OK, the 2024 Lumber Through Hell Tour is temporarily on hold while I let my foot heal from whatever is wrong with it.
I’m not happy about that, but as luck and hard work with the O.G. Mindbender would have it, I know I have choices and options, and one of those options is riding my gahdamn bike
While I’ve already got out once this year for a short ride—my first ride in over two years—I had no real plans to commit to riding more. Until now.
My first ride back in mid-April was a short, flat, out-and-back 11-mile ride from the house. But today, my plan is to start from one of my Dirt Road Launching Pads west of town and ease my nuggets into 15 to 20-mile rides so as not to find ANOTHER way to hurt myself before gradually increasing my mileage to the 25-30-mile range.
I’m not going to lie; my stomach is fluttering with nervous energy, my coffee-fueled stomach has the first-floor bathroom smelling (and looking) like a truck stop men’s room along I-70 in Flagler, Colorado, and I’m certain that I will forget some article of cycling accouterment. All to do something that I have loved and done my entire adult life but somehow found myself shunning in recent years for a variety of reasons, both real and perceived. And I haven’t even started looking for what I’m going to wear!! DAMN, IT!!
To Be Continued.
WE BACK!
Another ride in the digital books as I continue to creep my way back into cycling. Today I did a 15.5-mile ride from a riverside Dirt Road Launching Pad west of town, and I have to say, it was damn nice to be out burning some beer calories without my foot throbbing and my teeth grinding.
I did a loop that looks oddly like the state of Tennessee, took a few pics, and realized that while I dig riding the Stache on dirt roads, I want Mr. Burgundy back betweenst my legs (not like that) and need to get it off the trainer, and down to the shop for Stans and a couple other things.
I was also right about forgetting shit, but it was not as bad as it could have been. Leaving my phone in the car and THINKING I left my Garmin bike computer at home, only to find it in my bike box when I returned to Escape II.
Thankfully, I was using my watch anyway and had no need for my phone. Lucky, though, because if I had a catastrophic bike fail, a long walk back to the car in bike shoes would NOT have been the best thing for my ailing foot.
After three days of nothing, it was great to be back doing stuff and taking snapshots along the way.
Later.