I took off on the F5 yesterday morning and rode my 30 mile Mabank route. It was my first outdoor ride since early November last year. The weather this winter has been fairly mild, and there were days I could have ridden outdoors, but I wanted to make sure my vertigo issues were well enough under control before I tackled an outdoor ride again. But ever since I’ve been taking meclizine, my vertigo episodes have been infrequent, very mild, of very short duration, and never while I’m being active. I finally got to see a physical therapist for my vertigo. She did lots of testing, and thinks the source of my vertigo is my eyes. So I’m doing some eye exercises to see if that helps. If not, I’ll be seeing an ear nose and throat specialist for more testing.

So I think my only limitations right now are my left knee and my not-so-great fitness level, and I’m going to start doing mostly outdoor rides on the days the weather permits. As has been the case in recent years, I had my challenges getting my miles in this first quarter of 2023. Ongoing pain in my left knee has limited me, plus I had my usual January cold which turned into my usual January bronchitis, and I took a couple of weeks off the bike for that. I used to just ride through colds and bronchitis, but trying to do so these days seems to make getting well again take far too long.

I ended up with just 750 miles on the bike for the first quarter, much less than I would like and expect. My left knee surgery has been set for May 2nd, so I’m hoping for a better second half of this year on the bike. I’ve only made one fossil hunting hike this quarter, and didn’t find anything worthy of posting about. I’m hoping to be doing more of that as well after the surgery. The surgeon is just scoping my knee, so I’m hoping the recovery time won’t be too long. Yesterday’s Mabank route is more challenging than the very flat Cozumel virtual route I’ve been riding on the trainer, but it’s still a flat easy route. I don’t think I’m going to tackle anything longer or more challenging until after my knee gets fixed.

Yesterday’s 30 mile Mabank ride.