Sanity lives somewhere between hopes and fears. Waking up Sunday morning, I hoped that my first actual ride in 3 months and 2 days, 3 months to the day after surgery (but who's counting) would be relatively similar to what I was doing before the shit hit the fan. I feared that it would be a total fiasco. What happened was - drumroll, please - somewhere between the two.
Spinning bikes must have really short crank arms because getting over the top of my stroke on my bike was difficult at first. Position differences between a spinning bike and my bike made the whole experience a little wobbly at first, but I got the hang of things quickly enough and soon wasn't in any real danger of just drifting off. Pedaling stayed a bit strange the whole time. All in all my first ride on a real bike felt a lot like my first ride on a spinning bike did a month ago. Standing, which I've gotten proficient at in the gym (10 minute standing climb intervals are not a big problem) was a bit problematic. Not horrible, but not automatic either - there was a definite hitch in my stroke.
Just riding along seemed okay. There were times when I felt completely normal and times when I, in the words of a guy on the ride, was "crawling all over the bike." Not surprising, but a bit disappointing because normally my upper body is very quiet when I ride. Starting from a stop sucked. Climbing pretty much sucked. Normally, when someone accelerates all I have to do is give a good hard stomp and I'm right there. Yesterday it took quite a bit more thought and action to keep with the accelerations. A couple of times I thought I was going to get dropped, which would have been absolutely tragic.
I also spent last week battling through a nasty head cold, which didn't help things. Normally I am something of a heavy expectorator on rides. Yesterday I was an historic expectorator. Whatever. When I ride I fully expect to be slimed by others and myself.
Moral of the story is that things were probably about how they should have gone. Initial feedback entering surgery was that I would just be able to bear weight right about now. As it is, I've been walking more and more on my own power over the last three weeks and now I can pretty well walk unassisted over reasonable distances. Sometimes I limp badly, sometimes not at all. That part of the equation is better than hoped. There's a lot of work to do on getting leg strength back but the work I've done over the last month plus gives me a good start. It's going fine.
New bartape under any circumstances is a treat. The new Fizik fuzzy tape is WAY better than hoped. It's like having your bars wrapped in very soft suede - vat izh that, velvet? Went with the black, which is better than my standard white for fall and winter.
If I am going to be anything better than meat for the Lost River trip in October I am going to have to be very disciplined.
1 comment:
Luckily for you it is still 7 months until racing season begins. And that is when it begins. So you will probably be good by then if you are making some progress on the bike. The starting up always sucks even when you are not coming off an injury. Good to hear that you are able to get back to "life." Hope you keep progressing. I need a familiar face in the 4's next year.
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