It's All Winding Down Just As I'm Finally Winding Up.
The weather has been pretty much great for the past week, although the cooler temperatures hint that the road season could come to a crashing halt at any moment. I've been enjoying the fall riding, trying to squeeze in as many hours in the saddle as I can while still keeping the wife from going to DEFCON 5. It just makes the time I do have on the bike all that much more special. I haven't viewed my riding time that way this year. I've spent a considerable amount of time being disgusted at myself, because my goals and form were not aligning as I would have liked.
Some people would say I obsess too much about numbers or performance, and by their standards I probably do. They would insist that I'm doing it "wrong", and that I'm failing to get the most out of the cycling experience by devoting time and resources to succeed in races that nobody cares about. I should spend more time cruising around on a 50lb Dutch city bike, stopping at coffee houses every 300 yards. Then, and only then, would I attain any sort of semblance of comprehension of what it is to be a true cyclist.
All I can say is that very little of what they consider the essence of cycling appeals to me. I am a competitive person. I know that I don't have what it takes to be the best, but I still like to find some measure of success in whatever niche I can carve out for myself. Sometimes being the big fish in a small pond is a nice thing. Even when I'm not the alpha male in the group, I still like being able to hold up my end of the bargain. That's the way I'm built.
The last week has been great for my morale, after a season of blah. I needed that. I'm going to keep plugging away until the snow and ice chase me back into the garage for another winter of watching DVDs and dreaming. Maybe I'll come out of the man-cave in the spring ready to rip the legs off of the competition. Maybe not. Either way, I'll keep plugging away at it, because that's how I'm built.
I was built to do it wrong.
Some people would say I obsess too much about numbers or performance, and by their standards I probably do. They would insist that I'm doing it "wrong", and that I'm failing to get the most out of the cycling experience by devoting time and resources to succeed in races that nobody cares about. I should spend more time cruising around on a 50lb Dutch city bike, stopping at coffee houses every 300 yards. Then, and only then, would I attain any sort of semblance of comprehension of what it is to be a true cyclist.
All I can say is that very little of what they consider the essence of cycling appeals to me. I am a competitive person. I know that I don't have what it takes to be the best, but I still like to find some measure of success in whatever niche I can carve out for myself. Sometimes being the big fish in a small pond is a nice thing. Even when I'm not the alpha male in the group, I still like being able to hold up my end of the bargain. That's the way I'm built.
The last week has been great for my morale, after a season of blah. I needed that. I'm going to keep plugging away until the snow and ice chase me back into the garage for another winter of watching DVDs and dreaming. Maybe I'll come out of the man-cave in the spring ready to rip the legs off of the competition. Maybe not. Either way, I'll keep plugging away at it, because that's how I'm built.
I was built to do it wrong.
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