I..... WEEENNNT........

BIKING !!!!!

Saturday after my 4-mile race, I felt great. The weather was nice. I started thinking, I should clean up my bike and start biking when March comes. I went out again and thought, boy, it feels good out here --- I'm going biking TODAY!!



They say you don't forget how to ride a bike, but I had to rewire some brain circuits to remember which levers worked which gears which direction.


I rode 17 miles, about an hour and 10 minutes. Tights, thin tech shirt, longsleeved t-shirt, nylon wind shirt, bike gloves with regular gloves underneath, earmuffs, helmet. On the return trip into the wind, the cold whistled into my helmet vents and gave me an ice-cream headache, but other than that I was not cold. Temp was 45*F, wind about 10mph.


This was the first time I have even had the remotest desire to get on my bike since IMFL. And it wasn't remote desire.... it was very present and very strong. I WANTED TO RIDE MY BIKE!

I've got a new saddle, a Serfa Tri-W Women's. I needed one last fall. I saw this one in the Local Bike Shop, and pondered the risks and benefits of doing IMFL with a saddle I wasn't used to, or on one that was worn out and giving me pain. I used the old one.

Then my mother conspired by phone with my husband to get me a gift card to the LBS for Christmas, and this is what I got, putting it in layaway with her gift and bailing it out later with part of a paycheck. I thought at the time, hmm, I must be thinking about getting back on my bike sometime.

Also during this winter, I took a 3-session class in bike-maintenance and repair at the same LBS (just $5 a session, a steal!) and thought... I must be thinking about getting back on my bike sometime.

I didn't expect "sometime" to hit so suddenly, so strongly, and so irresistably. In fact, I wanted to go again today, but I worked all morning, work again starting at 5, and had to do laundry in between, bummer. I took Journey for a short mile-long jog instead. Tomorrow is supposed to be even nicer, but I'm scheduled for upping my "long" run to 9 miles.

TriSaraTops posted today about the new swimsuit she got from SwimOutlet.com, and I went to the site and thought, maybe this payday..... Does that mean I might be thinking about getting back in the water sometime? Or just that I need bodysuits to wear running and biking, and they ruined my favorite Catalina ones by "improving" them with bulky foam bra cups?

Either way.... I need a new swimsuit for all purposes. I cleaned out clutter this winter and THREW OUT my tri-swimsuits with bike-padding. I expect to do tri's again, and may even do another Ironman to celebrate the year I turn 60 (5 years from now), but in the meantime I have PISD (Post Ironman Stress Disorder) and have no triathlons on my docket.

I'm scheduling a weekly bike ride into my training now as cross-training. And because I want to again, finally.