Dusting off an old habit: V-Only Monday

[Matthew Strongin]

From time to time I'll notice someone commenting that they're back to cycling after a ____ year hiatus. My current run has been going consistently for a solid 12 years. Growing up I was obsessed with my 10-speed Schwinn (it was light gray and awesome) and BMX. As all my friends got more and more into skateboarding I stayed drawn to the bike. Occasional racing, but mostly doing tricks and throwing myself off of every jump I could find. Sometimes even on the Schwinn, which is why it died a premature death. This carried into high school until I started driving and then most of my free time went to partying. No more bikes.

About a year into college I moved into a house off campus with a bunch of friends. We were far enough away to make walking to class a pain but not far enough away for driving to make sense. Perfect...off I went to the LBS and picked myself up a new BMX (a sweet little GT, for those interested). I rode that thing a ton. I worked on campus, in a building close to most of my classes, so I rarely had to lock it up outside since my boss would let me keep it in our large storage area. I still remember the first time I legitimately bunny hopped onto something after that few year hiatus. What a rush. I kept things going after graduation when I moved to Washington, DC. I didn't get to ride as often, but I still got out on the bike a couple times a week around my neighborhood. Unfortunately I picked up a few bad habits during those years, primarily smoking and a bit of weekend binge drinking. Then I met my first wife. Damn did she like to party. So the bike went to the back of the closet and eventually got sold when we moved in together. No more bikes.

A few years went by, we had gotten married, moved to a bigger place, adopted a couple dogs and a handful of cats, and then the relationship started to get rocky. I knew I needed to start taking better care of myself, which meant quitting smoking, eating real food, and getting active again. I had been an athlete most of my life and just a few years of too much beer and a lot of junk food turned me into the definition of skinny fat. Coming home to a chaotic house and unhealthy relationship just made it that much easier to grab a few beers instead of doing something productive. I had had enough and off I went to the LBS. I was living in Reston, VA near the W&OD trail (a great converted rail MUP) and backing up to Lake Fairfax (plenty of woods to explore) so a cross bike made perfect sense. I could ride it to work during the week and rip around the dirt trails on weekends. I was in love again. Just a little while later we moved down to Miami, back home for me and away from home for her. The relationship got worse, we finally split, and I found myself single in my mid-20s with nothing but time on my hands. The cross bike didn't make as much sense down here so I got my first road bike since that Schwinn I bent in half. I rode that bike every chance I got. 60 mile round trip commutes, before and after work on days I drove to the office, long morning rides on weekends followed by trips to see friends or go to the bar in the evening. I was either at work, walking my dogs, or riding my bike. It was great.

A couple years later I was riding around Downtown Miami during a "Bike Miami" event where they closed off the street to promote cycling in the city and had live music, food, and activities for families. I was out of water and remembered some shop was handing out bottles a couple blocks away. I doubled back to grab one and as I rolled up the woman handing them out looked me square in the eye and said, "Matt?" I didn't recognize her at first, but once she said her name it all came back. This woman was the little sister of a high school cross country teammate and friend. I hadn't seen her in 15 years. A year later we were married and going back for that bottle of water remains one of the best decisions I've ever made.

So a couple times over the years I've given up bikes, but every time I went back to dust off the habit they ended up being an integral part of getting my shit back on track and instantly filling me with the same joy I had as a kid hucking that Schwinn off of anything I could find.

What about you? I know some of you have taking breaks over the years...why? And what brought you back?

[RichTheRoadie]

Up until the end of high school everything I did was on a bike. I used to get on my bike and explore where streets went. I got into racing radio controlled cars for a while, but the bike was always there and it didn't take long for MTBs to take over my life.

When I went to college I got into beer and girls. That continued at university. I graduated in 2001 and not much changed. By now my mates were all working in car sales and buying jet skis for shits & giggles because they didn't need to buy cars. I got bored of pulling on a borrowed wet suit to get 5mins on one in the few hours we were all at the beach. One day in 2003 I took myself off to an LBS to buy another MTB.

