Wednesday, February 29, 2012

Yoo 291 - I Am Not A Cyclist

I met up with a few guys from work for a group bicycle ride today.

It was everything I expected it to be.

They looked like this:


I did not. I was wearing my one and only generic yellow bicycle jersey, (same one i got in canada years ago at mec...elizabeth!), massively diapered bike shorts, a mismatched helmet, and no gloves.

Oh, and I broke my sport sunglasses on the way there so I had to resort to my bright green aviators, too.


(one and the same)

Also, and maybe this is just me, I feel like a dork wearing a yellow bicycle jersey. Like everyone is judging me. "Who does she think she is, Lance Armstrong?".  Like it's just reserved for The Tour, or something. Never again will I buy a yellow bicycle jersey.

But back to the point.

They were riding these:


I felt like I was riding this:


(they advised me to cut the streamers off before the ride...something about aerodynamics? i think it helped...)

(and just for the kyoodad...i'm kidding...you're old road bike is performing like a champ!)

I'm sure they, with their massively muscled bike legs, viewed the route like so:


While I, with my massive but not muscled legs, viewed it more like so:


(except stack that picture on top of itself 5 times and then repeat 50 times)

For some reason I looked at their list of scheduled rides and thought the one marked "Very Difficult" and nicknamed the "Hills of Terror" by seasoned riders was a good first ride to join them for.

Go Kyoo!

The whole 90 minutes was terribly exhausting and terribly exhilarating at the same time. I loved being on the bike and conquering hill after hill but I couldn't stop thinking "112 miles of this...and then a marathon...112 miles of this...and then a marathon?!"

It hit me a lot little more tonight.

But they're a great group of riders and pushed me waaaaaay more than I would have pushed myself. So it was good. And the hill country sunset was amazing! As we regrouped back at our vehicles they told me I was quite the trooper. I'm new to this but I'm guessing that's bike speak for "nice try". I thanked them for waiting for me.

It was kind of a slice of humble pie and when I saw the Gregbeau later I let out a "What was I thinking??" exclamation to which he echoed with a "What were you thinking??" exclamation and that was about the end of that sob fest.

Mostly because my phone started playing Ace of Base and that got us sidetracked on the most random of musical journeys with friends like Avril Lavigne and Boston and Veggie Tales and even a tiny bit of Backstreet Boys in there.

Hardly worth mentioning on the blog but I just did.

(also hardly worth mentioning but happening anyways...) I had Costco frozen yogurt for dinner. (you're loving this play by play, i'm sure of it). And I was resorting to counting out pennies to pay for it except I ended two short. And I almost panicked but the Costco dude was nice and still went thru with the sale...though I suspect he didn't fill the cup as full...

It was hardly the dinner of champions. I need to work on that.

And did I mention I'm not a cyclist? I really need to work on that, too.

Have a great day :-)


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