Friday, January 13, 2012

Kudos

Since work kept me from Hawk Hill yesterday, I went by myself this morning. Normally, my times on Hawk Hill suffer when I'm not chasing the hummingbirds. It's the absence of that competerone that I mentioned on Monday. Turns out, I've found another motivation.

Strava. That's the website that publishes and analyzes my times up Hawk Hill and everywhere else for that dedicated niche audience of Bay Area bikers to see. Thanks to Baleen, who got me the Garmin that stores the data to get uploaded to Strava, I spend a little more time than I should on that site, looking at my times and comparing them to others'. But that means that others do, too.

So sometime around 6.45am, the internal conversation went a little like this, If you're going to get up at 6am for a bike ride, might as well ride like hell. So I did, for a bit, and when I felt like slowing, the conversation went like this, It's not just you who will know that you slowed, but that dedictaed niche audience of eight other bikers who follow your times and you theirs. So with that, I kept on going, getting my fastest time yet on the final 2/10ths of a mile, the most painful part for no other reason than it's the end, and crossed the line with my second fastest time ever, one second off last week's PR. Hot bananas.



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