Today I Rode a Bike for Eight Miles

For Christmas, I bought my husband, an avid bicyclist, the documentary movie: Bicycle Dreams. This is a intriguing film about "ultra" bicyclists that bike from California to Boston in under twelve days!! They bike all day and most of the night. They get so little sleep that, amazingly, the winner of the event slept only seven hours during the entire twelve days and nights before crossing the finish line. Predictably, not everyone who starts the race finishes. The racers face the challenge of crossing the Rocky Mountains, the desert in Arizona, massive traffic (most notably eighteen wheelers on the highway), fatigue, irrational thinking, hallucinations, and injury.....sometimes even death. But, even after viewing the film, I was inspired to ride a bike. Now, my husband rides his bicycle easily for fifty miles and purposefully for eighty miles. His bicycle carries him down the road at speeds in excess of thirty miles per hour. He looks so cute in his biking outfit!!

Now.......jump to this afternoon. I borrowed my husband's road bike. This is NOT the bicycle he uses for competition. This is his beginner bicycle, the one he used before he became the accomplished bicyclist he is today! 

I decided to ride at a local park that also boasts an eight mile Run/Bike Trail. It seemed logical to me that since the trail is eight miles long ( four miles out and four back), riding for eight miles was a reasonable goal. Also, my husband biked for eight miles along the country roads near our home when he set out on his first bike ride.  I couldn't ride a shorter distance than he had on his first ride!!!

I was so nervous the entire first four miles. I questioned myself constantly: "Can I do this? Why am I doing this? This isn't so hard....I take that back, it is hard!!" and so on for four miles. Then, once I reached the half-way point I knew I couldn't stop now. I had to go the entire distance back in order to reach my car... Amazingly, the four miles back was so much easier....so easy that I stopped along the way to take a few pictures!

This was cool. The train went whistling past!

I saw this hill off in the distance! I sped down the hill when riding east....now I had to pedal hard up the hill while riding west!! Ugh!

Yipee!! Waxahachie is clearly in sight. I'm almost done!

But, not before cycling through the cemetery!!

                                         I arrived safely back at the park.

I plan to ride again and again. I'll keep you posted as to my distances. Maybe someday I'll be riding in a bicycle event with my husband.........While the ultra marathon bicyclists are quite brave and inspiring, the dangers they face in order to reach their goal is mindboggling to me.....