By the end of 2007 I'd built myself 8 bikes in various forms: geared hardtail, geared FS, SS rigid, SS hardtail, SS FS (man, I *loved* that Kona A), yet all 26ers - well, except the one Trek 69er, but I got sent the wrong size, so I sent that back and didn't bother getting it replaced - and had one road bike, but I sold that because I never used it.

In 2007/8 I moved to London. Travelling 90mins to get to decent trails was not something I could be bothered to do and wrote off my mid-week riding. I spec'd and built my first 'custom' bike (second hand custom Ti frame) and got hooked on the speed. Quite quickly I met up with a group of riders who all happened to be at a similar level, pace and distance-wise. We became quite close-knit and rode together all the time - which cemented my love of the road. I did a bit of racing, but could never love it despite placing quite well in most races I entered. I got a bit lazy when I met my now-wife in 2010, but never stopped riding regularly. In fact she took up cycling so she could ride with me. There was a Brompton in there somewhere that I used to commute on too.

By the time we moved to Sydney in 2012 I had built 12 road bikes and 3 more MTBs. I've built another 11 road bikes since we've been here, and had a Fat Bike. I'm probably doing the least riding I have done for a while because time is limited and I'm not good at getting up in the mornings, but getting my riding in is still critical to my sanity; and I do enough to have stayed pretty much the same weight despite not being shy with what I eat. I'm slow at the moment, but I'm ok with that.

Things are in a state of flux at the moment for various reasons, but I'm hoping I can ramp up my riding between here and Sept 2018 so that I can be fit enough to ride Cinglés du Ventoux for my 40th.

[christian]

When I was 6 and 7, my best friend and I would ride our bikes all through the woods behind our house. Rode all through HS and college. Burned out on racing after college, I put the bike away for about 4 years. In 2001, I moved to NYC, bought a bike, and started riding with NYCC mostly to meet some people in the City. From 2005 to 2008 I raced cars for a living, which basically meant I rode every day on weekdays. In 2008 and 2010 we added some little people to our house, so the riding took a pretty precipitous plunge for a couple of years but that was by necessity not lack of desire. Since 2013 or so, it's been a steady diet of road and mountain biking, with the mountain biking now getting more hours a week than the road (I'm blessed with a nice MTB trail system 4 miles from home). I also have an awesome kidback tandem that my daughter and I ride now. In two weeks, I'm getting a DH bike.

So a break after college and a slow down when the kids showed up. I suspect my next break will be will be from a mountain biking injury. Touch wood.

[David Tollefson]

My only break from cycling in my adult life was 1999-about 2005...

Rode around a rural "town" growing up and all through high school, then on to college and triathlon bit me. After graduation in 1988, I took a brief respite, but couldn't stay away -- 2 months later I bought my first MTB and used that to commute along side the roadie/tri bike that I raced. Transitioned to road racing in about 1995, and was hitting the peloton a good 4 days a week in-season. Around 2000 I started up a business venture, along side my full-time day job, stopped riding, and watched my soul drain away. In 2005(?) I flushed everything but the day job (including a marriage that was draining my health), and started back into triathlon.

Though I've essentially given up all forms of racing now, my involvement in the local cycling community has increased, putting on 2 events a year, building, and riding.

[SlowPokePete]

Well when I was a kid, we all rode bikes. I learned at four years old after pestering my mother to take off the training wheels again. She was having tea on the back porch with Mrs. Baron, my friend Chuck's mom from down the block. In the summer there would be plywood ramps and we'd all be out there jumping off them. As I got a little older, I wanted a "ten-speed" and my mother came up with a used Peugot. My older brother David had a Schwinn. I remember as a ten year old riding from Port Chester up to Armonk with my big brother and some of the older kids in the neighborhood, feeling like I was flying!

