take a seat, take your life
I resolved to figure out what to do about my seat being uncomfortable this weekend. So today, after the rain cleared up and I had gotten morning chores done, I rolled on down to BikeTek in Squirrel Hill, which seemed like a decent shop (and I had a coupon). I had a carefully rehearsed speech to describe my problems (sore butt after a couple miles), my attempted fixes (wear bike shorts, bike more), some of my theories (seat wrong position, butt not tough enough, need new seat), and ask for advice. The guy at the front counter took one look and said, "Well, for starters, you should try a woman's seat, instead of a man's."
Because I never even thought about the fact that hey, pelvic bones on men tend to be narrower. They showed me a "basic" padded woman's seat and an "extra" padded one, and both of them looked like soft fluffy clouds in comparison, so I took the less padded one. Switched it out, test rode around for a few minutes, declared it to be awesome, happily paid money for it, and left. Next task, fenders, so I can ride on wet roads.
Then I had a couple hours to kill before I needed to be anywhere, thought about some trails I was interested in exploring, decided to make the most of having a happy butt, and set off on a 21 mile loop around town (after a quick stop to acquire some sunscreen). I may be sore tomorrow, but this time, I -earned- it.
Some things I noticed:
- Man, things are SO much easier when you're not physically uncomfortable. I handled hills much better today. Although the lack of a ~10lb backpack probably also made a difference.
- Even so, there are NO gentle ways to get from the river up to Squirrel Hill. None. Zilch. At least there was a bike lane for most of the route I took uphill. I guess it could have been worse.
- The amount of whinging I did and the tremendous mental planning it took to get me into the shop and ask for help makes me uncomfortably pretty certain that I have Issues around something to do with owning and riding a bicycle. I suspect it has something to do with me constantly dating people who have -all- had significantly more bicycle experience/knowledge than me. I also wonder if my decisions to run/climb/write SQL are related.
Because I never even thought about the fact that hey, pelvic bones on men tend to be narrower. They showed me a "basic" padded woman's seat and an "extra" padded one, and both of them looked like soft fluffy clouds in comparison, so I took the less padded one. Switched it out, test rode around for a few minutes, declared it to be awesome, happily paid money for it, and left. Next task, fenders, so I can ride on wet roads.
Then I had a couple hours to kill before I needed to be anywhere, thought about some trails I was interested in exploring, decided to make the most of having a happy butt, and set off on a 21 mile loop around town (after a quick stop to acquire some sunscreen). I may be sore tomorrow, but this time, I -earned- it.
Some things I noticed:
- Man, things are SO much easier when you're not physically uncomfortable. I handled hills much better today. Although the lack of a ~10lb backpack probably also made a difference.
- Even so, there are NO gentle ways to get from the river up to Squirrel Hill. None. Zilch. At least there was a bike lane for most of the route I took uphill. I guess it could have been worse.
- The amount of whinging I did and the tremendous mental planning it took to get me into the shop and ask for help makes me uncomfortably pretty certain that I have Issues around something to do with owning and riding a bicycle. I suspect it has something to do with me constantly dating people who have -all- had significantly more bicycle experience/knowledge than me. I also wonder if my decisions to run/climb/write SQL are related.