https://www.washingtonpost.com/road-to-recovery/2020/11/19/challenge-daytona-triathlon-florida-coronavirus/

Gotta say this kinda reeks of douchebaggery.

Hi all, 
I wanted to share this testing information with you guys, especially as things are heating up again in the city. https://www.drconnornyc.com/about-covid-19/

After two weeks of quarantining at home with the kids I've made the drive to Toronto (14+ hours) to stay with my mom for a few weeks.

It's always eye opening to come home to Canada but covid highlights things. Duluth is staring at a 9% community infection rate and they've just locked down again. Toronto has a 3% test positivity rate and they just locked everything down again.

I was able to get my mom set up with some good internet so I'm hopeful to be back on the bike (and Zwift) even if my comeback plan has been delayed by a few days of driving.

Jules said:

It's always eye opening to come home to Canada but covid highlights things. Duluth is staring at a 9% community infection rate and they've just locked down again. Toronto has a 3% test positivity rate and they just locked everything down again.

Our kid's school, which as far as I know had no reported cases of covid19 before, just had 2 within 7 days of each other. Luckily they moved everyone to remote learning after NYC infection rates hit 3%, but still now our entire community and families have to upend their lives and livelihoods and face the very real and high probability that the rest of the school year will be 100% remote.

And then I read/hear about the underground pandemic parties and crazy huge weddings and it's taking a lot of effort not to freak the fck out.

Chanel your inner racoon...

https://twitter.com/doctor_oxford/status/1327924500990730240?s=20

Waited a little while to post this just to be safe, but I actually ended up testing positive for covid last week. I had a sore throat in the morning and after teaching remotely, went to get the test at one of the NYC testing centers. 

Thankfully, symptoms have been very mild (sinus-y type headache, bit of a scratchy throat and maybe a little bit of fatigue). I haven't had any fever and breathing has been pretty normal. Pulse oximeter says my O2 levels are in a healthy range. I've made some good progress the past two days and have started to actually feel better. I've been holed up in my apartment for about 8 days now and was told by my doctor that I'm in the clear to leave after the 10th day so long as I have no fever and symptoms are still improving. I actually ordered a WHOOP with their black Friday discount and it'll arrive today. I wish I had it earlier because it seems like it would be a pretty good symptom tracker. I'm hoping it'll provide some insight into my recovery. 

I've dedicated probably too much energy trying to figure out how I contracted it because I've been following CDC guidelines. I've literally only been indoors/unmasked with my partner. She has tested negative twice now and does not have antibodies. I suspect I may have gotten it in my apartment building because folks here don't seem to acknowledge that COVID is a thing (riding in elevators together, tenants/ construction workers unmasked all the time). My neighbor across the hall had a huge party on thanksgiving night that didn't seem like a close family gathering. There must have been a time in the past two weeks that I left my apartment and didn't have my mask up because no one else was in the hallway. This virus is strange and I do not understand how it works. 

All that said, things are OK and I am on the mend! Keep wearing those masks and get tested if you feel like you might have symptoms. It took a while at the testing center, but it was incredibly easy and painless (no more brain poking) and free.

Damn @RobertMullen, that’s awful (and super unfortunate that your neighbors are so cavalier about it), but glad to hear you’re on the mend and getting healthier. Hope you get back to 100% soon!

@RobertMullen Oh man, I am glad your symptoms aren't worse. Give yourself time to heal before killing yourself on a Zwift race. 

Oh yeah, today was the first day bicycle riding seemed like something that could be done but I'm in no rush. A couple days off the bike is peanuts relative to what some folks experience. 

@RobertMullen that's a gut punch for sure. I'm really sorry to read this, and glad your symptoms aren't worse. Hopefully you are able to keep quarantined from your partner (?) and this will be nothing more than story to tell your grandkids about.

Thanks! And yes, we don't live together and both live alone so we've been able to pretty much eliminate any outside contact. 

keep taking good care and heal up.

