Learing to ride again

So for the last week or so I have been contemplating getting back into mountain biking. I have a couple of friends that do it casually. That's almost giving them too much, they have bikes and never ride them. That would be a more accurate description. I think the whole thing that started this yearning to ride a mountain bike again was a video I saw on wimp.com. 

Its this guy and his 5 year old son at a MTB park. My son is 4 right now and I just thought hey, this would be really cool to do with him next summer. So thus started my arduous search for a mountain bike. I haven't been on any type of bicycle in probably close to 20 years, So needless to say I really didn't know what I was looking for at all. I started scouring the web for information and came across a great site. MTBR.com . Lots of useful information on the different styles of mountain bikes out there right now and a lot of good gear reviews and even forums. So with everything out there, I didn't really want to hold myself to looking for any one specific type of bike. I.E. full suspension, 29er, hard tail, and the like. With my new found information I started searching crag's list. I came across someone getting rid of a twice ridden 2011 Nishiki Colorado hard tail 21 speed for $100. I've never heard of Nishiki, but I figured its been a long time and that may be why. I started searching. Apparently this is a $500 bike. So I was pretty happy with my find. It fit all the requirements that I had in my uninformed state: Aluminum frame, and Disk brakes. Everything else could be upgraded, or replaced. I wouldn't mind having a $2,000 bike with full out suspension and crazy bells and whistles, but for now I think the humble Nishiki will do me just fine. At least it will give me a chance to figure out if I really want to take this farther then just the occasional ride. So then started the negotiation with the current owner. Well a long story short I ended up paying his asking price of $100. So either I'm a terrible haggler or, well I think I'm just a terrible haggler.

Not too bad of a bike if I must say, its got more or less everything I need on it and it is very adjustable from the seat to the brakes, to the bar height. I was stuck at the house on saturday and couldn't go ride so I decided to start researching people's different setups for the different styles of riding and bikes. It took most of the day. Which kindof worked out because I ended up going to a BBQ over at a friend of the wife's that evening. Said friend's husband was a competition mountain biker at some point so he had quite a bit of knowledge to impart on me. He was able to answer quite a few questions for me on random odd things like bar height, and crank length. Now I feel like I'm mentally armed and ready for this whole experience. Next step was to actually see if I remembered how to ride or not. As a matter of fact I do remember how to ride, and I'm not too shabby. The geometry of these new bikes is quite a bit different from the old bikes I remember riding as a kid so that took some getting used to. Once that was all said and done then it was more or less a piece of cake. I was having such a grand time I decided to bomb a hill thats close to my house a few times. It was a rush. Once my ride was over and I got back to the house, I realized something very important. I'm so not in as good of shape as I used to be. Well hopefully I'll be able to get back somewhere close to where I was and not be so damn winded after a ride. Another thing I noticed was I would have been more daring in some of the things I did had I worn my knee pads. I have no clue why but I just feel that way. So next time out I'm definitely wearing those jokers.

Until next time..