On Reflecting, why I ride

Recently I had a conversation and I was told why what I do is not an effective training programme. To be sure the language was far more polite than that, but the message was, my training scheme is not worth it.

Good advice if I wanted to win races, except I do not. I don't care for racing, well maybe something really casual like when David from the BCC told me to crank it until we passed that car in the distance, but not an official organized race with starting lines, time clocks, crashes and all that stuff. The fact is I ride for three reasons:

1. The scenery
2. The camaraderie
3. Physical fitness

Allow me to elucidate. On the scenery I love riding through the country side, when you can take a deep breath in and not smell diesel exhaust or a sewage treatment plant, instead it is the air cleaned by the trees, free of carbon monoxide and all the other byproducts of human activity (many of which I do not even want to think about.) Besides which, the forests and the farms offer a beautiful change from the office towers of this concrete jungle.

On the camaraderie, we are talking about the Beaches Cycle Club, I suspect if you looked camaraderie in the dictionary there would have to be the BCC referenced in there somewhere.

As for physical fitness, well I have not lost much weight since I started riding, maybe 5 pounds, but I have lost three inches from my waste line and my pants are tighter in the legs and that is not from fat either. According to mapmyride.com, the last time I went to Lake Simcoe I burned nearly 6000 calories in under 6 hours. My training programme may not win me any yellow jerseys, but I think my cardio health is probably pretty good now, although I am going to get a regular checkup soon from a GP, I'll see what the numbers are then.

I could race, but I would loose, I am not a gifted athlete and here is my dirty little secret. I don't care! I don't want to win... oh wait I said that already. Sure it would be nice if I could keep up with guys like Emile, Thi and Lauri for an entire ride, but here is another dirty little secret, I almost can right now. With a little effort, time and training (that I am already doing) I am confident that I will not be the guy so near the back of the pack on Tuesday nights for much longer and even if I am stuck at the end of the pack, that is alright with me, I would rather enjoy myself and love the sport than beat myself up on rollers and end up doing with my bike what I am now doing with my skates. (That would be a colossal waste.)