RunOnSentences

By Nancy Chaney

The latest installment: Snob on Wheels

Okay, I admit it. I’ve been a running snob. Skiing is fine. Backpacking is interesting. Swimming is kind of soothing. But running is where it’s at. Free. Portable. A nice blend of sociability and solitude. Physically challenging and mentally integrating! You get the picture. But recently I discovered bicycling. It started innocently enough when my husband gave me a bike for my birthday. It made sense. He’d been an avid runner all of his adult life, but ailments and age were catching up and cycling afforded his joints and lungs the cushion he needed to keep on going. If we both had bikes, he reasoned, we could ride together.  This July, we rode in our first organized bicycling event, the White Pine Metric Century. I credit the Moscow Central Lions Club with my transformation from running snob to biking enthusiast and the realization that cycling is a ton of fun.
 

This year marked the 11th year of the White Pine Tours. Riders could choose from a 26-mile out and back between Moscow and Troy, a Metric Century (that turned out to be 66 miles), and a 116-mile⁺ “Century.” We figured that running had kept us fit, but we also recognized that we were fledglings at this new endeavor. Okay, “We can probably do the middle distance,” we reasoned. We picked up my new bike at 5:00 Friday. As of Saturday morning and the big ride, my steed had a grand total of zero miles on the odometer. Reason for trepidation, I surmised. Still, this was not a race. Just a group of fun-loving, mutually supportive folks out for exercise, sightseeing, and to support the many worthwhile community efforts of our local Lions Club.

The start was pretty low-key. No starter’s pistol. No, “On your marks…” preamble. Just general geographic directions then something like, “Well, off you go!” We wound ourselves through familiar downtown streets and even stopped for a red light. The little incline up Main Street barely raised my heart rate. Sniff! (What sort of a real runner would lollygag like this?) This was going to be more than manageable. Oops. Then came the mile-long 500-foot climb up Steakhouse Hill. Still, I admit to feeling a little smug when I blew by the couple on the tandem. Well, okay, I sort of chugged past them while making polite conversation. Then came the downhill. Somewhere in the space of 320 vertical feet, the lead Tandemizer uttered something about “payback time” into my left ear and his stoker giggled as they left me handily in their wake. 
 

Aha! Then there was Crook’s Hill. Even longer and just as steep. Same scenario. I think I’m starting to like the dynamic duo on the tandem, now that we’re developing this relationship. We dropped into Potlatch, to the first aid station and a cadre of smiling Lions. The two-legged kind…dealing playing cards. I picked a Jack and a Snickers bar. So far, so good.

Next came Harvard, more green rolling hills, the sweet smell of new-mown hay, and another deck of playing cards. This time, an ace! The conifer-lined climb en route to Deary would prove to be the steepest and longest, but I had the pleasant distraction of conversation with my friend Barb, a self-avowed bikeaholic and experienced rider. Just outside of Deary, we arrived at my nomination for the best aid station of the tour. Cheerful Lions and Lionesses offered ice water, two flavors of Gatorade, sandwich fixings, cookies, candy bars, a variety of fruit, sunscreen, and a generous supply of encouragement—all in the shade of a multi-colored umbrella. It was here that we Metric 100 riders would merge with the sleekly and fashionably attired 100-milers coming down from Clarkia. (By then, our faction was more unfashionably tired.) Besides being aced by the fashion sense of the speedsters, the only real downside of the encounter came when I drew a lowly deuce from the deck of cards. Could it be all downhill from here?

The mostly downhill ride into the next rest stop in Troy City Park was a welcome relief. By then, drawing a 9 from the deck wasn’t even a disappointment. I was in familiar territory, and could sense the finish. I’d forgotten that those last 13 miles were mostly uphill, however, and the motorized traffic on that narrow highway was unnerving--at least from the perspective of someone perched atop two 28mm tires without benefit of airbags or even a seatbelt. (Read a related article about the status of our much anticipated Latah Trail elsewhere on this site.)

By the time we arrived back in Moscow 5-1/2 hours after we’d started, my quads were aching, but I swear I had bugs on my teeth for all of the smiling I’d done. I assessed my non-competitive effort to have been considerably less than for running a marathon, and I was fully ready to eat the spaghetti dinner awaiting us under the finish tent. I drew my final playing card and don’t even recall its number. I was about to shrug and walk away when I suddenly realized that I was holding a heart flush. How fitting! I came away with a certificate for a six-piece chicken dinner, a floral arrangement, a feeling of accomplishment, and the revelation that bicycling is a very cool sport! In fact, Gary and I have decided to do the Seattle-to-Portland bike ride this weekend.

Now, if I can manage to work on the mindset that swimming is supposed to be soothing, I may have a shot at triathlons… Stay tuned.

(For more information about what the Lions Club does, call 882-2655 or 882-2814.)