Everybody's Gotta Learn Sometime

I'm way in the back of the pic, to the left, wearing black.

So, we did a time trial race last night. That's the kind of bike racing one would do in a triathlon. The Guy built me up a time trial bike, but I didn't have the special clothes or helmet. I had only ridden the time trial bike about two times before the race, so I didn't have the gears and stuff all down.

The evening ended up being VERY windy and so cold there were actual wind chill readings. I'm not used to racing in that kind of wind and wasn't used to riding my new bike, so I had a little anxiety about the race in general.

After the starter counted down to zero, I went on my way into the strong wind. It felt ridiculously hard just to pedal, but I was in my easiest gear, so I told myself to breathe deeply and carry on. At one point, after a particularly strong gust of wind as I was going up a small hill, I thought I might have to stop, it was so hard. I just slowed down a little and recovered and kept on keepin'on.

At the halfway turn around point, I finally had a tailwind. I went to change into the bigger (harder) chain ring and discovered that I had really been in it all along. Derrrr. I could have made my life so much easier all the way there, but instead, I had to mash as hard as I could against the wind.

Even with that, my time was better than it was last August, and I was about right in the middle as far as places were concerned for all of the women. In the master's women category, I got first out of two. It meant that I got a $10 gift card to the co-op, and canceled out the $10 registration fee. Score!

Of course The Guy did really well. He was 5th overall and 2nd in his category. Woot!