Sunday, July 10, 2016

Reflecting on Five Years

   Five years ago, we'd just had a baby and I was 190 pounds, the most I've ever weighed in my life.  Then came my 36th birthday and the surprise gift from my wife: a bicycle.  Yes, it'd been close to a quarter of a century since I'd been on one, and I'd never ridden a bike with more than one gear and never as an adult. It was a Walmart special, but it got me going out.
   I set off, then on July 9 of 2011 on this incredible journey.  That first few months, I shed some weight (about 15 pounds at the time) as I struggled to increase my distance.  Now those days seem like a different time of sticking to paths and avoiding major roads for fear of cars as I relied heavily on the Internet for enlightenment (okay, some things don't change) so that I could hopefully have a clue of what I was doing and be safe.  Not knowing how to properly shift my weight to remove one hand from the handlebars landed me hard on the pavement and skidding along to get that road rash I'd been so afraid of...I was right to fear it!
   Over those first months, there was a steady movement of greater skills and better equipment that remains rather ongoing, from my Schwinn gear and Bell bike computer to now my Pearl Izumi and Louis Garneau gear and my smart phone to track my rides.  But it reflects how it's all been a gradual growth and evolution, moving from the first basic bike to a hybrid bike that kept up with me better and allowed me to continue to strengthen my skills and body. More roads became possible and less scary, and then the clipless pedals.  I began meeting my family at further locales as they began to also join me as the girls got older.  Biking became more and more integral to who I was and what we were doing as a family.
  And then came the road bike, not a replacement but an addition.  And it opened more roads and longer rides to me that the hybrid just wasn't that well equipped for with it's sturdier, and heavier, frame (it's still great for family rides with the tag-a-long attached!).  Setting out for hours on the bike no longer meant a quick ride to the paths and back but to the next city and back, truly cycling along the front range, making me finally ready to call myself a cyclist.  I even had the chance to discover I really don't like group rides.  My rides are for myself, and I can stop whenever I like, though I also came to realize that I need to stop the frequent breaks if I was going to increase my endurance.
   The floods of 2013 were a major setback with roads and bridges out all along my main routes.  My main routes had to shift.  It made me more flexible, but it also began the winters that have been more challenging to get out on the bike with bitter cold and biting winds.  Forced to look for other alternatives, biking went inside on the trainer, which isn't nearly as freeing and fun.
   And now my life now includes regular visits to the recreation center (I would never have thought that would be something I'd enjoy!).  Joining this January and using their equipment (which, yes, includes the stationary bikes), I was able to begin the cycling season not so physically unfit from the winter's time cooped up inside.  In fact, I was able to start out at a higher level and just keep growing.     Five years later, my wife and I are consciously watching our diet, so I have dropped down to almost 160 pounds.  So, facing five years on the bike (with some other life changes) and being 41, I'm back to my college weight and jean size.  Ironically because the bike is what got me to this point, some of my bike gear doesn't fit quite as well as it used to!  The recent blood tests from my yearly physical show all my vital numbers in the healthy range (I've struggled in the past with my triglycerides and good cholesterol).  I feel better and am generally happier.
   So what next?  Continue to increase my endurance with higher average speeds and less stopping as I set out on longer rides.  To celebrate the past five years, I did a two-day century over two different rides from Friday (7/8) to Saturday (7/9).  On Friday, I went about 61 miles, then yesterday I went 46 more miles, so about 107 miles over the two days.  Of course, I realized after the fact that Friday's ride was almost a metric century!  It's amazing to me to think back to when just a mile about killed me and then when it became a goal to just reach 50 (and eventually 100) miles in a week!
   So I find myself, yet again, moving beyond the capabilities of the current bike and looking toward the need to get a new one but also continuing to enjoy the wonderful insanity of cycling.