I started to gain weight in my teens, smoke cigs, etc. Got married young (age 20) with a year of college left and stayed married for twenty years, no kids until after the first ten. Upon graduation, I started my brief business career as an accountant (yikes) for Norelco (one year), then Merrill Lynch (one year) , then TSI International (I remember when Spinergy moved into our building in Wilton, CT). I started running at Norelco and wanted to do triathlons, so I worked many hours for my ex in-laws and saved up for the 1987 Cannonade SR500 that I bought new at Better Bicycle Center in Norwalk, CT. I still ride that bike as my "rain" bike.

Got in good shape, did lots of races with my boss Larry at TSI, always middle of the pack finishes, but that was OK. Biggest event was the Tupper Lake Tinman Half Ironman that we did together. It was tough for sure.

Then I started getting into paddling whitewater, abandoned the bikes with the exception of occasional mountain biking, and did that throughout the Northeast and a bit of the South for the next maybe 5 years.

Moved farther from the river, had twins then one more, fell in to some bad depression as I became overwhelmed and gained weight, peaking at about 262 (I'm 195 now and do my best to stay under 200). Tried to get in to riding again, but with three little kids and a (ex)wife who didn't see that I needed to ride, we split up and I got more in to riding.

Next real road bike came after many years of getting more in to mountain biking, bought LBS owner Lou's personal road bike (Jamis Xenith Pro) with nice parts (many of which are still on my Parlee), and rode it occasionally.

Getting the Parlee (used) a couple of years ago ignited my desire to ride on the road more. I also like riding my cross bike on the local dirt roads.

I am slow and getting slower, and I do not much like the vehicles I must exist with every time I ride on the roads. I work hard to the ride the right roads at the right time but would love to have front door access to less traveled roads.

I'm sure there's more but that's what I've got at the moment.

SPP

[Lionel]

No break, been riding a road bike since I was 13 and a MTB since I was 18 (it was a new thing then). During this time I always had at least one of both.

[DCT]

Great thread Matt. About four years ago I was off the bike for two months with a mild injury, but aside
from that, I've been riding for the last 10-12 years.

[rec head]

I've always loved the damn things. Some years I have loved them more than others but I don't think I have ever really stopped.

[joosttx]

I gave up biking for graduate school. I couldnt afford mountain biking or had no the time. This went into my post doctorate work where I bought a motorcycle to explore. First year of work I traveled and then started working out, cardio days were biking days. i started just biking again.

[Too Tall]

Great thread.
I've been riding since the age of 5 with one real break when I was working in Rock Springs, WY where tossing glass bottles is a serious sport hobby. Despite having my trusty Hetchins with me there was no way to keep tires on the bike and I was too bone headed to switch to clinchers. Some things never change.

Returning from Rock Springs with a lung full of coal dust and two busted up knees I could barely breath or walk. The light bulb went off when I spotted a Mtn. bike for sale at the local shop. I used the C&O canal flats with that mtn. bike to rehab. my health and within the year was racing Mtn. bikes in the Canaan series, Whitetail, Blackwater 100 etc. etc. etc.

Mtn. bikes saved me. If I did not return to a daily exercise habit I'd be dead.

[rwsaunders]

I received a metallic blue Stingray with a white Naugahyde saddle and sissy bar for my 11th birthday and that was my key to exploring the world beyond the 8 city blocks from our house. There was really nowhere that we wouldn't ride our bikes and when I was 15, a friend and I decided to bike/camp for a week. We plotted a ride which took us 70 miles a day and to various state parks for four days out and four days back on our ten speed Sears Free Spirits. I still recall my Mother telling us to call when we arrived at our turnaround point. Imagine that in today's world...she'd be arrested for neglect.

I rode a bike for campus transportation throughout college and dropped away from the machine as work, social activities and life kicked in. Running was my drug of choice until 1985 when my wife and I treated ourselves to new bikes with part of our tax refund. I've never looked back after that as cycling has been a part of our family's activities since then and while I don't race, I enjoy a couple of centuries throughout the year. Beyond my own recreational riding, family rides are a regular event, depending upon who is home at the moment.

