I have the BEST husband in the world!!

Ok so lets see if I can tell this story well! Its a little long but totally worth it!

Last night was our first official ride on our new road bikes training for our triathlon. I have these special pedals on my bike that are meant to clip into bike shoes. I do not have bike shoes yet so I just have to wear tennis shoes on these little pedals. Its a little tricky. I’m already nervous about riding and stuff just b/c I’ve always ridden a mountain bike and not really on busy roads and stuff and the little tires on a road bike just make me feel like if I hit the smallest rock I’m going to go flying off my bike into traffic. ok… so I’m a bit freaked out.

We head out on this 4 lane road outside our house with a turn lane (speed limit is 45) so kind of busy. We ride for a little and mike just takes off! he’s super fast on the bike and I’m struggling to figure out how to shift into different gears. My old bike had numbers on the gears so you knew which was was up and down… this bike has 2 levers and on one side the big one makes it easier to pedal and the other side it makes it harder…. ok so I’m struggling.

Mike stops and waits for me and then we ride on (him ahead again) cross towards this smaller road and pull into a gas station (about a 2.5 mi ride). I’m still freaking out a little (OK!! A lot) about the little rocks on the road but I’m getting a little better b/c mike switched to riding behind me and helping me know when to shift! (huge help!) then he decides that we are going to go up and down this hill to practice shifting… well he turns out of the gas station and starts to head left so I follow… then he turns and heads right b/c that’s where the street is we’re going to ride on and we RUN INTO EACH OTHER in the middle of the road!

I literally bust out crying!! like sobbing! It freaked me out soo bad! Once I composed myself… sort of.. we road up the hill and practiced a little and then headed back home. I was a little better on the way home with mike behind me coaching me how to shift. We got to the neighborhood and turned a street early to practice a little more with him behind me again. I’m still trying not to cry any more. There’s a huge hill in our neighborhood that we headed up then down and the down part is really long so mike’s flying up ahead of me and I’m just praying to Jesus that I don’t hit a rock and die. I’m seriously praying out loud on my bike. Ok so we get home and decide to work out the kinks by running a short loop around the neighborhood. I needed to work out some tension and succeed at something.

Well anyways… all this to say – I was freaking out on the bike and Mike kept changing his method of encouraging me. First by coaching me from behind then by explaining how the shifting works a little better and then by bringing my bike in the house for me, holding it for me while I sit on it and he teaches me how to lean forward and actually bending my elbows (i guess i was riding with straight arms which makes the bike feel more wiggly!) and how to sit on the seat without crushing everything! then just listening to me explain to him my fears of riding the bike and just encouraging me and then telling me he was fixing dinner and then helping me make ice cream with our new ice cream maker and letting me pick the flavor (fresh strawberry – it was soooo good!)

so anyways, I just wanted to brag on him a little saying how much he means to me and how much he really understands how important listening is and continually pursing me and not letting me give up because I wanted to ride back into the neighborhood as fast as possible to get home and get off my bike.. but I’m ok now (mostly) and am even willing to go out again today and try again to be even better at it.

I Love you babe!

Maybe this will be us some day =)