Why do I ride?: Week 18 ~ Lessons Learned

In order to succeed, Your desire for success

should be greater than your fear of failure.

Bill Cosby

Feeling more and more confident every week, I woke up early and got ready. Our ride started at 8:00 instead of 7:30 so I had extra time to relax, stretch and eat breakfast while I waited for Jan to pick me up. I kissed the girls goodbye and loaded up. Jan picked up the “tool box” Frank put together for me and started taking it to the truck. I foolishly said “let’s not take that today. We are going on a short ride and I have new tires. I won’t need anything”.

We started out on our “short” 47 mile through Los Lunas from the Tingly Beach train station and took the bike path until we reached the highway. For those of you who are not familiar with Tingly Beach, it is a stocked pond off of Old Route 66 (Central). The train goes between the Botanical Gardens and the Zoo. The beach has no waves washing ashore nor can you do any body boarding. It is a place to go and have a picnic with your family and while trying to catch a couple of fish.

I have always liked the bike path. The leaves on the trees are starting to turn so the scenery was great to look at. When we got to the highway, the scenery turned a bit brown and boring. Eleven miles into the ride the flat queen got a flat. I heard the “phish” going up the overpass and tried to ignore the noises the tire was making trying to repair itself. We rode to the nearest gas station and sure enough it needed to be changed. Well, I didn’t’ have anything… no tube, no tools only a co2 cartridge. Why would I need tools, I had new tires and tubes? LeeAnn gave me a tube, Nick changed the tire and Tom pumped it up because he did not want to use my cartridge for fear of freezing his hand.

We were off again and about 5 miles later Ed got a flat. We waited for him to change his tire and finally got to our official rest stop in Los Lunas. We didn’t stay long as we were already rested up. We trekked through Los Lunas. A bit scary at times because there are no bike lanes or shoulders to ride on. The cars didn’t seem to care we were there and drove very close to us at times. We finally made it to the road going back to Albuquerque. The road was a nice flat with one hill. I kept telling myself this is easy and tried to keep my speed at 16-18mph. Well, I was struggling. Why, Why, Why, I don’t know. The peddling was hard and butt was aching. Rides like this should be easy and rewarding. We rested at the Walmart on Coors and Rio Bravo. When we started out again, Tom M said, “your back tire looks low”. NOOOOOOO Yes, I had another flat. I rode approximately 10-12 miles on a back flat tire. No wonder I was struggling. When we returned to the bike path Nick pumped up the back tire and I made it back to the car.

Needless to say I was frustrated. I was mad at myself for being too confident and not having any tools with me. It does not matter what kind of tires you get or how much goo you have in the tubes, you have to be prepared with spare parts. I will ready this weekend.