike?

My answers were that none of it matters at all.

My best 'everything' was behind me re the above and I decided to chill.

I no longer keep meticulous records of my physical fitness activities and just enjoy them for what they are and appreciate that I am able to do them at my age.

***

On top of that, whilst I accept that keeping fit is important, I would not want to be obsessive about physical activities in retirement.

Retirement to me is all about relaxing, chilling and having fun with my girl.

I had enough of pushing myself during my corporate career - all that striving for promotion, more money, better cars etc. It got us to where we wanted to be now but it was utterly exhausting at the time.

So, we just want to kick back and enjoy the time we have left and that, for me, includes shedding the shackles of 'pushing on' and challenging myself.

I accept that we are all different and each to their own etc. 👍🙂

You me and Dave r seem to have the same approach to continuing to enjoy cycling in later life

 

[Deleted member 1258]

Another one from my Facebook page this afternoon, an oldy but one I like.