ninevirtues (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
ninevirtues) wrote2004-03-07 10:48 am
ninevirtues) wrote2004-03-07 10:48 am
The turtle ride
I tried the Turtle ride today. The Turtle ride is "The fast ride". A bit of cultural explanation is in order here:
The Turtle ride goes at 7 AM, so its participants can be home when their families return from church. (They say they will leave at 7 AM, and by 7:10, they are gone. If you're late, too bad.) They have wives, kids, college educations, professional jobs. They go 45 miles fast. They don't dawdle. There are attacks; there are plots and strategies; it pays to know the players and their respective aerobic capacities. There might be one five-minute convenience store stop, somewhere in the ride, but that is it. I do not know why it is called the turtle ride.
The Fred ride (named for Fred, who sets the route and provides the inspiration) is scheduled to leave at 11 AM and actually gets around to rolling out at 11:20. Again, it's mostly guys; they're retired or otherwise can spend the majority of their weekend rolling around the countryside. They stop every ten miles or so at a convenience store, where they buy and eat a variety of interesting things. It's slower than the turtle ride, and mercy is freely available, if you ask.
I showed up at the turtle ride, armed with six power bars, quietly shaking in my shoes. Result: I could stick with the group in the flats, but when we hit a hill, those guys went by me faster than Martha Stewart looking for a plausible excuse.
Time for more hill repeats. I hereby decree that Wednesday is Hill Day.
I did discover one other cultural phenomenon: When everyone in front of me yelled "Ho!" and dodged, I looked up trying to find the woman of dubious virtue.... and fell into the crevice in the pavement that they were actually trying to warn me about.
At some point during the ride, I realized that it was very hard, and that was okay with me, and I was there because it was hard, and hard work, high heart rate, ischemia, and exertional pain were the point.
When I stopped trying to evade that, and relaxed, I got the feeling I sometimes get when running fast: I relax, so only the muscles that need to work hard are actually working, and I calm down, so that my heart and lungs only need to fuel the work.... not my own anxiety or avoidance. I'm still working as hard as I can, but I feel like my center is calm.... like the eye of a storm, even.... while my arms and legs and wheels are working like mad around the periphery.
The Turtle ride goes at 7 AM, so its participants can be home when their families return from church. (They say they will leave at 7 AM, and by 7:10, they are gone. If you're late, too bad.) They have wives, kids, college educations, professional jobs. They go 45 miles fast. They don't dawdle. There are attacks; there are plots and strategies; it pays to know the players and their respective aerobic capacities. There might be one five-minute convenience store stop, somewhere in the ride, but that is it. I do not know why it is called the turtle ride.
The Fred ride (named for Fred, who sets the route and provides the inspiration) is scheduled to leave at 11 AM and actually gets around to rolling out at 11:20. Again, it's mostly guys; they're retired or otherwise can spend the majority of their weekend rolling around the countryside. They stop every ten miles or so at a convenience store, where they buy and eat a variety of interesting things. It's slower than the turtle ride, and mercy is freely available, if you ask.
I showed up at the turtle ride, armed with six power bars, quietly shaking in my shoes. Result: I could stick with the group in the flats, but when we hit a hill, those guys went by me faster than Martha Stewart looking for a plausible excuse.
Time for more hill repeats. I hereby decree that Wednesday is Hill Day.
I did discover one other cultural phenomenon: When everyone in front of me yelled "Ho!" and dodged, I looked up trying to find the woman of dubious virtue.... and fell into the crevice in the pavement that they were actually trying to warn me about.
At some point during the ride, I realized that it was very hard, and that was okay with me, and I was there because it was hard, and hard work, high heart rate, ischemia, and exertional pain were the point.
When I stopped trying to evade that, and relaxed, I got the feeling I sometimes get when running fast: I relax, so only the muscles that need to work hard are actually working, and I calm down, so that my heart and lungs only need to fuel the work.... not my own anxiety or avoidance. I'm still working as hard as I can, but I feel like my center is calm.... like the eye of a storm, even.... while my arms and legs and wheels are working like mad around the periphery.