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Originally uploaded by retrotec&ingliscycles
Slow blogging of late...lo siento mucho...
Cool beans though, despite pretty much second guessing myself for a week, I stuck with riding my singlespeed at Lake Sonoma Grasshopper and ended up doing a lot better than I hoped. Now granted, I didn't win, but—thanks to weather that was A LOT more favorable than last year (last year it was 109 degrees out there), a great breakfast and Huey Lewis playing in my head— I did finish almost 40 minutes FASTER than previous year!
Yee Ha!
Funny thing that made me think...riding to Lucie's house with Kara, Brian, Rick and MaryAnne-Brian asked why I wasn't faster if I rode my bike all the time... I didn't take it as an insult, quite the contrary, it played well into my entire reasoning behind doing these races and such... then answer is many-fold.
Top-most, I am not a heavy competitor-my upbringing, for better or worse, led me to be a bit more timid and unsure of myself than others...with that to bear, I am pretty much handicapped by myself...
Secondly, I pretty much ride my bike to help sort myself, my life and my thoughts and feelings out. I got into the whole racing thing as a response to my divorce. Rather than sit around and feel sorry, I jumped at the opportunity to ride more. And egged on by Curtis and Andrew to hit the Grasshoppers, County Lines and so forth, just found that being amongst like-minded folks helped me sort ME out...
What else? Well I am overweight, so pushing the tonnage around is harder. I don't "train" and don't really ever see myself doing that to the extent that the top folks are doing. I think that the entire point of cycling (to me) would be lost if it became a "job"---as it's more of an escape for me than work (even when I'm hiking my bike up the 30th hill) and I'm just not into more "work"...
Anyway, it was a great question, one I am still pondering. The event was incredible as well... almost 6,000' feet of climbing in 23 miles, A LOT of pain, but I resigned myself to walk whenever I felt like it, so it was all good...
I'll try to post more to the ol' blog... god knows there are plenty of really great things going on in my life as well as a few funky things...2009 is still shaping up to be gooder than 08' in many ways though...
1 comment:
tell those fast racer guys to stuff it! they're just jealous because they ride ugly bikes....
but seriously, you are a lot faster than you were even at this time last year. just like a lot of things in life, the speed will show up without your asking for it in any conscious way, from riding and racing and having a good time. you don't notice it because it happens in tiny steps, little by little. if riding more and harder is fun, then you'll do it. if it's less fun, it won't happen (and doesn't need to). you're not getting a paycheck for it and 1st or 10th place isn't automatically more fun than 50th.
see you out there...with more and bigger grins during the next few months.
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