What a great thing to be learning such independence! Way to go!

I have to admit, I'm very happy that DH likes to do the tinkering on all the bikes, and leave nearly all of the maintenance including cleaning & lubricating, to him. He's much more particular than I am, and just knows exactly what to do. I'm lucky that way.

That said, a good ten years ago I went out on my first ladies mountain bike ride with about 6 other girls, most of us very new to riding. Before we even reached the trail, I had helped one of the other riders fix chain suck on her bike. Funny thing about those old Rocky Mountain bikes - they had a cute little anti-chain suck device that actually made chain suck harder to get rid of. Having experienced it myself, I knew which wrench to use and got her away in just a few minutes. Later, on the same ride, way in the trees, I came across a rider who'd had a mechanical failure. After a few moments we realized that her rear deraileur had exploded all over the trail. I somehow managed to figure out how to put it together, run the chain through, and she was able to finish the ride. Of course, I was able to refer to my own bike to make sure I did it reasonably right.

One of the ladies actually told me I could have a future as a bike mechanic. You know, when DH is making plumber money and I don't have to bring in the big bucks anymore, maybe I'll do that! haha. Naw, I think I'll stick to photography.

I do always ride with tools no matter how short the ride is. And, over time, have learned to have a few odd things in the tool pack, the oddest one I carry is zip ties. You just never know when you'll need them.

oh, and we have the Park Tool stand. DH likes it a lot, but would rather have the one with the folding legs so it could be more easily tranpsorted to races, etc. We've seen a couple of versions of the inexpensive "suspended" bike stands and found them limited - hard to take suspension and hard to spin the wheels is what DH noticed. Heck, we were visiting friends - I was having a martini with Dawna in the other room!

Way to go ladies! Hugs and proud independent butterflies,
~T~