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| Mile 95! |
My adventure
into biking in general came when I tore my knee
back in Dec 2007. I mean really? Numerous sports all my life and I do it
in a flag football game with da boys from work at almost age 30. At
the time it was devastating. Several of my friends and athletes when I
coached went through this. I knew the pain and discipline it took in
rehab if I ever wanted to be active like I once was. After the first few
excruciating months I was eventually able to jog and the doc said
road biking would be something I may want to look into. I looked into
it, decided I can't stand jogging, bought a road bike, and
made a goal to do the Tour de Tucson 110 miler in November of 2008 (I
know, I know…roadie ha)
Life
handed me some sour lemons there for a while after the Tour and I
became unmotivated only riding here and there for a couple of years. I
slowly became sedentary, oinked out, partied, and got a bit chubby.
During this rough patch I moved to Tucson. Little did I know the famous
Fantasy Island trail network was almost in my backyard. One day I drove
by and saw some people head into this area (Valencia trail head) with
bikes. It was funny because I had just made some workout goals to help
me out of the dumps and bought what I thought was a badass $200 Diamond
back mountain bike from Sports Authority to help kick start reaching my
exercise goals.
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| My 2nd time trying this. I used to walk it. |
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| One of my 1st rides w/the Tucson MTB Addicts - CHUBBY! |
I immediately went home and headed to Fantasy with my
bike. I never had been on singletrack before. I didn’t know where I was
going
or what I was doing but I was having a blast. I don't even think I had a
helmet or gloves at the time. YIKES! I now know that I
did some of it backwards and ended up lost cutting across the desert and
ran into what we know as the fenceline. I followed that praying it led
me to my car. Wrecking a couple times and my asthma acting up prompted
me to find people to ride with to be safer. I found SAMBA (Southern
Arizona Mountain Bike Association) online. That poor Diamond Back was
destroyed after a few rides, so I went out and bought a full suspension
GT that was two sizes too small, but whatever, I didn't know the
difference and thought it was 20x better than what I had.
For
a couple months I rode with SAMBA and even a couple times with the
Tucson MTB Addicts. I crossed Scott's path out there at Fantasy one day
and he said he was making a riding club on Facebook. Cool, more people
to ride with! It's now a huge hit with over 500 members.
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| My 1st Milli Run w/the SAMBA Crew |
Wouldn't you know that work would send me out on a
ton of trips in a row just as I'm starting to get better and used to it.
At the time I wasn't into it so much to splurge and rent a bike or keep
riding during my trips. Excited to get back, I caught a strange virus.
Soon after I got strep, then broncitis, then pneumonia, then some more
minor colds and such. It just never ended. This triggered my asthma like
no other and I could barely walk at times without breathing heavily.
Two weeks of being sick turned to a month, turned to two months, turned
to four. I missed riding and tried to go out but had an asthma attack
out on the trail. I wasn't recovered enough I guess. It scared me to not
do anything for another couple of months. FINALLY, I felt better and
reunited with SAMBA around June 2011.
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| One of my 1st rides back from being sick a long time - 50 yr |
Now from June 2011 to Feb 2012 rides were more for comradery and justifying eating 4 carne
asada burritos and having 10 beers after. Hey I
worked out, so I can have this, right? Last year SAMBA entered a team into this race called
the 24 Hrs in the Old Pueblo and I decided to go cheer them on and volunteer. I
had never been to a mountain bike race before.
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| Kathy and I - 1st Brown Mtn Run w/SAMBA |
When I got there I was overwhelmed. I had no clue
this sport was
so huge. Talk about epiphanies. As I was in the tent taking lap times, I
noticed these amazing riders of all ages. 60 yr old riders coming in
posting faster times than 20 yr olds. The majority of the solo riders
were in their upper 30s, 40s, even 50s. Huh, interesting.
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| Getting better and more brave! - 50 yr |
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| Weeee! - 50 yr (I didn't die on this btw) |
I had been going through that “I’m a has been
athlete” stage for
a while. I had this ridiculous notion that being an athlete ended with
college or after my post college injuries. It depressed me. Sports
weren't something I just did but they defined me. You don't just wake up
one day not athletic anymore.
I felt
pressured to move on like "I guess it’s time to settle down, make lots
of money, have babies, be
what everyone wants me to be. Time to fit into the box, forget that
athlete in me." But at that very moment in the 24hr tent I asked myself,
why? Look at all these awesome competitors of all ages able to bike
circles around me. They have families, kids, some grandkids, jobs, and
they are rocking it out there. Why do I have to stop being athletic and
competitive?
So what if I'm 34. Doesn’t have to be basketball, track, or whatever.
I’m pretty good catching on
to sports, why not this one? And I have an advantage, I know what it
takes to be at a high level of competition and I have a degree in
exercise science. I can be my own coach! There is just no excuse anymore
for sitting on my ass, moping around feeling sorry for myself. And in
an instant my competitive nature, my determination, my definition of
myself came
back to me.
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| Learning. Kathy helped me tackle this! Thank you! |
And so it began…
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| My 1st Molino/Milli Run - HARD! |
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