hack

No kids here, but that's likely change in the near future. Given that and what appears to be a consistent increase of negative car/bike interaction, I'm starting to reconsider my long term attachment to cycling. Too many distracted, impatient, angry drivers out there these days.


Group rides offer some sense of "safety in numbers", but the risk of stupid crashes increases as well (this year's local race ride scene has had at least 6 rough ones to date). Maybe TTs on the local canal access road (closed to traffic) is where I'll spend more of my time until the joy fades.

Ygduf

yeah, not trying to be a total downer but the whole thing is making me kind of sad. I've never connected with anything like I have cycling and am overall feeling sad about it.

Made the break in the race yesterday, had my usual end-of-break **** finish because it came to a sprint and I was basically changed and driving home by the time the rest of the guys finished the cooldown lap.

globecanvas

Any traffic-free options available? Track, cyclocross, MTB, ... ?

mollusk

I am so old that I remember patching and resewing training tubulars. I think that I still have one of those Velox triangular needles somewhere. And waxed dental floss was the perfect thread for resewing.

I patch old tubes once I get about 20 or so collected together and then I do them all at once. It is cheaper when you buy patches and glue in bulk. The patches stay fresh, but the glue goes bad once opened.

mollusk

Sounds like the stuff my oldest boy now does working for Pepco in DC.

miyata man

Today while looking through the archives for racing/training material I came across this.

For starters, the kids always come first, which you are no doubt aware of now. So I hope there is a big and tall grocery store near you that tailors for the cyclist build. Next, a lot of your development is tied to theirs. I'd feel very confident postulating for them how the second parent is effecting ruining parts of their lives that validate them through competition.

You're right of course. Cars are getting faster, people less attentive, and both are getting more numerous. I'm not going to repeat my unsolicited thoughts here. I will say, compared to Scarponi, your job and the people you work for are much less likely to result in your wife getting "the call" than someone else getting "the email". Scheibo recently mentioned your time up OLH being respectable and I didn't realize just how recent that placing was. Less than the year plus however many days old your kids are now.

From that same thread quoted above here is what GC thought of your ninny leanings. Get back to us when they discover matches or make that exclusive pre-pre selection you just know we'll all be so proud of we'll need pictures and a birth story to fully absorb our feeling on the matter.

Edit:
Liar, an open buffet.

topflightpro

I've started giving track a go this year. It's a three hour drive there, but it's different. And the lack of cars is definitely a plus.

That said, Monday through Friday, I'm on the rollers or trainer. I don't bother trying to ride among the cars during the workweek.

furiousferret

Last year, we lost 4 local riders in a 2 month span, that got me thinking. I also don't think my wife wants me riding anymore after so many close calls. I really do enjoy cycling though, so its hard to just walk away.

Ygduf

this is one of the times I wish you'd write like a normal person with understandable phrasing.

Flatballer

I think my odds of dying by fat and of shape if I don't start riding again are higher than dying by car if I do start riding again, but maybe I'm just justifying.

TheKillerPenguin

I don't have kids but I can understand how having them changes the risk calculation. I have to think though, that having a father that is happy, active, and does what he genuinely enjoys would benefit them a lot as they grow up. There's gotta be a way to make it all work.

hack

Agreed, but wonder if other hobbies would offer up the same happiness with a reduced chance of getting smashed.

caloso

There's a pretty pronounced genetic disposition towards heart disease and chemical dependence on my dad's side of the family. It's funny how many of my cousins of my generation are pretty hardcore active. A couple of cousins do several IM's a year, another is through-hiking the Appalachian Trail, another does open water swim races, I race bikes.

miyata man

Y, replicating the type of fitness you have now after a few years off is not going to happen. Fat jokes and shots about your emotional state are all in good fun, but probably worthless attempts to penetrate your current state. What appears to need to happen is somehow making it work until the kids get a little bit older, repeatedly.

That means really listening to that nagging little voice in your head without fully giving yourself over to it. Chances are you'll come back with a fresher perspective on racing or enjoy talking to the people on group rides more. Sneak out now and then to keep sane. Otherwise doing max cadence burping intervals on Zwift for the next few months will do more for you long term than weak attempts to fully enjoy a new hobby. Which by no means rules out a new hobby in whatever limited time you have.

From my perspective your biggest hurdle is holding a kid in each arm makes relaxing with a beer into not relaxing with a beer, ever. Pre-pre selection is so ridiculous it can't even qualify as an acceptable human endeavor.

globecanvas

I can't help with that but I will point out that I was quoted incompletely, and out of context (to the extent there even is a context). But that was probably obvious.

miyata man

But fairly and quite obviously for the purpose of pointing out numerous other people have survived being a new parent and riding a bike. Unless you thought he was being serious about separating the twins at birth and hiding one under the stairs with nothing to wear but a potato sack and grocery bags. My intent was not to be injurious to either party here.

mattm

This has probably already been covered, and doesn't really change much but..

It seems like it's not bike racing that's dangerous; it's the training is where people get really really hurt.

mollusk

Since I quit racing and race training a few years ago all I have done is ride four times a week with a friend that was once a low level domestic pro and all we do is ride the local rail-trail (which is a really good one, BTW. 30+ miles round trip and the very nicest one I have ever ridden. I used to run into Phil Gaimon on it very often when he lived in Gainesville.)

He is the one that talked me out of road riding. I kind of miss it, though.

himespau 

I hear (and relate to) that.

johnybutts

Here in Houston, traffic has gotten noticeably worse since I started riding. With the city's sprawl, you have to ride further and longer to get to the decent roads. I'm not worried so much about the cars as the inconvenience.

So I just ride the trainer now.

furiousferret

You're right, the act of riding the bike, especially near automobiles that's dangerous. In the past I'd say that danger is exaggerated in the cycling community (which it is) and has created and unhealthy fear. That being said, it still happens.

Racing is mostly scrapes, broken bones, etc.

Although evaluating an array of hobbies, bike racing is more dangerous than badminton, knitting, football, and hockey.

scheibo

actually, i was shocked to find about a week or so ago that i'm now used to it and it seems normal. maybe you just need to spend more time on BF

mattm

A friend of mine does paragliding (like hang gliding, but with a parachute kind of setup) and talks about his 'wing folding' and going in to a downward spiral at 2k feet, then somehow pulling out of it.. yikes!

But yeah, bike racing is definitely risky - there's no way around it. Road riding/commuting is even riskier.

Hockey though.. I thought it was kind of a joke that hockey players have missing teeth, then saw a game on TV recently and realized it's not a joke at all. What if someone was in to recreational/weekend hockey and came in to worth with missing teeth?!

abhirama

That picture really broke my heart. It just isn't fair.

The world would be a far better place without automobiles. Would be nice if the governments around the world realized that.

I ride in India where people drive crazy. A ride without close calls is a rarity. And yet, I have to ride to be sane.

echappist

Even in the summer of the South? how do you guys have the trainer set up? How many fans blowing, and any portable AC units? I remember @topflightpro mentioning that the AC doesn't do much anyway, so that may be a moot point.

I've gotten very caution about my riding lately, spending hours on google maps to make sure that roads have shoulders (though that alone is no guarantee of anything). Perhaps eventually i'll do M-F riding on rollers as well, and if it's summer, i'll probably have to use ice vests