Sunday's "Recovery" Ride

I woke up on Sunday morning to Slingshot asking me if I wanted to go do a recovery ride. I hadn't planned on riding and really didn't need to "recover" from anything. But since I had missed my Tuesday ride and needed to make up some time, I agreed.

Since it was to be a "recovery" ride, we rode out to Springville - a nice, flat route. We actually took it really easy and spent a fair amount of time goofing off - looking for new routes and taking lots of pictures.

As you can see, I found my tights and shoe covers. It was so much more pleasant to ride in the fall chill with them. And to think, they were right where I had left them all along. Silly me.



Somewhere in Springville, we found a newly paved path leading off into the trees and decided to follow it to see where it went. It ran along a little river and was quite pleasant...for about 50 yards. Then Dead End! It was fun while it lasted.
We also found this huge field of pumpkins. The following picture does not do justice to the amount of pumpkins that were out in that field. There were millions of them. Acres upon acres of pumpkins. A blanket of orange as far as the eye could see. Tell me, with just an few days left until Halloween, what are they going to do with all those pumpkins?


I have a thing for trains. I love the woeful sound of a train whistle. Granted, I wouldn't want to live right next to the track, but I do love listening to the sound of a train in the distance. So of course we had to get some riding-by-the-train shots.


Coming back from the ride I could tell that my butt was not accustomed to spending so much time on the saddle. I can't believe what a little time off the bike will do to a person. It hurt! I did a lot of moving around and adjusting myself on the saddle coming home. Here are my theories as to why I can't handle sitting on a bike seat for too long anymore:
1) I took too long of a break from the bike a couple of weeks ago.
2) Could my saddle be getting old? I've only had it for a little over a year.
3) I've lost weight. Less padding on the sit bones makes for an uncomfortable time.
4) I spent more time on the bike this week than I have for a long time.

At any rate, I'm thankful that this is a rest week for me. Just Spinning classes and a little weight lifting. After all the extra time on the bike last week I guess I deserve it.