but now it is some crazy heat wave and in the high 50s or something like that...so i am sad i don't have my bike. i can't believe one day it is 1 degree and two days later is 58. (and there is my obligatory discussion of weather, as everyone loves to talk about the weather, especially when they don't have anything better to talk about. and right now, i don't have anything better to talk about.)
the folks at the local YMCA are real nice and when i tried to see if i could buy a one week pass, they just gave me a week of free guest passes. thanks! the YMCA at lake anna just opened up about a year ago and it is very nice. there are these stationary bikes that were more like a video game. so i sat down and went past the beginner, intermediate, and advanced "routes"-- right to the CHALLENGING routes. then i found the hardest one on that page: SAVAGE REVENGE.
so there were a lot of things really savage about SAVAGE REVENGE. first, was the fact that all the mock cyclist were riding in the snow capped mountains with short sleeves and shorts. only one lady had on some pink knee warmers. second, were the trolls that would throw snowballs at you.
i saw the "winning times" at the bottom of the screen and i was all set to crush it. some dude had 55 minutes. i could beat that. after all, i ride real bikes. AND i am in barberton, ohio. i wasn't really worried about my competition and was hoping to eternalize myself on the winners board at the lake anna YMCA.
so i started my route and after a minute, everyone was passing me. i mean everyone. and not just passing me slowly, but flying by me. then i realized two things about these stationary bikes. 1) you need to steer them, as i was wondering why i kept riding in the gutter. 2) you also need to shift -- and there are like 30 different gears so even 3 shifts feels like nothing. okay, so i figured this out in the first five minutes. then i started passing people, and then started throwing hooks to people to see if i could cause crashes... but the people just disappear when you hit then, so then i started to just ride straight through people. after a few minutes of this, i was exhausted and still way behind, clear that i wasn't going to get the high score. so i did what any good person would do.
i started over.
don't judge me. i wanted to school SAVAGE REVENGE. and five minutes into the new round, i was already 3 minutes behind. i finished a just little bit off the leader board.....in 1 hour 39 minutes, slightly behind the record of 0 hours 55 minutes. while i saw how they were 30 minutes or whatever ahead of me, i started thinking about ben jacque mayne and wondered how he could do on savage revenge. maybe he could get on the leaders board. i would be curious. it's not like i wasn't trying. i was. i was trying real hard. i just don't think i was savage enough. it is pretty hard to get beat by 45 minutes on a 55 minute course.
so, as i was sucking, i started to try to figure out why i sucked so bad. when i was spinning around 80-90 rpms on a flatish part, i was only going about 6mph. then when i'd shift up to number 25 or something HUGE, going at 30 rpms, i would be flying. so i came to the conclusion that these "expresso fitness" bikes are biased toward fat gear mashers. not that all gear mashers are fat...but i am just bitter about getting beat by 45 minutes on 55 minute course.
so when i got home i googled the company who makes the bikes: expresso.net. i found out some interesting things:
- that 55 minute dude actually doesn't live in barberton. these bikes are hooked up to the internet and that guy is from minnesota. it makes me feel better knowing that it was at least a transnational competition.
- there is this whole forum where people shit talk each other about the stationary bikes.
- this one dude - get this - who biked 180 miles in one day on these bikes. apparently, they have these competitions where they clock miles and times and get free t-shirts if they win.
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