[Matthew Strongin]

<snip>I suspect my next break will be will be from a mountain biking injury. Touch wood.

Yeah, stay away from rapidly approaching trees. I didn't include my breaks due to injury but there have been a few of those in there as well.

[dashDustin]

I left for TX4000 enjoying riding. Broke up with then girlfriend the day before leaving. Over the 2.5months on the road, we decide to get back together since we were moving in with each other...oops on my part.

I get back from TX4000 and sink pretty low. Hard to get back into the swing of things after being on the road surrounded by friends with nothing to do day after day but get from point A to point B and find food. Regardless, getting back was hard and I pretty much stopped riding. Not because I had spent the previous 10 weeks on the bike, but because I didn't feel like doing anything. That was also my worst semester in college. That was 2004. I didn't really get back to riding a bit until 2007, when I moved to a Dallas suburb.

[m_b_b]

I grew up in Iowa, and when I was in 5th or 6th grade the RAGBRAI route went down the road I lived on. Decided that was something I wanted to do someday. In high school I did the ride twice, both on a hybrid that I had bought to replace my car after the transmission gave out. Dreamed about the road bikes I saw others riding across the state (bright red steel Allez, all those crazy looking kestrels, an amazing blue waterford), but most of my riding was for transportation so never got one.

I went to a small liberal arts college, so didn't need to ride for transportation much anymore. I joined the crew team and riding stopped. Quit the crew team and spent my time on school (and beer), so still didn't start again. Then came med school and my bike lived unridden on the fire escape.

In the middle of med school I went to do a PhD and found more time, so finally bought a road bike. This was early 2008 or so, and it's the one I still have today, although everything but the frame has been replaced since then. Rode it a ton for a couple years and it got me through a lot personally. Then I started residency. Had zero free time the first couple years and the bike sat in the closet. Finally, about 4 years ago, I took it out, overhauled it, and haven't looked back.

Since then I started riding to work, first on an old raleigh I found on craigslist and then on a more reliable but somehow even heavier surly. Now my car sits abandoned until the occasion when the whole family needs to go somewhere on the weekend. The time I spend riding for the sake of riding waxes and wanes depending on other commitments, but I commute every day. Next year my road bike will be 10 years old, and maybe I'll find something to replace it.

[xjoex]

I grew up in the age of BMX, when RAD came out on VHS there was a 2 month wait at the local video store! I rode around in parking lots doing flat land tricks. But I was a chubby kid, 185lbs at 13 years old. I decided to lose weight, got a 18 cheap speed mtn bike and started riding. I lived 5 miles from Valley Forge park, while mtn biking wasn't legal, not enough people did it to make it illegal. I rode every day after school. That turned in to a racing mtn bikes.

I went to college, worked in shops, was a courier in DC and raced and rode everywhere in the DC area. Then my last year of college they opened an outdoor rec center. I started climbing with some of my coworkers. I moved to Colorado and had my first and only break from mtn biking.

I got really in to trail running and rock climbing for about 4 years. Real runners didn't compete in trail races, so I could go and win, which was fun. But my knees were not meant for running.

I got back in to riding and never looked back.


-Joe

[caleb]

Great thread. I feel a lot of the common themes like shifting from bmx to mtb to road to tri, and maybe back again, along with the role of education, jobs, and relationships.

I've always ridden I guess, but the forms have ebbed and flowed.

In the 80s, I rode BMX like every other kid in my small town.
In the 90s, I had a series of mountain bikes that I rode everywhere.
In the late 90s, as a high school runner, I got injured and ended up with a road bike for training. It turned out to be a ton of fun.
In college, I raced road a bit, and did a bunch of triathlons, including an ironman. I was training 25-30 hours a week, and I burned out. I stopped doing triathlons and dialed the training way back.
Early in grad school, I raced cross a bit for a few years and had fun at it, but I never had the time or drive to put in the training to race with the P12 wave. I plateued about the time I had to get serious about writing my dissertation, so all racing went by the wayside.
Late in grad school, just about everything went on the back burner, and I was down to just commuting to campus in the spring/summer/fall and skiing in the winter.
After grad school, a job took me to upstate New York, where there's fair to good mountain biking right near my house, so I've started riding the trails again.

