Umair Yasin

Another ride leader in my club, Melanie, led a 54-mile ride starting 38 miles south of me in the little town of Paicines. The route was 27 miles out Panoche road to the Panoche Inn for lunch then back to the start. My friend Kris, also in Morgan Hill, was going on the ride so I carpooled with her. This is a beautiful but remote road, passing through some vineyards and then mostly ranches, with a lot of climbing up and over Panoche pass. The Inn was really more like a biker bar (the other kind of bike- some Harley riders showed up not long after us) but the folks were nice and they had great sandwiches. On the way back we had a brutal headwind, averaging about 25 mph but gusting to about 40. This was a pretty fast group and I would not have been able to hang with them without some electric assist, especially against the headwind. So a nice first test of the bike. This took 80% of my battery charge. Rolling Past The Vineyards on the way out Some Nice Color in a Canyon we rode thr...

The motor in my electric-assist kit on my recumbent has developed an annoying knocking sound. This is not something I could fix, nor could my dealer, it would have to go back to the factory (in China) to get refurbished. It took me a while to isolate it, but I finally got it to go away by removing the wheel and remounting the original wheel (with no motor). This is the second time one of these add-on kits has had serious issues, so I decided not to throw good money after bad and just restore the bike to non-assist. This leaves me without an electric-assist bike. I like to have one to extend my range and ride with groups that would otherwise be hard to keep up with. I’ve had enough fun with the add-on kits so I decided to treat myself to a factory-built electric assist bike from my local bike shop (with the added bonus that they can work on it if something goes wrong- they would not touch my add-on kits). I was planning on treating myself to a “dream bike” next January for my 70th birt...

After missing three weeks, I was able to get back to riding with my local Morgan Hill group yesterday. It was great, I had missed the camaraderie and the incentive to go harder. We went out to the beautiful Redwood retreat road and back. It was tougher than I expected. I had ridden this ride in the past with the group with no issues, but I hadn’t been riding my upright as much. My recumbent has electric assist, and I thought I had been working hard enough, just riding faster with the assist. But with assistance, you can always dial in a little more help when the going gets tough, like on a hill or into a headwind. Today there were plenty of both challenges, with no assistance. Not having electric assist keeps me honest! A beautiful ranch on Redwood Retreat Road Some Alpacas at the Ranch from BionicOldGuy https://ift.tt/VOmfIzW via IFTTT

I just started riding my upright bike about a week ago. It has been almost 3 weeks since what I call my “ TMI procedure “, after which I was supposed to avoid sitting on a saddle for a while. At first, I stuck to riding my recumbent, then about a week ago I tried upright but with continuous standing. A couple of days ago I did my first short upright ride in the saddle, and it went well. I ride with my group on Tuesdays, usually about 2 1/2 hours or so, and I usually take my upright for that. So yesterday I wanted to see about my stamina in the saddle and tried a ride of a bit over two hours. It went fine. I was worried the portions of my anatomy that interface with the saddle would have lost their “toughness”, but it was not too bad in just a little over a couple of weeks. I had a great ride. Although I enjoy riding my electric-assist recumbent, it is a bit of a clunker, weighing almost 50 pounds including the battery and motor. My upright Specialized Sirrus is just over 20 pounds so ...

I saw a specialist on Thursday about the lower leg I injured. He confirmed the x-ray showed no sign of fracture, and thought it was unlikely I have a stress fracture because the symptoms were getting better so fast and there was no pain when he poked and prodded. The radiologist had mentioned there was some sign of arthritis in my ankle, but he disagreed, saying the cartilage (which shows up as a white gap at a joint on x-rays) looked fine. He also manipulated my ankle and said he couldn’t detect arthritis by feel. So that was good news. He also pointed out something else interesting: my x-ray showed calcification in the arteries of the lower leg. Not too severe, but noticeable as white spots in the arteries. There is no sign of impaired artery function because the pulse in my ankles and feet is fine. I mentioned previously that calcification had been detected in my coronary arteries, which can indicate plaque in the arteries. But in my case, it has been since proven to be benign fro...

