I bonked around 2.30pm on Saturday's club ride. It was 62 miles and 5,500 feet into the ride, 8 miles and 500 feet short of where I wanted to be. Not being pregnant, it's been months since I've felt anything more painful than bonking. Maybe years. When it happens, gone are the fantastical thoughts that sometimes carry me up the hills, that maybe, just maybe, had I grown up here or in Ghent, and gotten a few breaks, I could have been a journeyman pro, maybe even being the bottom domestique for one of the Grand Tours. But as people in tennis shoes and baggy shorts pass me, all I can think about is getting off the bike. But even those thoughts can't last forever. When I get sick of thinking about that, I think about Baleen.
In the summer of 2009, two days before we got engaged, Baleen and I and a few hundred other bikers were in a parking lot at the University of Washington. The good Dr Ladra had dropped us off there early that Friday morning and a sag wagon took our bags to a dorm in Bellingham, 102 miles away. It was less than a year since Baleen had thrown her leg over a real bike for the first time in Sports Basement and she'd definitely ridden less than a thousand miles in that time.
Our last training ride had been 75 miles up near Point Reyes. I figured the adrenaline, the group and the rest stops every twenty miles would be enough to carry her through those final 27 miles. And while I was right, technically, in that she pedaled through those extra miles, I didn't realize how painful they would be. So about 2.45 on Saturday, when I was sick of thinking that I needed to get off the bike when I'd still be on it for at least another 45 minutes, I thought of Baleen pushing up that last hill into Bellingham. It didn't make my legs feel any better, but it made me a whole lot happier.
In the summer of 2009, two days before we got engaged, Baleen and I and a few hundred other bikers were in a parking lot at the University of Washington. The good Dr Ladra had dropped us off there early that Friday morning and a sag wagon took our bags to a dorm in Bellingham, 102 miles away. It was less than a year since Baleen had thrown her leg over a real bike for the first time in Sports Basement and she'd definitely ridden less than a thousand miles in that time.
Our last training ride had been 75 miles up near Point Reyes. I figured the adrenaline, the group and the rest stops every twenty miles would be enough to carry her through those final 27 miles. And while I was right, technically, in that she pedaled through those extra miles, I didn't realize how painful they would be. So about 2.45 on Saturday, when I was sick of thinking that I needed to get off the bike when I'd still be on it for at least another 45 minutes, I thought of Baleen pushing up that last hill into Bellingham. It didn't make my legs feel any better, but it made me a whole lot happier.
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