My First Winter Ride

I woke up at 5:30 am this morning. Not because I planned to, but I just did, and I couldn't fall back to sleep because I was starving. I got up and fixed myself a huge bowl of cereal, drank some OJ and then laid down on the couch to try and get more sleep. About half and hour later, I was passed out and woke again just before 8am which was the time my alarm was originally set for...perfect. I was hungry once again, and ate a peanut butter sandwich made on some very tasty pioneer bread (dark rye bread with no sugar or yeast added).

I'm guessing the reason for this hunger was because of my intense strength workout yesterday. I am proud to announce that I completed a full lap of lunges around my block with 25 pound dumbbells in hand. I was able to do sets of 30 all the way around and it took just less than an hour. About a quarter way around a lady asked me if I invented "that exercise" and I almost said "yes" sarcastically, but I took her seriously instead and explained what it was and how to do one properly. She was thrilled to learn it and said she will do them daily to strengthen her knees. I ate a bunch of high protein food after and a had a lager than the usual dinner, but I guess that just wasn't enough to feed the guns......haha.

So on to today's ride now. The trails were finally frozen again this morning, but an icy road made me think the trails would be very slippery. I took my cross bike figuring that it would be fun on the trails and on the road if the trails were to slick. I took the canal path to get to some of the Lake to Lake trails, and then took them back to downtown adding in the "Switchback City" trail. There was a dusting of snow on all the trails that made it feel very wintery. In the past I had never touched a bike in the winter, never mind riding one, so this was a first for me and I would have to say that I loved it. The headwind on the Canal path sucked, and my legs hurt bad from yesterday, but the fact that it was snowing put a smile on my face. Once I got to some single track, that smile got bigger cause it was a blast. Cross bike + frozen trails = good time. I surprised myself by riding almost everything, and was pretty confident on the skinny tires. I found the hand position hard on my thumbs, but I guess they will get used to it with time. Other than that the cross bike kicked ass.

Oh and a shot of vodka in each bottle is not enough alcohol to prevent your bottles freezing in minus 6 for more than an hour.