Day 122.....FLYING!!!!

When I was a kid I LOVED riding my bike.  I rode it everywhere.  I was my sole survival skill when my family moved 5.2 miles away from the house I grew up in.  I had just finished 6th grade at St. Martha's and Janet Faraci was my best friend.  I would jump on my bike and ride back to her house every chance I got.  I remember flying down Waukegan Road to Church St.  I would make it in less than ten minutes.  I always felt so free when I was riding my bike.

So naturally, when I started training for this, I assumed the bike riding would be...well, just like riding a bike.  It would all come back and I would be riding like the wind.  Wrong.  As mentioned in previous posts, I struggled.  Of course riding on flat tires did not help, but still.  It was not the flying feeling of my youth.  I thought perhaps it was typical of just not realizing your aging, so I asked my brother,

"Tommy, have you ever tried, as an adult, to go back to something that you loved as a kid and were really good at, and found out it wasn't easy at all"?

"No".

Asshole.  Of course the fact that he's remained athletic and continues to work out everyday may have something to do with it.  Still.

So today, for the first time, I combined two different events.  I went to the neighborhood pool (had not been there since I was 11) and swam 32 lengths, which was about a half mile.  In the spirit of full disclosure, I do not want you to think that I did 32 continuous freestyle laps.  I never stopped moving, but there was a lot of water being tread, breast stroke and something very close to dog paddling, involved.  It took 40 minutes, which frankly I was thrilled about.  Then I was momentarily REALLY excited because I thought the swim part of the race was only a quarter mile and I was actually over prepared! Then I went on line and rechecked.  Wrong. A half mile swim.  Now, I'm back to just plain prepared.

 I got on my bike and rode about 4 miles home.  It did not start out well.  I was crossing Lake Ave, a VERY busy road.  And I was crossing at the light, so four lanes of traffic have all stopped to allow me to cross.  When I first started training, I walked my bike across the intersection, but now I'm much better at hopping (not sure hopping is totally truthful) on and off, so I ride across.  Should have stuck with walking.  The light turns green, the little green walking person lights up, the beeps for the blind start and I push off.  As I go to sit back, I can't get on the seat.  It appears my bike shorts were a little droopy and when I would go to sit, the pointy part of the bike seat would get stuck in the material between my butt and the bike padding.  So, I'm stuck in a perpetual half standing position in the middle of Lake Ave.  The days of my riding my bike standing up are long gone.  I had to stop.  Restart and push up extra high so the bike pad cleared the seat.  I do not want to EVEN imagine what that looked like.

However, the good news is, I got my biking groove back!  Somehow, I finally found the right gear (3 on the left and around 4 or 5 on the right) and I was zipping along.  Just like when I was a kid!

FLYING!!!!!!