This summer was going to be my post-education fitness extravaganza of regaining all I'd lost while finishing the dissertation, but I managed to tweak my knee running in March, and I've been gradually rehabbing it ever since. I've been riding easy on the dirt, but I haven't turned the pedals in anger at all this summer. I've been doing some open water swimming again with a buddy, and canoeing a fair bit. It's not what I had envisioned for this summer, but it's been fun to play in and on the water. Once my knee is back in order, it'll be time for some long rides again, both on the road and on the trails. Every now and then I'm feeling the itch to try touring - we shall see.

The bike has always been part of my life, but the type and amount of time I spend on it have significantly varied.

[Matthew Strongin]

I grew up in the age of BMX, when RAD came out on VHS there was a 2 month wait at the local video store! <snip>

If someone can point me to a stream of RAD so I can watch it again I'll be forever grateful.

[defspace]

It's funny, until I took stock after reading this thread, I wouldn't have ever considered myself a cyclist pre 2007 or so. But I now realize that maybe I have been one for a lot longer than I previously thought.

Growing up, the neighborhood kids and I were always tearing around on bikes and rollerblades. I still have scars from riding a too-big bike down a too-fast hill as an 8 year old.

Fast forward to middle school and high school. Guitars and music definitely took over. I remember a few times not knowing what to do that day and setting out to see how far I could ride my mountain bike. During junior and senior year, I started hanging out with some less musical people and we'd drive out to a mountain bike park and have a blast getting muddy. I remember being very proud of being the only one who was "crazy" enough to do the more technical sections. I recognize now that they were probably quite tame, but those 8" drops were huge at the time.

Fast forward to college and my experience is nearly identical to Matt's:

About a year into college I moved into a house off campus with a bunch of friends. We were far enough away to make walking to class a pain but not far enough away for driving to make sense.... I worked on campus, in a building close to most of my classes, so I rarely had to lock it up outside since my boss would let me keep it in our large storage area.

I moved to a house about 3 miles off campus. I borrowed a buddy's way-too-small Bianchi to ride to campus. I could beat the bus to campus. If I really pushed it, I could beat two buses. I'm not sure if I ever got to three.

I worked in a lab on campus and I had a safe spot to store my bike. With every pay check I'd buy another bike part and slowly assembled my own road bike and returned the Bianchi to my buddy.

I got clipless shoes, bibs, met some "real roadies" and the rest is history.

[dogrange]

Grew up in Missoula, MT and rode my crappy BMX bike all over the place from 5-12. In high school Mtn bikes were coming on the scene and bought a Pugeot Orient Express (didn't have the money for a Stumpjumper) that I rode for fun around Missoula with decent amounts of time on the trails. I had a lot of fun with riding, but it was never my main focus in high school so I never "trained" or got into much in the way of shape. I spent more time playing in rock bands and chasing girls. This was from about 1984-1988, at which time I left for college at Columbia in NYC.

When I got to college I decided to get serious about getting into shape (I was sort of a skinny fat 18 year old) so joined the lightweight crew squad, and oh boy if you want to get into shape join a Division I sport as a novice and get your ass kicked all year. By the end of the year I was in pretty darn good shape and really rocked it on the mtn bike when I went back to Missoula that Summer. Repeat for Year 2 at college. No bike at college, though.

After year 2 I dropped out and moved to Seattle to play with my old Montana rock band, who had moved out there at the end of 1989. I didn't ride much at this point was busy spending all my time practicing rock music, writing songs, practicing the guitar and trying to meet girls on the side. Also got into hiking and climbing which I did a fair amount of. Finished college in there somewhere at U of Washington. Starting in 1993 rock band started touring a lot, many months per year.

