Alpine Touring

I thought about racing Lava, but instead today I did the Alpine loop with an extended approach to get to Provo Canyon. I thought it would be interesting to measure my sweat rate for the ride. I once read a rider can loose something like a pound of glycogen, etc. during a ride. I'm not sure how that works, so ignoring that:

I drank 5 large bottles and lost 5 pounds during the ride, so the weight total, almost all of which should be water, was 5.4 liters, or 1.4 gallons. I never really felt all that wet, but I was plenty salty at the end. Dry day and 90 F in the valley.

This is a great time of year to ride the Alpine Loop. The road is still closed and the pavement on that section has all been resurfaced, so except for some poachers on motorcycles the top section is fast, smooth, and safe.

The other interesting thing I did was put some soy protein in my bottle (can't do whey for lactose problems). I didn't really like the taste, but I was surprised how strong I felt at the end of the ride and wondered if the protein was responsible. No stomach issues from it. I just mixed it in so I was at 10% protein (by calories).

Before the ride I spent about an hour fiddling with my Sansa MP3 player that is locked up. It appears to just have a bad file on it, but when powered on it seizes and the USB won't recognize it either. No reset switch. So I called their customer support and they are sending me a new one. This is the latest incident in a string of experiences that has left me thinking a lot about quality lately.

I think Americans just don't care about quality very much, or even expect it. Particularly with electronic devices. Some would claim Microsoft has lowered all our expectations, but I don't think it is just Microsoft. I rode past the old Wordperfect headquarters/campus today and thought about Wordperfect 6.0. It was so buggy I switched to Word because at least it crashed less. Before the PC years, I had an Amiga. Laughable stability.

Unfortunately, it goes beyond just computers. Why do power locks on cars ever fail? They are so simple. It is because they are manufactured on the cheap, I guess. Maybe the designs are poor. When I bought our last washer, I told them I wanted one that would last 30 years and I'd pay for it. "Sorry, can't buy those any more. No one will pay for them so no one sells them." The last three Timex Ironman watches I have purchased all failed because they were not as water-resistant as claimed..."takes a lickin, keeps on ticken?" Not to mention much of the stuff on the shelves at Walmart.

Whine, whine, right? We've had some quality concerns at work lately too. I think American engineers have gotten a little lazy and often choose to take the first or easiest approach when only a few minutes extra thought might yield a far more robust solution. A small amount of extra planning while coding can yield source that is far easier to read, comprehend, and debug, all leading to better reliability.

Bike products often exhibit the same issues. Graber Powertap products definitely have quality issues. They usually work, but not every single time.

A few companies buck the trend. Toyota immediately comes to mind. My Garmin 305 is also like that. It works really well. Not once have I had it loose data, fail to download, or crash, hang etc. The HR monitor works better than any others I have too (they all have problems on dry days with static, but the Garmin seems better than even the polar).

I'm out of time before I talked about what I think the solution is. Maybe some other day.