Who invented potholes anyway? Who thought that they would be a mighty fine addition to our nations roads and highways? Come on, raise your hand; I know you’re out there, hiding from my scrutiny. It was also you who decided to fill them with water, wasn’t it? Fresh, sweet, snowmelt, dribbling as though from a bubbling brook, settling over the jagged, hidden counters of your despicable, tire flatting, rim busting abomination! Alright, alright, I know. I can’t blame some random person for potholes, or for the fact that I am hitting them and flatting my tires.
Why am I ranting about potholes? Why, simply because I have begun to ride outside again. With February hunkering back down into it’s dreary hole for the next eleven months and the first few days of March tentatively stepping onto the stage things look…optimistic for us cycling folk. It reminds me of the phrase, ‘out like a lion in like a lamb.’ I may be applying this to the wrong two months, but with February spitting and snarling snow, slush, and rain at me in it’s last week of 2010 existence, and March strolling onto the scene with sunny skies and melting snow, I think I will change its application.
I feel very similar to March right now, or perhaps similar to a bear coming out of hibernation. I sneak outside every morning, sniff the air, assess whether I will wear twelve or twenty-four base layers (just in case) and then suit up to go foraging for food, I mean journeying about on my bicycle. I must be jinxing myself. Weather this pleasant at the beginning of March is just begging for a three day blizzard to come and dump six feet of snow back on the roads. This would merely be a minor inconvenience to my base miles, of course. Why, in the days of Napoleon we rode on top of the snow!
It’s not all sunshine and butterflies (cold, semi-frozen butterflies) though, as there are the certain evils of early season riding to contend with. Case in point, potholes. Sometimes it seems like to avoid one, you have to jump into another one, or alternatively, you are faced with my favorite situation: a pothole, a large puddle, or a large truck. Oh yeah, date night at it’s finest, but who to choose… The puddle of course leaves you with a streak of mud halfway up your backside and the usual residual splatter. I love riding around looking like I had an accident with some Indian food. The pothole may wish to buy me dinner and then flat my tire but this is not my idea of a fun night out. The truck…I know it wants to love me violently but I don’t love it back.
Although this is all small beans when you think about the fact that riding outside is about a thousand times better than riding on the trainer indoors. There is not a movie in production that has enough constant explosions to keep me entertained for more than an hour on the trainer. Even Mr. Schwarzenegger falls short in this realm. So for this reason I will deal with the potholes, and the flat tires that ensure. I will deal with the muddy butt, and I will deal with the trucks swerving around you in confusion, ‘CRAP. The cyclists are back swarming all over my ROAD.’
Happy outdoor riding everyone. (Please don’t hit me with your car.)
Frances was found amidst a pile of ferrets, sticks and cyclocross bikes, and someone thought it would be a good idea for her to write for Embrocation. She enjoys eating cookies, trolling the internet, drinking coffee and racing bikes. She is a Cat 2 road and cross racer on the Wheelhouse racing team. She is a recent graduate of Mount Holyoke College and spends her free time riding around the Pioneer Valley. She is not related to James.