https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg25433861-200-fascia-the-long-overlooked-tissue-that-shapes-your-health/ There is an interesting article about fascia in this month’s issue of New Scientist (unfortunately there is a paywall, but you can get a free subscription for three months, which I highly recommend because there are lots of good articles in the magazine). These are connective tissues throughout our bodies, for example, all of our muscles are encased in them. I first learned about fascia from Yoga teachers who claimed one of the roles of stretching in keeping our bodies supple as we age is keeping our fascia from stiffening up. There is a good discussion of stretching in another New Scientist article here . There has been some backlash against stretching recently. Previously it was thought to be useful for warming up for exercise, but stretching cold muscles is controversial. Also, there is some evidence that athletic performance actually decreases after stretching. But ...

My lower leg is recovering much faster than expected since my injury the other day. I got the x-ray results back and they were negative. This doesn’t prove I don’t have a stress fracture because they don’t always show up on x-rays. But my recovery has been very fast so far which makes me suspect it is not a stress fracture. My GP agrees but is referring me to a specialist for a follow-up next Thursday. It helps that I was curious the day of the injury about how impaired the weight-bearing was in the leg. Normally if you’re standing on one leg you’re taking 100% of your body weight on that leg, and this naturally occurs during a normal walking gait. I knew it hurt to walk without a walker or cane for support and was curious how much weight the leg could take, pain-free. Time for a sophisticated science experiment. I got out my bathroom scale and stood on it with the injured leg, while supporting myself with hands pushing down on the counter. I relaxed the support so more weight went o...

On Wednesday I was out for my first longer ride standing up to pedal since my Urolift procedure . It’s been about a week and a half with no more side effects, so I’m feeling great about that. I’m still not cleared to do strenuous exercise till the 2-week mark which will be next Wednesday. Anderson Lake Park, Bridge Across Coyote Creek But even taking it easy, it felt great to be out and I was riding on local unpaved paths because it’s fun and closer to nature. I was doing great for over an hour when I decided to explore some paths in Anderson lake park I hadn’t been on previously. One of these had a large pothole I didn’t see because it was full of leaves. I was standing with my right foot on the pedal and my leg happened to be locked, not a good position for impact, when I slammed into it. It felt like an electric shock up my lower right leg. Surprisingly, I didn’t fall off the bike but I did stop and step off to assess the damage. It turned out I couldn’t put weight on my right...

This is a very good summary. Health Secrets of a SuperAger One in 10 adults in the United States struggles with depression, and antidepressant medications are a common way to treat the condition. However, pills aren’t the only solution. Research shows that exercise is also an effective treatment. “For some people it works as well as antidepressants, although exercise alone isn’t enough for someone with severe depression,” says Dr. Michael Craig Miller, assistant professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School. Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com The exercise effect Exercising starts a biological cascade of events that results in many health benefits, such as protecting against heart disease and diabetes, improving sleep, and lowering blood pressure. High-intensity exercise releases the body’s feel-good chemicals called endorphins, resulting in the “runner’s high” that joggers report. But for most of us, the real value is in low-intensity exercise sustained over time. That ...

Our hills have gone from green over to brown, although we call it “golden” in California. They’ll stay this way for several months now until late autumn when the rains return. I remember a few decades ago someone visiting from Minnesota said “how come you call them ‘golden’? Our hills look just like these in the summer and we call them brown”. Whether you call them brown or golden, I prefer green but that’s ok, this is our normal transition towards summer. And it’s just the grass that goes dormant, many trees and shrubs stay green. El Toro itself has lots of forest and shrubs so it’s still green. But its lower slopes have turned There are still some spots of green on the West side of town, this is on the way up Willow springs road. Looking in the other direction, the hills on the East side of the valley have all turned Riding in the little valley of Coyote Creek Open space preserve The open space authority is trying to acquire more land for habitat preservation. It’s nice...

