I'm a wimp...and where are my biking shorts?

Sunday, August 08, 2010

A couple of weeks ago, I’d taken the jeep to Dan knowing that I’d be leaving it with him. I’d thrown the bike in the back for the ride home and just before leaving, realized I’d forgotten to grab my biking shorts. I’d grabbed them from my bathroom and thrown them in the back of the jeep with the rest of my riding gear…or so I’d thought. Once at Dan’s, a thorough search of the jeep had not revealed their location and I’d been forced to have Holly pick me up and bring me home. That was two in a row. The last time I’d come out to Dan’s with a vehicle, I’d forgotten one of my biking shoes and been forced to ride home with my running shoe on my right foot.

I’d gotten back home to find John there ready to ride. I searched in vain for the biking shorts I was sure I’d left somewhere between my bathroom and the jeep, but…they were gone! I put on an old pair that were two sizes too big and embarrassingly loose. They made me look like I had no butt…quite an accomplishment for any garment.

So…I’d taken the jeep back to Dan for some more work…and I had to ride for the next week because of the sore hip. The biking shorts have not resurfaced and I concluded they MUST be somewhere in that jeep. I’m always looking for different courses to ride so I decided I’d ride out to Dan’s in my baggy shorts and switch them out for my good ones. Excellent plan. I rode the 18 miles uphill to Dan’s and found him working on another vehicle…he’d already put a new radiator in the jeep. I told him the nature of my mission and began searching the jeep for the missing shorts. After a 10-minute effort, I gave it up. Those shorts were gone and that was that. I was riding in baggy shorts unless I quickly stored about 20 pounds of lard in my butt. Nice picture.

The ride to Dan’s…uphill and into the wind had taken 67 minutes and left me more than a little tired since I hadn’t been riding in two weeks and only sparingly when I did. I wanted to get in a long one though, and so I headed south on Auburn Road from his place to add another 10 miles to the return trip. By the time I’d been on the bike around 2 hours, I knew I was in trouble.

I like to mirror as closely as I can what I will be doing on all-day climbs in the Adirondacks with my training. It’s hard since there is no comparable terrain in Northeast Ohio, but I have found long bike rides to tax the cardiovascular and endurance systems in similar ways. The muscles of the thighs do so much work on a bike, which they also have to do when climbing peaks, so long rides make a lot of sense to prepare for climbing. I’d just come back from hiking 14 hours in two days and I’d thought the bike ride would be a breeze. There’s wrong…and there’s ‘John’s a dumbass’ wrong. This was the latter. I was attempting to ride a very hilly course in 90 degree weather on a windy day for about three hours when I hadn’t been riding anything to speak of in…oh…3 months? I crawled over the last 45 minutes of the ride, just thinking about how stupid I was and how good it was going to feel to dive into the neighbor’s pool.

I made it home, but was in bad need of a swim and a nap. I texted John about the disastrous ride and responded with one sympathetic word…”wimp”. He’s right, though, but we’re going climbing in September and if he’s not ready…well…he’ll be paying for that text.

Bike duration: two hour and 45 minutes.
Training Heart Rate: 120.
Calories burned during workout: 2,400.