Changing Gears: A better way to measure your bicycling progress

A ten-mile mountain bike ride would be close to a 30-mile road bike ride. The knobby tires and rougher terrain of a mountain bike ride is much different than the efforts of narrow tires on smooth pavement.

Yet given these differences, I would suggest a different kind of odometer for measuring anything and especially bicycle rides – the joy meter.

It was stormy the other day when I set out on my mountain bike out of Nevada City. I had been housebound all day. The wind, cold and dark clouds were calling to me.

So in the afternoon, I bundled up in layers with a light raincoat on top and headed out. And that’s when it began to rain! Let me tell you that rain while riding can be miserable and greatly adds to the cold. However, I decided to go until I was really wet and then head back to warmth.

 The rain actually lessened and eventually stopped, leaving the quickly moving dark clouds and winds to intrigue and excite the ride without the cold misery of wetness.

 Somehow the exertion of bicycle riding causes stimulation to the mind, to thought patterns. Riding in town, amidst traffic, a great effort is placed in defensive riding, putting great caution and guess work into the flow of traffic and those spontaneous decisions drivers sometimes make with infrequent use of turn signals – that’s where the guess work comes in.

Once away from traffic, out on a dirt road or trail, the mind is free to enjoy the beauty and rhythms of nature and the challenges become personal.  Ahhh! Getting to the top of a hill, slipping through a narrow spot, up and over a tree root, the long downhill breezes after a climb –  yes, the constant feeling of accomplishment. And we haven’t even touched upon the elevated feeling of rightly earned endorphins.

In cars and trucks – windows up, radio on, heat or AC on for personal climate, even those obnoxious people endangering the rest of us while holding their cell phones while driving – we are quite divorced from the experience of bicycling, the total exposure to the elements.

 As you dig your bicycle out of storage, oil the chain, pump up the tires and prepare to ride, I would like to offer a suggestion. Measure your bicycling experience not by an odometer but by the joy it brings you. Enjoy the feeling of moving under your own power, the total immersion into the atmosphere around you, the awareness of your own body and balance itself. I think I can see the grin on your face already. Put your joy meter in the red!

George Grist is Hap Hazard on the Bike Talk team, which can be heard from 1 to 2 p.m. on the third Wednesday of the month on KVMR-FM 89.5.