Raúl’s view from the San Francisco Bay Trail.

May was National Bike Month, and DriversEd.com celebrated by participating in the 2015 Bay Area Company Bike Challenge . With just three team members, we biked a total of 426.4 miles–just 73.6 miles short of our goal of 500!  

Out of all small companies in Alameda County, DriversEd.com took 14  ^th  place. Not too shabby for a 3-person team, even if a few factors held us back from logging five centuries:

•  Weather  : Temperatures in May were lower than average . Though the chilly conditions were perfect for me, it was too cold for Raúl, who prefers to take bicycle trips in hotter weather.
•  Travel  : Flink took a trip down to the eDriving office in Carlsbad for a couple of days and wasn’t able to ride a bike during that time.
•  Injury  : I had an embarrassing fall and injured my hand, which kept me from taking any long trips during the last weekend of the competition.
•  Forgetfulness  : A certain member of the team didn’t get the memo that every trip had to be logged within 7 days, so we lost a couple of miles here and there. Oops!

Maybe next year, with a little more planning, we’ll be able to recruit more colleagues to join the challenge and bike more miles. (Or maybe I’ll just set an easier goal for us!)

Highlights from Bike Month

Flink riding to Crockett.

 We got away from our computers and went outside.   Bike Month was a great excuse to get out and ride. Raúl made several trips along the scenic San Francisco Bay Trail . Flink went for a long ride through his favorite environment with lots of green trees.

 We got tons of exercise.  Altogether the three of us burned a total of 18,336 calories from bicycling during the month of May. That’s about the amount of calories in seven large cheese pizzas. I even managed to meet my personal goal of biking 200 miles.

 We biked more than we normally would have.   Tracking our bike trips for the Bike Challenge and comparing our total miles with each other inspired us to ride more. “I definitely changed my weekend plans to include some extra rides, and some extra-long rides,” said Flink. “So I guess it really did get me on the roads and in the saddle a little bit more than I would have been otherwise!”

 We had fun!   The Bike Challenge sparked a bit of friendly competition among the three of us (which I totally won!). We also participated in Bike to Work Day  and bonded over beers at the Bike Happy Hour. Most important of all, a great time was had by all!