woosh

That’s the sound this weekend made as it was rushing by ….

But it was a good weekend. Since most of my blog follwers either write or follow the rest of the biker blogs in southeast michigan, I’m not going to go into too much BOW clinic detail. I’ll say this though – in 2003, I went to the BOW clinic as a participant. I was nervous and had no idea what to expect. I’d had a small amount of singletrack under my belt, and a whopping 2-3 rides on clipless pedals. I took the challenge and rode with the intermediate group and my life has never been the same since.

Its hard for me to believe that only 3 years later, the tables are turned and I’m now the ‘experienced’ instructor. I was somehow shyly embarrased whenever one of our group asked “so, how long have you been riding?”. Heh. I still think of myself as a beginner.

Aside from my own insecurities, the day was fantastic. We couldn’t have asked for better weather and the attitudes and determination of the participants was just amazing. And the ear-to-ear smiles at the end of the ride is an incredible reward for a day of volunteering.

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Saturday night was spent chilling out and getting ready to ‘man the MMBA table’ at the REI garage sale on Sunday morning. We didn’t sell any jerseys or memberships on Sunday, but we gave out quit a few flyers. We might even have one or two more participants on our Wed night rides!

The garage sale itself was its own ordeal. There’s some good deals on returned items, display items, defect items, etc.. IF you can elbow your way through the crowds and grab whatever you can carry before everyone else does. We managed to sneak out with a couple of Thule wheel holders for 1/2 their normal price, so it wasn’t all bad.

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After the garage sale, we headed out to the shop for a ride with Mike and John after closing. The original plan was to park at Maybury, ride out to ILRA and do a lap, ride back to Maybury for a lap and go home. We were looking for 2/5 – 3 hours of riding, and it was a bit of a hike to ILRA from Maybury, so when we got to ILRA, we only rode the second (easier) 1/2 of the yellow loop before heading back to Maybury. We ended up with ~35 miles without any Maybury singletrack. When looking at the data last night, I felt alot better about slowing down as much as I did on the way back. When we first got to ILRA, my average speed was 13.8 mph; but when we got back to Maybury, my average speed had dropped to 12.5 mph. As it turns out, we were slightly downhill all the way out to ILRA, causing us to be slightly uphill all the way back. And on the way back, I bonked. Harder than I ever have before. LUCKILY, though, I didn’t severely bonk until we were in the driveway of the Maybury parking lot. As soon as we hit that driveway, I felt dizzy and nauseous. I’d sucked down about 3/4 of a flask of hammergel during the ride, but it was just not enough. Thankfully, John had brought along some enduralytes, which helped keep the cramps in my legs at bay for the last 7 or 8 miles. If I’d had a luna bar or something similar at ILRA, I think I might have been better off. Good thing this season is all about learning 🙂 So, a bottle of gatorade, 1/2 a bag of kettle cooked chips and a payday later, I was feeling much better. All in all, a very good ride. I think I held it together pretty well even though I was running out of steam at the end. Today, just about every muscle in my body hurts. And that’s a good feeling 😀

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Alex finished school last week and came home this weekend. He dropped a bunch of stuff on Saturday night and came back for the duration last night. It was our first chance to really spend some time with him talking about school and got a good recap of his 9 months away. Sounds like he’s really happy with the experience and education he received, and would definitely recommend the school to others. He just wasn’t too keen on the micro-managing/babysitting kind of rules that seemed to pop up all over.He’s applied to several jobs in the area, and luckily, we live in a good place where most of the jobs he applied to, he can walk to. The poor kid just graduated from an elite automotive training program, ownes 4 cars – not one of which actually runs. Hopefully he can get a job and bring in some cash so that he can get at least one of them back on the road. It’ll really suck to be stranded for too long … blech …

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A very good weekend overall. Not quite as restful as I would have liked, but as my grandfather always said “i’ll rest when i’m dead” … heh .. sounds good on paper, doesn’t it?

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