Sunday, September 24, 2006

Training wheels are HISTORY

Last night I got a text from Bike Expert Friend, asking if wanted to ride with her today. I knew it would be a bit of a mess to fit in, but I REAALLY wanted to. There was just one problem- in the two weeks or so that I've had the new bike, I haven't had a chance to ride with cleats- I've only done one outdoor ride since then, and since we were going out to the Wairarapa yesterday, I didn't want to be farting around with the cleats in the morning. So today we met at a local carpark for me to practice. And I was FINE! I was freaked out at first, snapped at Phil and tried not to cry and give up. So we headed out on the road. It was VERY windy (well, around 50 km/h) and we were on the coast, but I was ok with going slow. My computer and my bike were having some communication issues, and I was riding without numbers on the handlebars for the first time, so I was set free from numbers. We came back through the evil suburb -in hindsight I'm glad we did - and I practiced traffic lights. There were a couple of teeny stuff ups in the traffic, but I handled them well. And the time I panicked and nearly fell I did manage to unclip in time. Bike Expert Friend was impressed with my clip-virginity loss and I'm feeling quite happy with myself.

The weekend has been good. As I said, we went out to the Wairarapa yesterday. It's wine country and yesterday was hot and gorgeous. I had more of those torrid bike fantasies, both going over the mountains to get there and driving through the country streets past the vineyards and the paddocks. We had brunch, shopped in cute boutiques, bought salami and fresh bread. Yum. We had my dad and stepmother for brunch today. I overdid it on the cinnamon buns and felt kinda carbed out until about 3:30. Yeah, there's a reason I've got love handles. Speaking of which, I've cheated a couple of times and looked at the scale. It ain't pretty (between 138 and 140. High scary body fat too.) I won't cheat again (I think...) Hopefully I'll be back where I like to be by November sometime.

Anyway, time for my favourite two hours- Sunday swimmin'!!

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