First Ride

Sam and I went out for a short ride on Sunday, November 21, to test out the bikes.  We decided to head out to Griffith Park, where I used to do a lot of training rides.  It had just rained the day before, so it was a beautiful clear day.  One down side is that there was all kinds of gunk on the side of the road.  (This is important to the story later.)

I was kind of nervous since we were both new to our respective bikes.  One of the reasons I was nervous was that I was using brand new clipless pedals on my new Cannondale.  Clipless pedals are designed to help you ride more efficiently by “locking in” your cycling shoes to the pedals.  The trick is to get used to “locking in” and “unlocking” quickly.  If you’re don’t “unlock” yourself before you come to a full stop, you are stuck on the bike and you will fall over (yes, this has happened to me and I have scars to prove it).  This is very dangerous, especially on a busy road.  Even though I had used clipless pedals before on my old Bianchi, I was concerned about breaking in my new clipless pedals.  They were a bit too tight, but I eventually got used to them.

The ride ended up being great.  It was a beautiful ride from Griffith Park to Burbank and back.  Along the way, we passed the L.A. Zoo, the Autry National Center, Forest Lawn Cemetery and a kiddie choo-choo ride.  We were almost back to the car when I realized we had only gone 9.8 miles.  I wanted to hit at least 10 miles, so I made a last-minute decision to add more mileage.  That decision ended up being very messy.  Those last 0.2 miles took us through a giant puddle of muck and got mud all over us and our bikes.  Oops!  Sorry bikes!

This ride is dedicated to my very first sponsors: Katherine L., Nghia L. & Jordan L.