This is crazy! Poor Fernando 
https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-pro-cyclist-who-caught-covid-twice-11606919308?mod=e2fb&fbclid=PAAaYHGSsTCxJXhw5LJGqbay3aJwqhl8lz6ghSeJ3DGXJIZQni2TUVGkLvrL4

So 2020 had one last fuck you up it’s sleeve and I tested positive for covid last week. I had felt like something was off last weekend, but chalked it up to riding outside on Saturday when it was really cold. By Tuesday I seas running a fever and had a bad headache, so I made an appointment to get it checked out. The doctor ran a rapid test out of caution and it was positive and followed up with a positive PCR test. 

Yikes, good luck Matt. 

Whoa. Hang in there @Matt Budofsky

Good luck Matt, take good care.

That stinks. Hope you feel better soon

Glad to hear things are trending in the right direction, Matt! Take it easy on the bike for sure and hopefully you'll be feeling back to normal soon. 

Thanks guys!

RobertMullen said:

Glad to hear things are trending in the right direction, Matt! Take it easy on the bike for sure and hopefully you'll be feeling back to normal soon. 

Any advice for getting through it?  

best wisest wishes Matt

I think Whoop actually mentioned that they anecdotally could predict 80% of covid cases just from the metrics they measure. It is really interesting how the body reacts to stuff like this.

mugwump said:

RobertMullen said:

Glad to hear things are trending in the right direction, Matt! Take it easy on the bike for sure and hopefully you'll be feeling back to normal soon. 

Any advice for getting through it?  

I think the best thing I did was absolutely nothing. I think giving myself permission to be a lazy shit for once was really helpful. Obviously you can't really be out and about, but I did read that it is good to move around a bit in your home and not be totally bed-ridden. I took some advil here and there for headaches but tried to limit it as long as symptoms were manageable as the CDC says even after the after the 10-14 day isolation, you need to go a few days without any fever-reducing medicine before you can see other folks. 

I also picked up a cheap pulse-oximeter and thermometer to keep an eye on the important vitals. I've read some mixed views on using a pulse-ox for training purposes so maybe it'll have some uses beyond 2020.

 I definitely didn't touch the bike until I felt absolutely ready to. There's nothing to peak for in the near future, so being fit 14+ days later isn't a big deal. I think if I pushed it and rode the turbo too early, I would have just prolonged my crummy-ness and not actually gained any fitness. Unfortunately/fortunately, this is a great year to allow yourself to do nothing.

TL,DR: Rest

@Matt Budofsky 
@RobertMullen

FWIW, the idea that you two got it when you seem to be careful has me wearing a mask just about every time I step into my building's common areas.  And I think most of the common areas are decently ventilated.  

Guess that's a good thing.

Here is that Whoop post:

https://www.whoop.com/thelocker/predict-covid-19-risk/

Obviously they sell a product so all this should be read skeptically but the correlations sound interesting. 

Seriously, there are 3 walk in emergency centers offering testing within a block of each other near my house in low density eastern Queens and there have been lines around the block every day since at least Thanksgiving. Shit is real out there.

David Yang said:

Seriously, there are 3 walk in emergency centers offering testing within a block of each other near my house in low density eastern Queens and there have been lines around the block every day since at least Thanksgiving. Shit is real out there.

I agree with JP that Rob and Matt's cases have me more worried than previously.

I've been involved with the design and construction of multiple COVID testing centers over the past 9 months.

But today we got assigned our first two projects to convert testing centers to vaccination centers! 

With the arrival of the Covid-UK variant in NY state and based on the impact that this has had in the UK in a very short period of time, it would seem likely that post the holiday periods would see an increase in transmission (the UK variant is 50-60% more contagious).  

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/new-covid-variant-uk-new-york-b1782300.html 
https://www.cnbc.com/2021/01/04/new-york-gov-cuomo-confirms-states-first-case-of-new-covid-strain-initially-found-in-uk.html

I hope that governments here will be quicker to realize that the spread in this case won't be controlled through the same measures as previously employed.