Picking your riding partners….the key to high self esteem….

196.0lbs

A couple of weeks back I rode with some of the guys I regularly ride with and was totally destroyed by the end of the day. Evidently, while I’ve been using the cold weather as an excuse to drink beer, shop for stretchy-pants, punch new holes in my belt and basically hibernate, they’ve actually been out riding. As a result, I spent the entire ride trying to keep up…..and it sucked…..

This of course shattered my confidence and self esteem. I’m supposed to be the one to wait on people, not the other way around. I’m supposed to be the guy circling back to check on the stragglers, I’m supposed to be the one cruising easily up the hill chatting and talking while my partners gasp and heave and suffer…..

So, being the ultra-competitive guy that I am, I did the only thing I could do to prevent this from happening again. I went home, deleted their email addresses from my riding list and began to scour my address book for new, less fit riding partners.

I know, I know. I can hear you saying “Gee Rich, why don’t you just get off your lazy a$$ and start training?” And you’re right. I could do that. And, while it would hurt and cause me no small amount of discomfort, I would eventually get back in shape and soon be keeping up with my buddies on the group rides…..
But I don’t have time for that. I need instant gratification so I did the next best thing….I invited my son in law out for a nice easy ride.

Granted he’s young and pretty fit, but with a new family, a full time stressful job as a police officer and a busy young person’s schedule, he hasn’t ridden since the last time I invited him out a couple of months ago….

And of course, our ride was anything but easy. I immediately got him redlined, and just so he couldn’t recover and get back into his groove, I kept the pace right up there where he was on the verge of hurling the entire ride. Sure, I’d slow down and look over my shoulder and ask ever so nicely how he was doing, but I never did slow down and I never really gave him a chance.

Needless to say, I feel much better about myself now……