SWOT not SWOT

The storms are upon us, sort of. They haven’t hit as hard as we all thought they would. This makes it challenging to figure out if the effort it takes to get ready for a snow ride is worth the payoff.

After today’s ride, several fellow cyclists were curious about the road conditions. To provide answers to this very important question, I decided to put together a SWOT analysis on today’s ride. I quickly realized that in this case a SWOT analysis is overkill. I decided to go with a simple “3-Ups, 3-Downs” format. This is a format a former boss used successfully to get quick updates in our daily status meetings. He was so sharp that he’s now the VP of Marketing at a local company that extends the concept of “community” to knit organizations and their customers and enhance communications. Now that’s kewl. (You can pay me my $5 now, Geoff.) The format’s pretty simple—list the top three and bottom three issues.

Now that I am completely off point, here are my three-ups and three-downs for today’s Squaw Peak ride.

3-Ups

• 1,768 vertical feet over 4.8 miles with no recovery—solid 55 minute cardio workout
• Semi-sticky snow provided “barely enough” traction
• Rode outside—avoided the indoor trainer for yet another day

3-Downs

• Did not reach lookout point—climbed 2.4 miles then dropped to base, twice
• Potato flake snow chunks pelted my face on the descent—felt like cat scratches
• Mike broke his chain

The Ups clearly outweighed the Downs. If I can, and if the outside conditions stay relatively the same, I will ride again tomorrow.

Riding with Mike is always good. In sharing our work-related issues and stress, I was reminded again that the stress I deal with at work is like Kool-Aid compared to the stress he and others deal with at work. Mike’s an ER doctor.