2014: Year in Review

2014 certainly had its ups and downs. I had high hopes and a solid January, but broke my hip on February 3rd. As a result, I had to scrap most of my goals. Here were my 2014 goals:

1. Ride a century every week. (Out the window. I've ridden 1 per week since August.)
2. Complete the California Triple Crown. (Technically possible, but DMD was too early for me, so I set new goals and moved on.)
3. Ride a century in 3 new states. (I actually accomplished this one. Check out the Century in 50 States blog for reports on KS, OK, and AR.)
4. Ride across Nevada in 30 hours. (Didn't happen. I would prefer to do this in the middle of the summer when the days are the longest. I wasn't ready yet this summer.)

1 for 4 isn't good, but after I broke my hip in February I had to set new goals. First was to simply complete the Alta Alpina Challenge double, which I was able to do. I did it slowly, but I did it. After that I shifted my focus to Everesting. I did 2 of those: Geiger Grade and Monitor Pass. I also tried to Everest 2 different shorter climbs, but I failed on those attempts.

After I was done Everesting, I shifted my focus to 10,000 miles for the year. Normally this wouldn't be a big deal, but I spent 2 months off the bike in February and March and had a slow April. I am happy to report that I was able to reach my 10,000-mile goal, which isn't too bad for essentially 10.5 months.

I know you're all tired of hearing about it, but 2014 was the year of the broken hip. It was a scary time for me. I wasn't sure I would ever be back to "normal" again. What would life be like if I couldn't ride my bike the way I wanted to? That's a very difficult question to think about. I was lucky. I was able to come back. Some people aren't so lucky.


I plan to make the most out of my good fortune. There's no telling how long I will be able to ride, but I am determined to make the most out of whatever time I have left. That's the lesson I took away from 2014 and the reason behind my lofty ambitions for 2015. I don't want to mention my hip too much in 2015 (I'll probably bring it up on the 1-year anniversary, but that's it). Nobody wants to hear my lame excuses. However, it's always going to be that motivating factor in the back of my mind.

2014 Numbers

10,948 total miles
728 total hours
43 centuries 
2 Doubles
2 Everests