[jyl]

I ride to and from work every day, and do most errands (grocery, hardware store, pub, etc) on the bike. So most of my riding is done in short loops around town, call it 3 to 10 miles. Some weekends I'll go for a fun ride, usually I'll do hill repeats at a local park, those might be 25 mile days. In the summer I also do longer rides, 50 miles, to prepare for the Seattle to Portland which is 200 miles (over two days for me). I don't tend to do long rides on a regular (e.g. weekly) basis year-round, because of lack of time. I'm thinking of getting a mountain bike, to increase the variety of my riding. In the heart of winter, which here means rain, dark and cold, I still ride to work and errands but don't do weekend fun rides (because they're not fun then, and there can be ice on my hill lap route). Instead I go to the gym's spinning class 2x week. Last winter I found spinning made me stronger, came into spring in better shape than the previous year. As far as speed, usually 15-20 mph around town, 25-30 for short (really short) bursts like trying to keep up w/ traffic, 10-15 on moderate hills. For a long ride on flattish ground, usually about 17 mph average. Your speed will depend not only on conditioning but on the type of bike, a road bike being significantly faster on pavement. This winter, try some spin classes, maybe do one of those free week trials at a gym. That way you won't lose the fitness you're building now, indeed you will keep building it.