Touring in a van with a small time rock band is the opposite of joining a college crew team - nothing can describe the physical atrophy that results from sitting in a van for weeks and months at a time and then sitting in a crap club until 3 a.m. most nights. It was great from a music and personal development perspective, but after 5 years of this it felt like I could barely walk. Thank the stars that I didn't have a drinking/drugs issue to add to the decline, saw this a lot with others. Around 1997 we rock band members agreed that music would be much more fun as a hobby than it was trying to make a living at it, so we all moved back to Seattle and got jobs. At this point to get back in shape I started running (literally 10 minutes of jogging at first was all I could muster before exhaustion). Built that up and after a year or 2 ran a couple marathons. Still no biking. This was 1997-98.

In 1998 moved to Chicago to go to law school and continued running. I thought a lot about getting back into biking as the city is flat and it seemed like it would be a good way to get around (driving in Chicago is pretty unpleasant). This was before the City got serious at all about any sort of bike infrastructure and I could never get over thinking that riding around the streets with the insane drivers wasn't worth the risk. Incidentally, things are a lot better there now as the city government has done a lot to improve things, not the least of which is the large scale bike share program which seemed like it got many bikers on the streets where there were none and raised drivers' consciousness a lot in a short time. 1998-2007 in Chicago, still no bike.

Finally, bikes returned! In 2007 I moved to a leafy lakeshore suburb directly North of Chicago. I noticed many groups of roadies out and about, and it immediately dawned on me that I should join them. Went to the LBS and bought a Specialized Tarmac and started doing shop rides and commuting. Since then, I have gotten more and more into it and have been pretty steadily upping my time riding. I have also certainly increased the stable, Tarmac is long sold and replaced with the younger, prettier version X3. I still really enjoy mountain biking when I get the chance, but it is 90% road at this point as that is what is accessible. I'm really enjoying getting better at riding a bike, but I think I am bumping up against my upper limit at 10-15 hours/ week, what with job, kids, etc. We'll see what happens, but for now it's great.

[Bob Ross]

It feels a bit disingenuous to claim I got "back" into cycling. The truth is I was never not into cycling, it's just that from the time I learned to ride a bike (age 7) until I was 45 I was a completely casual cyclist, a "utility cyclist" at best. As a teenager the bike was my only form of transportation, I didn't get a driver's license until I graduated from college (!). When I was in college I would commute by bike to class and to work. After graduating I would often commute to work. Throughout much of my adult life I'd use the bike to run errands. Once in a rare while I'd just go for a spin around the city, for fun. Doubt I ever did a ride longer than 20 miles (except for that one time my batshit crazy girlfriend convinced me we could ride from Boston to Plymouth wearing backpacks full of camping gear, that sucked). Did a little bit of mountain biking in the early 90s. Mostly just tooled around. Always had a bike, but never a particularly good one, and don't think I knew what a "particularly good bike" would even look like. Never raced, never followed bike racing.

And then in 1995 my girlfriend (not the batshit crazy one, this one would eventually become my wife) got suckered in to doing the Boston>New York AIDS Ride by some friends. Within six months she went from having never ridden a bike farther than to the end of the street and back -- and the last time she'd done that was probably 1969 -- to doing back-to-back centuries every weekend. She loved it; not just the long distance riding, but the whole group riding discipline & camaraderie thing. She took to group cyling like a fish takes to water

...and then she spent the next ten years trying to convince me I should take up group cycling also!

In 2006 I finally relented, we joined the New York Cycle Club and took their C-SIG group riding skills coaching program (an 8-week series). And it was like somebody flipped a switch in my internal wiring. I went from being a casual cyclist to a completely obsessive recreational roadie. Moreover, I went from being someone who did absolutely nothing for physical activity (other than occasionally playing drums), who almost never saw the sun (because I was working in dark concert halls, clubs, or recording studios all the time), and who slept until noon on weekends, to a guy who cycles between 5,000-8,000 miles a year and who was advised by his physician to stop taking Vitamin D supplements because I was getting too much natural sunlight. I drank the Kool-Aid big time.

Best thing I ever did for myself.