Day one.
Collected my new bike today from the shop. It's part of the government approved Bike to Work scheme which lets you buy a bike and associated equipment out of your pre-tax salary up to a value of €1000, saving up to 50+%, depending on your tax bracket. More info: http://www.bikescheme.ie/ Not having had any recent experience of bike buying, I was a little surprised when, rather than asking how much I wanted to spend, or how many bikes I wanted for my €1000, the more usual question was, "would you rather keep it at/under the thousand for the bike and gear?" I could tell I was already getting out of my depth!
A little history: My last experience of regular cycling was in and out of work and Bolton St. while I was serving my apprenticeship as a fitter. I can't tell you a thing about the bike. Who made it, where it came from or where it went to but it was silver and at the time it was modern enough because it had front and rear derailleurs, which were operated by levers ergonomically placed between your knees. 10 gears in total. Who could ever need more? First gear felt like the chain had come off and tenth felt like it had seized. The eight in between were useful enough and got me to college and work, quicker and cheaper than the bus ever could.
Back to the present. Thank you to Stagg Cycles in Lucan and Andy in particular for holding my hand through the whole selection process, not making me feel like an idiot for not knowing which crankset I wanted or which accessories were needed. I was a blank canvas and it's a credit to them that I didn't leave with a bike and a separate carload of accoutrements and an empty chequebook!
What I did leave with was a bike, a Trek 1.2. A vision in white and blue, it looks the part until I get on it. There is a big problem with the engine but more on that later. I also got a little bag that hangs under the saddle, containing a spare tube, puncture repair kit, tyre levers and tool kit. I got two locks. A serious U lock that at some point is going to mean the death of whatever I lock the bike to, and a handier cable lock for out and about style popping in to the shops for an energy bar and an electrolyte drink. As if!
The shorts, in conjunction with the saddle, deserve a paragraph all to themselves. First the saddle. I've grown accustomed, or rather my bottom has, to the comfort of car seats over the years. My cars have not always (ever?) been the freshest, nor the seats as supportive and cosseting as when they left the factory but, truth be told my arse has got used to expanding horizontally when I sit on it. So the shorts were an odd experience, and should have warned me about what was coming. Hurdle one: Lycra. Mr.Motivator and Bizzy Lizzy wore Lycra while doing morning exercises on breakfast TV when I was growing up. Even then you wouldn't dream of dressing like them in case you had the only two way TV to slip past quality control, and they could see you. So the Lycra was a slightly odd feeling. Not nearly as odd as the padding though! I'll be honest, if I was padding a pair of lycra bike shorts I may have a somewhat different agenda. But the guys that made these shorts had my comfort in mind. To that end, they contained a nappy with no dry nite absorbency or dry weave top layer. This nappy had one function, to stop the instrument of torture that is the saddle of the bike from chiseling it's way into my digestive tract. You know when you're stopped at traffic lights and you're watching the JCB across the road with the rockbreaker chisel breaking up the path/road. You can hear it hammering but it doesn't look like it's moving, but as you watch it's disappearing deeper into the ground? Yeah, that!
So, Lycra discomfort syndrome, coupled with the closest thing to a nappy I want to feel on my undercarriage until my kids are liquidising my food. AND IT DOESN'T WORK!! I can't imagine that the cycle would have been any less comfortable if the shop had omitted to fit the saddle.
Once the rain looked like it may be taking a breather, and the neighbours were notably asent from their front gardens, I decide it was time for the maiden voyage. My Lycra, eh, aversion, coupled with my common decency meant that a pair of cargo shorts were fitted over my skintight nappy shorts. Jacket and helmet donned and I was off. First thoughts: I'm going to die, if not today then soon. It seems to take about 10 minutes to get the second foot located in the toe clip of the pedal. Ample time for several SUVs, Jeeps and juggernauts to render me an interesting design near the gutter.
Wahey! Two feet engaged and we're off, heading toward the Newcastle road with the plan to go as far as the top of the Nangor road and down to the Outer ring and back towards home. We'll see. Not much in the way of suspension here, tyres are rock hard and my nappy doesn't seem to be repelling the saddle as well as I might have liked. Quarter of a mile down and I feel violated already.
Then came Adamstown.
You tend not to hear Dublin and San Francisco spoken about in the same terms when hilly cities are being discussed. Usually for good reason. SF is all about the hills, whereas in Dublin, if there's a hill we'll tell you about it by naming it such. Arbor Hill. Captain's Hill. Constitution Hill. And so on...
So it was with some surprise that I encountered Adamstown Hill for the first time. I've driven over it hundreds of times but it was always called the Newcastle road and never seemed too much of an incline. Today the word hill seemed too polite. It was my Hamburger Hill! (Yes, ironically I was regretting the double sausage and egg mc.muffin I'd had for breakfast today). Near the bottom of the hill I passed a kid on a BMX huffing and puffing a bit (him not me). I dropped a few gears and continued my ascent like a boss. I was ok at trigonometry in school but I struggled today to remember the bit where metres at a slight angle are exponentially longer than flat metres. Every pump of my legs produced a burning sensation that was only nudged into second place in my priorities by the thoughts of this little shitbag passing me on the way up the hill!
At the top of that hill I gave serious thought to moving to Holland. Then I remembered they have trains there too.
I reckon I managed about two more miles before I was back home wondering what have I done. I had a time of 20-30 mins in mind for my commute to work, but after today I'm going to have to re-evaluate the route with a spirit level!
By way of motivation, I weighed myself today to judge my progress. 93Kg.
Next on the list is to find a good iPhone app to properly log my cycles.
Then to keep this blog updated.
Stay classy San Diego!
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