July 22, 2013

It has been just over two years since I first started cycling, and here I am on a road bike looking back at that first comfort bike with its clunky shifters and heavy drag (exactly where I needed to start!).  In a lot of ways, I feel much healthier than I have in my life to this point...at least, not since the miles of walking around campus when in college!  Even still, to think that I'm technically an athlete is just weird, and sometimes I find it hard to actually call myself a cyclist because it was always a "them" thing.  I'm far more aware of bicycles on the road, which is a far cry from the person who wondered why the idiot went out in the rain (well, the weather was nicer and clear when s/he left two hours before!).

My elbow wounds....

So, to celebrate making it two years, almost exactly two years to the day of my first crash, and fricking fell off my bike with a failure to unclip.  That's not even close to the seriousness of the first fall, which was a failure to balance with only one hand on the handlebars after a five-mile ride while going about thirteen miles an hour.  This one came toward the end of a thirty-mile ride having gotten up to 40 miles per hour coming down a hill.  I think my legs were a bit tired, and I was in a hurry.  There's driveway toward a lake I sometimes stop at to take a moment of rest, and as I pulled into it, I
coasted in and failed to unclip my shoe.  More embarrassing than anything, I basically just tipped right over on the asphalt.  As soon as I righted myself, my first thought was to my bike (the break hood got a bit scuffed, but the derailleur and gears were fine and no scratches to the frame) and my expensive shorts (no holes or snags!), then finally the gushing wounds on my knee and elbow.  These were nothing to the wounds of a few years ago, but they stung as I cleaned them up to get on and finish going home (one brake hood had shifted inward, but I was able to adjust it back out).  The worst part was that I was calling my wife to see how I was doing on time: did I have time before our swim to get a few more miles in or should I head home?  Of course, after that, I headed home and even went swimming with giant waterproof bandages.

I went back out yesterday and got fifty miles in, and I was very aware of the pedal to make sure I unclipped correctly!  I can't believe I did that...I've come close before, but that was just too much!  I did lower the tension a bit in the right pedal so it'll unclip a bit easier...I did stop at the same driveway without incident.  Though I did find myself looking at the ground as if I'd see ripped off pieces of my flesh or drops of blood!  Heck of an anniversary observation, though...next year I'll just send myself flowers instead of the sympathy flowers my wife brought me after I got home!