September 2000

Fortitude, perseverance, or just plain stupidity?

Since we last spoke, I’ve been really trying to get into good shape. My routine includes a 6-11 mile bike ride daily. It also includes 45 minutes with weights and 45 minutes on a cardio machine (or my mountain bike) on Mondays, Wednesdays and Saturdays. On top of that, I ride my mountain bike as much as I can. Unfortunately, that seems to be a big part of the problem.

2000 Kona NUNU

You see, I really I haven’t been much into bicycles since high school. After getting a little bored with the usual cardio workout, I decided to give mountain biking a try. I had an old, cheap, heavy department store bike that convinced me that pedaling was hell. After checking out some of the newer bikes, I ended up getting a nice new Kona hardtail. I had no idea how much fun a bicycle could be.

Now, on to the problem -- as much fun as I have doing it, apparently, I really suck at it. About a month ago, while attacking a single-track downhill, I went over the bars. Wearing nothing but shorts, a t-shirt, and a helmet, I donated a bunch of flesh to the hillside. I scraped skin off of both of my knees, my left thigh, my chest, and my left forearm. This interfered with my workout schedule for a couple weeks.

My daughter revels in my wound

I just recently had my RMX 250 throw me off a cliff. This was another incident that interrupted my workout regime. Due to the current state of my left ankle, I had to bail on our annual trip to the Rubicon that was scheduled for this weekend. However, now that I’m finally off of the crutches and have taken the splint off, I thought what better way to start building the ankle back up than to go for a bike ride. Well, I did it again! While riding along a single-track hillside trail, I fell over on the long side. After flipping and rolling for a while, I ended up in the bottom of a concrete irrigation ditch. This time I lost a chunk of flesh on my left arm and elbow and scraped my back up pretty well. I also have added to my significant bruise collection. Not to mention that I certainly didn’t do any favors for my ankle. For those of you considering using clip-less pedals, practice your panic-get-off technique a lot (over and over again) before hitting the single track.

Based on my last couple rides, both on my dirt bike and my mountain bike, I feel that I’m stuck in a deep quagmire of really bad Karma. My first thought is to avoid riding anything until I’ve waded through it. However, upon deeper reflection I think I’ll just ride through it . . .

"High Sides" by Ev'Mon