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Pre-Teen/Teen Tandem Team
Last summer I did some longer rides with my then 11 year old, and she
suggested that we might, in 2005, be able to do the Seattle-to-Portland ride, which is just over 200 miles. The rubber has hit the road now that it's February -- we've started training. Because it's very easy to put off doing any cycling when it's cold and wet out, I decided that I'd get us going on our training rides by opening them up to our bike club. So, I'm leading a ride series with my bike club with the title, "Pre-Teen/Teen Tandem Team". The concept was to get adult/kid tandem teams, including us, in shape, so we'd be able to dovetail into the club's regular training series that begins in mid-March. After leading two of these rides, I have found them to be a challenge. All last summer I led kids' rides through our bike club, but these were little cheesy rides down the multi-use path for the most part, at a easy or leisurely pace. These rides we're doing now are at a low moderate (~15 mph) pace, and are on the road. I not only have to coordinate with my daughter on the tandem, but also coordinate with the rest of the riders. As a result, my concentration is always up there -- there's never a moment where I can let my mind wander a bit. How's Rose doing? How are the other riders doing? What's that gravel doing there on the shoulder? Look at this traffic -- holy cow! etc. Last week's ride was tough. It had been cold but sunny up until the day of the ride. The day of the ride, it was cold and wet. Then, it became cold and even wetter. One team turned back; my daughter's lips turned blue and we had to bail out of the ride a few miles before the end. I felt awful -- I was ride leader, but I had to bail; my daughter was hypothermic. I felt like I had let just about everyone down -- my kid, the other riders, and even myself. I began to really worry about Rose's and my ambition to ride STP together this summer. Two hundred miles is a lot of miles. Would we really be able to get into shape by July to be able to pull it off? We couldn't seem to even do 20 miles on a rainy Sunday! Today, I made sure Rose was dressed warmly enough. There was a light rain, but it wasn't pouring. The temps were in the low 40s. I made sure we had gotten our stuff together and were ready to ride earlier in the morning than last week, when we had to rush it. We had a 25 mile loop planned. This time, things went more smoothly. Rose was not in such bad straits. We all finished the ride, and one team decided to tack on another 10 miles on their own. We were damp but not chilled through this time. We got home in time for lunch.Nothing like the restorative powers of tomato soup and mac and cheese, and chocolate pudding for dessert, to put a fine gloss on the ride of the morning. We were driving home from the ride start point when I started to say things like, "well, even if you didn't do the whole 200 miles of STP, it would be OK. Even to do the first 100 miles iwould be a tremendous achievement." Rose listened to me for a while, and then talked about how she really wanted to ride the whole thing. She talked about how she is on the edge between being a child and moving forward to becoming an adult. How, if she could pull this off, she could prove that she could do adult type things. So, maybe we will do STP this July. Even if we don't, we'll put in a lot of miles together getting in shape for giving it a try, and that's worth something too. -- Warm Regards, Claire Petersky Personal page: http://www.geocities.com/cpetersky/ See the books I've set free at: http://bookcrossing.com/referral/Cpetersky |
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