https://borneobulletin.com.bn/the-active-grandparent-hypothesis/ Humans are meant to keep active as we age, according to the “active grandparent” hypothesis put forth by evolutionary researchers [1]. We have a significantly longer lifespan than our close cousins the chimpanzees, who also happen to be considerably more sedentary. One of the study authors, Dr. Daniel Lieberman, observing chimpanzees in the wild was surprised by how much of their day is spent “sitting on their butts, digesting”. Hunter gatherers, in contrast, typically spend about 135 minutes of moderate to vigorous physical activity a day, even when they get older. The first reasoning I heard for an evolutionary advantage for this behavior was “the grandmother hypothesis” promoted by anthropologist Dr. Kristen Hawkes . She observed hard-working older Hadza women in Tanzania helping to gather tubers, which can require going several feet underground with a digging stick. Women with infants to care for can’t spend their...

It has been known for a while that high-fat meals can temporarily impair artery function by causing constriction of the arteries. This is usually demonstrated in the arm (brachial artery) because that is the easiest to measure. It was also made famous in the movie The Gamechangers because it can impair function in an organ near and dear to men below the waist. But this is a temporary effect that may go away after a few hours, so you may wonder how important this phenomenon this really is healthwise. https://nutritionfacts.org/video/exercising-to-protect-your-arteries-from-fast-food/ This was answered in a study that looked at the effect of high-fat meals on coronary arteries, as reviewed in Dr. Michael Greger’s video “ Exercising To Protect Your Arteries From Fast Food “. It turns out coronary artery function is also similarly impaired for a few hours [1]. Such a meal can use up your entire “coronary reserve”, which is how much surrounding arteries can expand as needed if blood fl...

http://www.Amazon.com/books This was a good book I read recently by Tim Beynon. The title caught my eye because I thought it might be about something akin to runner’s high, with the drug being endorphins or endocannabinoids. It is about how running is a major psychological booster for the author, but it is much more, as it tells the inspiring story of how he fought his way through a rare form of early-onset prostate cancer in his 40s. This required major prostate surgery and a tough rehab. This made the prostate procedure I just had on Monday seem minor indeed by comparison. During rehab Tim did a lot of walking, then finally worked his way back to his favorite activity, running. As he started to ramp up the distance he could run, he needed a challenge to motivate him, and set his sights on the following year’s London marathon. This would be to raise money for Prostate Cancer UK, who had been helpful to him in his recovery. He also wanted to raise awareness for early prostate scr...

Last October I mentioned I’d had a urinary tract infection that took a stout round of antibiotics to kick. My urologist suspected benign prostate hyperplasia , a condition where the prostate is restricting the ureter, and was concerned this put me at risk for future UTIs. It’s also kind of a nuisance because it often makes me wake up multiple times per night to pee. He confirmed it a couple of months ago with a cystoscopy . This can be treated with a medicine called Flomax (generic Tamsulosin ) but that wasn’t too effective for me. An easy way to correct the problem is to install some tiny clips that pull back the prostate. It is a very minimally invasive procedure called Urolift . This procedure took less than 15 minutes. The clips are actually shot in place with a spring device and self-deploy. There is very little pain during the procedure . For the adventurous, there’s a short video of the procedure here . So I had that done this morning. There was very little discomfort duri...

Today I attended “HPV fun day”, a special once-a-year event at Hellyer Velodrome. A local couple organizes this, renting the velodrome and then inviting participants to come just try out the velodrome or enter races. I did a little of each. I rode my electric-assist recumbent down the Coyote Creek trail from Morgan Hill to the velodrome. I then rode on the velodrome for multiple laps during the open practice period. This is fun as I did not feel confident on the banking at first but it came back to me after a couple of laps. I was soon enjoying going up to the top, working up a head of steam, then swooping down to the bottom line, simulating the flying start of a 200-meter time trial. The first event was the time trial. I wasn’t blazingly fast but it felt great and was a fun experience. There was a break after the time trial so I rode some more laps as a cooldown. All the other events were group rides, which I promised my wife I would avoid because I’ve crashed at this velodrome in t...