A lesson on humility and keeping up with my schedule

So today I had the bright idea of heading downtown to Jack and Adam’s and join the shop ride. They’ve been having daily rides during the Tour de France and every day the shop ride mimics the terrain for that day’s stage (i.e. flat ride for flat stages, hilly rides for “medium mountain” stages, big hills on Pyrenees and Alps stages).

I thought, well, the ride is hilly, and my schedule calls for a hilly workout, so.... why not go check it out. I got there early and started talking with some of the other riders. They were discussing how some of the riders like to speed it up the whole time and how they don’t slow down even in the inclines and how they had averaged 20mph in previous mountain stages. Hmm, maybe this is not my kind of ride. But, since I was already there I decided to give it a try.

The first 10 minutes of flat riding were fast, but I was able to keep up, so I naively thought that maybe, just maybe I would be able to do it. Ehm, no! At the first sight of a hill, not even a mountain, I absolutely knew I was not going to make it. I decided there and then -12 minutes into the ride- to go back the same way I had come. One of the other riders had a mechanical (his chain broke) so he was also turning back. I offered to go get my car and give him a ride back to the shop, but he declined saying he was going to do some barefoot running on the trail. (WTF! but, hey, it’s a free country.)

As I was hauling back my sorry, slow butt to the car, feeling stupid for even considering that I could ride with the cool guys, I remembered there is a cross street going back Barton Springs Rd that has a somewhat steep hill going up to the Barton Hills neighborhood. Miguel and I had parked there not too long ago and I remembered it being quite a hike on foot. So, since crazy-let’s-go-run-barefoot-at-the-trail guy didn’t need a ride back, and since I was already downtown ready for a hilly workout I decided to turn into the hill to check it out. Once I was at the top, I decided to continue riding through the neighborhood streets, taking every opportunity I could to go up the hills. And so I kept riding, street after street of this unknown neighborhood, hill after hill on this impromptu ride.

I ended up riding for an hour and not feeling sorry for myself anymore. I might not be fast or powerful enough to go out with the good guys, I might never be, but I’ll keep riding, taking every mount-- I mean, hill I can at my own pace.