Recipe for Disaster

1 195lb stupid human
1 chronically vulnerable L4 / L5 spinal disc
1 bulging S1 / S2 spinal disc 
4 days driving across the country
13 20lb boxes of books
1 flight of rickety stairs
6 built bookshelves
3 weeks of skipped core / flexibility workouts
55 hilly miles
1 skipped cool-down
1 enthusiastic eight year-old girl

• Actualize the stupidity of man. 
• Herniate discs playing basketball in 1998. 
• Drive 1500 miles in four days (with an optional 2 days hiking in Rocky Mountain National Park)
  
• Arrive at your destination and immediately start hauling books into your upstairs office. 
• Meanwhile, completely and utterly neglect any sort of preventative back or core therapy. Allow hamstrings to tighten like spun rubber bands. 
• Spend 2 weeks off the bike and then jump straight into a 50-mile ride which includes several steep power climbs of 2-3 minutes each. 
• Ignore ache in back and forgo cool-down or post-ride stretching
• Attempt to hurry 8 year-old into a Honda Civic the next day
• Spend two weeks in near constant pain. Serves 1.
  

So yeah, that sucked.  I can't sit. Imagine that--a reader and writer who can't sit at his desk for two weeks. Now imagine that same poor bastard not riding his bike, an activity which usually alleviates all of his stress.

Back to the ride: I sent emails to several local cycling organizations and received any number of welcoming replies. Pat Cash of the Omaha Pedlers kindly invited me to join their group for 50 miles two Saturdays ago. My other option was a charity century sponsored by Bike Masters, a local shop which sponsors Team Kaos, a local team that sent a rider to Bissell to race with my friend Paul last year. I didn't think I had 100 miles in me, so I met Pat and his merry band of outlaws at Democracy park, a small swath of green space nestled at the northern end of Omaha's Keystone Trail."Look, ma: hyperlinks! I learned how to use hyperlinks! In my blog! Ma! Ma! Ma mamamamama! Didja see me? Didja? Watch, ma! Watch me! I'm gonna use a hyperlink!"

The group reminded me of the Davis Bike Club's Over-the Hill Gang (no offense, Pat--they're really not that old, either): recreational riders out for a spin at near-warp speeds. They showed me some spectacular roads in the hills north of town--and embarrassed the hell out me by insisting that I, as a ride "virgin," pose with one the figures of a sculpture commemorating the spot where Lewis and Clark crossed the Missouri and met with the Omaha Indians.

"There's more of us coming--but we always keep our promises..."

As you can tell from my kit, the weather bit into the skin--50 degrees and windy. In early October. See earlier post for inane anti-winter muttering.

I really enjoyed riding with these people, and they put the wood to me on three different climbs.

Then I spent two weeks (almost, now) crippled. Dumb. Work your core, kids!