I always watch other people ride and think “I wish I could be on my bike right now.” I’ve never watched people run and thought “I would love a great jog right about now.”
Maybe I just don’t run enough — and I thought about a run tonight, but I was too spent from my brief little bike ride. Maybe I haven’t jogged enough in the aggregate. Either way, the run is never is good as the ride. The road looks different, moves differently and feels different in every way.
(I’d never see the curves that way on foot.)
Maybe a good run just doesn’t teach me as many things as even a mediocre ride.
I dropped three riders on my first hill of the day. So I can be capable enough in my weakest part of the ride, if I know when to do it. I’m a fairly instinctive attacker. It felt great to swing out from that little group and go over them. I have something almost approaching a decent uphill sprint. I can be strong, in short bursts, even if I haven’t been using my legs recently. And it feels good to fly up a hill, to get to the top, look back and not see anyone there.
I struggled with my pedals, again, and had to stop to straighten the cleat in my shoe, again. So that means finding a parking lot, stopping, pulling out the multitool, taking off the shoe and tightening the screws. I think I learned why I got these shoes for a song. Those three people never did catch up. I must have dropped them hard. Unless they turned. But I take the optimistic view about these things on the bike.
I rode up and down my favorite parking deck, practicing the 180-degree turns at both ends. I probably enjoy that too much, the incline isn’t too bad and there’s all that descending to do.
I passed two other cyclists, but one of them was a kid on a sidewalk. Also, I apparently now own the top spot in one of the local sprint segments. This was all supposed to be a slow and easy ride, but my fast is so slow, I’ve learned, that I can’t tell a difference.
I did not run. There was nothing to learn from it. Maybe tomorrow evening.
