It's not about the bike

Lance was right, it’s not at all about the bike. I laugh when I’m on a ride and find myself thinking about how I love my bike. Actually it’s that I now cherish each and every ride for how alive it makes me feel. It’s really the riding that I love. Just last night I finished reading “It’s All About the Bike” by Robert Penn and he wouldn’t agree at all. How nice would it be if people could learn to value the little things, like bike riding, without having to gain that perspective through life changing experiences such as cancer?

And with that said boy was I humbled on the bike this past weekend.

I have become a bit bored with my local flat route and so I gathered the Mentschen for a similarly short ride at Washington’s Crossing on Sunday morning. That was mistake #1 (the rolling hills shouldn’t have been poo-poo’d. Yes, I was a bit cocky). Mistake #2 was that Amy was going to join me to do this ride on the tandem (the tandem is not even close to the ease of riding my single bike). Long story short is that we got 6 miles out and I was totally fried. Trying to go further made no sense and we were able to turn it back around and got back to the park with little trouble. In 2008/2009 I made a similar mistake when I was in treatment and also thought with my heart and not with my head. Luckily I didn’t mess up Gary, Stephanie, Doreen, and Grace too much as they were able to head back out after accompanying Amy and I back to the park.

Yesterday was a terrific weather day and so I headed out for my flat ride here at home. Stubborn much? I got about halfway into the 27-mile route and started to feel my gas tank nearing empty. I finished the route nice and slow which in itself wasn’t so terrible because really I just wanted to ride and clear my head. But clearly something is up. Next Tuesday when my blood counts are checked pre-treatment I’ll be asking some questions to see if anything shows up there. It could also be that 11 treatments into 2011 that chemo is starting to catch up with me. That would be the simple explanation.

Thanks to all that have donated so generously to my LiveSTRONG fundraising. I’m over $3,700 raised and the Mentschen team total is now over $12,500! Not too shabby. Donations can be made on my fundraising page by clicking here.