MILESTONES, NEW TOYS AND BIG PLANS - A mixed bag of goods!

MILESTONES - VeloDiet is quickly approaching 2500 pageviews! Starting this blog has been an interesting process so far, which included learning how to write creatively again - something I would recommend to anyone! I do feel like my story is worthy sharing and hope it can help someone out there, but it is nice to see, in hard data, that quite a few people have read (or at least looked at) my articles so far.

Warka, Poland - VeloDiet might not have taken off as a jet plane,
but I am happy it has gained traction!

As I am still trying to figure out how to best tell my story and keep readers interested, I've been using many tools that Blogger (that's the "blogspot" from "velodiet.blogspot.com") offers to gain some insight on the site visits. As I type this, there have been 2460 page views in the history of Velodiet, 504 pageviews this last month alone. Most viewers have been from Poland (1321) with the USA following close behind (929), and the page has also been accessed from many places around the world including Japan, Russia, Bangladesh and Kuwait. The most popular posts so far have been WANT TO RIDE BIKES? JOIN THE CLUB! and "DIETING AND EXERCISING" MADE ME FAT!  , while the least accessed post has been THE CYCLIST GOES FOR A RUN! So, apart from readers not being interested in me complaining about joint pain from running, there has been equal interested in both the "Velo" aspect of the site as the "Diet" aspect so far. I've also have heard from readers who are very experienced cyclists and from readers who rarely go out for a ride but enjoy peaking into the cyclist's mind.

Someone from Bangladesh checked out VeloDiet!

Although I am really happy that VeloDiet has had a balanced reception, it leaves me with very little insight of which direction the blog should head. What I would really like is to establish a dialogue with the readers. The comment section below each article has been open to anyone to share anything they want (you don't need to register or log-in and you can even leave a comment as anonymous!) If you have any suggestions, thoughts on any articles, any subjects you want to revisit, or even a funny joke, please feel free to share!


NEW TOY - Last year, during a beautiful Autumn day in Poland, I went for a ride and wanted to capture some of the gorgeous scenery I was cycling through. If you click on the video below, you will get to see my attempt of riding up Lipkowska Hill while filming with my I-phone on one hand and trying not to breathe too hard (it is a lot steeper than it looks). As you can see, the footage will not be nominated for any Oscars and I wasn't really able to enjoy the climb - you just gotta get off the saddle for that steep section! There have also been many times when I see a beautiful moment while riding, which are long gone before I manage to grab my I-phone "camera" from the back pocket.

Enter the Polaroid Cube, a low-cost entry action camera which I have just ordered. I had been planning on saving up for a much more expensive GoPro Hero camera, but this new toy not only fits my budget better, it also will do everything I need it to do (share interesting footage/scenery from the rides). So, I hope that in the next few weeks, I will get to show you how I was overtaken by a brand new Ferrari in a small rural road and then had to pass a tractor a few seconds later - instead of just writing about it! Feel free to leave a comment if you have any personal reviews of the Polaroid Cube, or if you'd like me to give it a try at doing some tech reviews!

Hoping to bring more than just still shots of cafe's
and improvised ramps to VeloDiet!

BIG PLANS - Remember the time I decided to run a 1/2 marathon just to see if it would be as fun as riding a bike (well, according to my data, not too many of you will actually remember it!) Well, I've been trying recently to find new ways to challenge myself and find new enriching life experiences, which may just be interesting enough to share. And as the weather begins to warm up and the bike rides get to be longer, I am seriously thinking that some long European bike trips might be in order! This is very early in the planning stages, but I've already starting doing some "test rides" to study different factors of what a long bike trip might require. Very quickly, I realized that I need to learn a new way to ride a bike, starting to focus on distance and endurance instead of speed. But it seems that every time I get on the road bike, I fail miserably at riding at an easy comfortable pace, which I manage to do that much better while riding on the mountain bike. Yet, the thought of riding for 600kms on a heavy mountain bike is not very appealing!

Some possible destinations include Berlin and Prague.

Other factors which I am looking into are route planning and being comfortable in different types of roads. Distance is also a key factor but I am thinking that breaking each day into 150kms or so seems to be doable. Berlin or Prague sound like good destinations at about 600kms away and some interesting places along the way. I have a few experiments in mind to make sure I am up for the challenge, after all, I am not a 37 year-old kid anymore, and have learned to respect my body much more than I used to. Keep an eye-out for further updates on this possible adventure. I am pretty confident that I will do a test-run to Kielce and the Świętokrzyskie mountains and re-evaluate my plans then! Again, if you have any experiences, insights, or would like to volunteer to come along, please feel free to leave a comment below!