I was slow

Mine started due to financies, we lost our car and had to have someway to get, FOOD and larger items, that we couldn't carry on the city bus. So I bought a Wal-Mart Roadmaster Mnt. Sport sudo MTB. Found a cheap, used childs trailer and converted to a utility trailer. After taking the Roadmaster to the LBS to be adjusted correctly (cost almost as much as the bicycle!!!), I rode and hauled that POS for 8 months. The great thing is that riding it reminded me how MUCH I missed bicycling. So we saved up cash and bought 2 entry level Jamis MTB's, put skinny road tires on them and started to "ride" longer rides. It's 4 miles to the local Wal-Mart and back home to the Apt. with a load of food for the week, it was "tough" but I did it, it was so much easier going, when we got the Jamis MTB's with lower gearing.

We finally joined the local Cycling Club and started riding the "social" rides and from there we just started putting on a little more miles each time. By July 2009, we did our first "multi-day" tour (motel'd), avg. 40+ miles a day for 4 days. So start slow and just keep adding "miles", each time, it will come to you, ENJOY!! :)

Will not recount my story of retuning to cycling after a (stupid) 14 year lay off.

Two bits of advice: Having participated in many sports over the years, your gains in cycling will be much slower than you expect. But that is not a bad thing. If you were active in competitive sports you will not be able to get to the level you had in your youth. You could train 23 hours a day and it just isn't going to happen.

Good luck, stick with it no matter how discouraged you get. Rest and recover when you need it.

I was at my uncle's funeral, and talking to my long-lost cousin when he poked me in the tummy and says, "Looks like you're putting on some weight there!" I thought to myself, "Hmpf!" but didn't say anything. But he went on, "You should do what I did. I bought a bike and ride it every day and have lost about 60 lbs."

So when I got back home, I went to Academy and bought the $100 mountain bike, put a new seat on it, and started riding. There was one little rise on the greenbelt trail, and I had to downshift and huff and puff to make it up that. But it got easier, and after a while, I was able to ride up the same spot without downshifting, and then without even slowing down. And it's just been slow and gradual improvements since then.

I never started back. I started. I had to teach myself to ride as an adult. Me and my first bike, about four months after I took my first ride and crashed into a mailbox.

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I made up for lost time......

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Was that a Navigator 3.0 in the first photo?

Yes, my first bike, which I named Excelsior.

I have a Navigator 2.0 (21" frame), which I've not named... other than "bike". :) It's great for roaming aronund on a variety of surfaces, but I suspect that at some point I might like something a bit more roadie in nature. It'll be a little while, though.

I've ridden metric centuries on Excelsior, and an overnight tour. It's not the bike, it's the motor.

That said, he's not been out for a couple of years. My other bikes, Roark and Nothung, get more use.

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Wow, great stories everyone,

Great reading! My time away from cylcing was (relative to some others above) super short: Stopped riding when I got my driver's license when I was 16, started up again when I was 18 and haven't stopped since.

Might as well face it, I'm addicted to bikes (and cycling)!

Rick / OCRR