Tis the Season!

Hoi. My non-base training started today with, as all good training schedules should, a day of rest. It went well. Tomorrow I'll actually ride. I'm pretty excited. Up until this past weekend we had pretty decent weather out here considering it is January (Mid 30s-upper 40s?) which allowed me to get some good rides in. And I've been doing about as much trainer work as I can handle without going nuts!

I had my first Sturdy Girl team training session last weekend. Despite showing up way late (for those of you who have never attempted to drive in New Jersey I would suggest building at least 15 minutes of getting lost time per 5 miles traveled into your itinerary) it went pretty well. There are some strong ladies on my team and I am pretty sure I will learn a lot about riding with a team of more than A.Miles.

As for the collegiate racing scene, I am trying to get a women's team together for an occasional ride. I don't think there are any other A's to race with, but I can't get anyone to upgrade to race with me if I don't coerce them into riding and trying out racing first! The weather needs to cooperate a little bit more before we can get a good group going, though....

The semester is only 3 weeks underway and I am already swamped with projects, papers and proposals. I got to choose my classes this semester and they are a lot more exciting and geared towards what I want to do when I get out of here. It's finally beginning to feel like I'm in graduate school and not just continuing to slave away as an undergrad, which is a good feeling. But there's also a lot of responsibility that comes with it. Sometimes I freak and think about giving up riding, but then I come to my senses and remember that riding keeps me balanced. Everything in moderation.

On Thursday Axel and I are going to see David Byrne, author of The Bicycle Diaries, speak at an urban sustainability forum at the Academy of Natural Sciences. I'm pretty excited. Then Friday is my team's fundraiser cocktail party and the Penn team's potluck dinner. Yay!