There’s nothing like going for a bike ride but in my mind a close second is planning for a ride with a route that I’ve never been on before and staging all of my gear in preparation for the journey.
Training season is in full force now for the Seattle to Portland double century so my training rides are starting to get ridiculously long. Being that they are so long every second of the wee hours of the morning are critical. So, I took a page out of the firefighters play book and started meticulously staging my cycle gear so I could throw it all on in a matter of seconds to get out the door. It kind of makes me feel like I should slide down a fire pole before I slip into my cycling gear in the mornings. A NASCAR pit crew would be jealous of my clothing application efficiency.
Here’s the drill for a Saturday morning ride.
Alarm goes off a 4:30 am
- Have a full fledged argument with myself…
Self: What was I thinking….
Self: Why am I awake this early on a Saturday….
Self: Maybe the rain is coming down in biblical proportions in which case I would be forced to sleep in…..
Self: OK Mike, roll your rear end out of bed. You’ll be glad you got up in a couple of hours
- Finally stumble out of bed and look for a monsoon out the window
- No luck
- Stumble to the bathroom where my cycling gear is staged
- Jump into my cycling gear in 9.2 seconds and apply all applicable lotions and creams. (if you ride you know what I’m talking about, if not you don’t want to know)
- Eat a bowl of granola while checking my fantasy baseball team – grumble because my team sucks.
- Brush teeth
- Kiss Jenny goodbye
- Push off for another great training ride/adventure
I love this time of year.
