You can all blame Glenn Hammerson, Rider #1308.
Sometime in April of 2002, I met Glenn at a dinner party thrown by Mike's good friend Hans. We got to talking and Glenn told me about the AIDS Ride he was doing in June. It was a week long bike ride from SF to L.A, he told me. I thought-- hey! what a great idea! (ok I was not very sane at the time and had probably had one too many glasses of wine). I figured that April was probably too late to start training--- funny not everyone thinks that way-- but decided to consider it for the following year.
I don't know how or why I thought of it again that December, but I decided right before Christmas 2002 that I was going to do it! I told Mike that I wanted to buy a bike and do AIDS/Lifecycle the next year. Wise guy that he was, he said, " why don't you wait until after the New Year and see if you still want to do it. If you do, we'll go buy you a bike."
On January 2nd, I said, "Ok can we go buy a bike now?". And that was that.
I bought my first bike at Mike's Bikes in San Rafael. (I also bought my second bike at Mike's Bikes in Sausalito.) I remember looking at that skinny seat and thinking my ass was not gonna be very happy by the time I got to L.A., so I walked over to the other seats, pointed at the wide, cushy one and said to D.J., my salesguy, " hey why can't I put this seat on for the ride?", his reply; " ...because I won't sell it to you for this ride." He was a smart guy, and the beginning of my great relationship with Mike's Bikes.
So there you have it. I rode in ALC 2 as my first ride, got hooked on cycling and have logged close to 24,000 miles in the last 5 years or so.
I ride because I enjoy blaming Glenn for it! (and oh by the way girls, Glenn is one of the only straight, single men I know who do the ride every year....)
ooh he's gonna kill me for this post! :-0
