Of course! I'm lucky that this is my husband's and my new hobby, so he understands. His golf clubs are collecting dust in the basement. However people at work think I'm nuts. They mostly ask "why?" I usually have some snappy answer like, "because there's a restaurant in Hermann/Washington/Alton (fill in the blank)" or we wanted to see the bridge/Lewis & Clark/standing rock (fill in the blank)," but then it usually turns to awe. They usually say, "wow, that's cool" or silence as they contemplate if they could do something so crazy. I'm sure most people don't believe they could do it themselves. I usually give a small pep talk such as, "You should try it. You can always pick up a bike at a garage sale to see if you like it. There's all levels of fitness out on the Katy/Creve Couer/Forest Park (fill in the blank) and if you can get a family/friend/SO to go with you, it's even more fun. And it's good for you!"

One friend I didn't even try to convince, went and bought a bike after I visited. I hung my head out the window of her car in LA and whined everytime we passed a biker on the paved path (It was a Saturday and I was missing a training ride for my century). When I went to show her the pictures on my computer, they all turned out to be pics of bikes or pics from bike rides. She called me a week later and said they bought bikes--I made it sound so fun!

However, something strange just happened with my sis. My DH convinced my brother-in-law to do a century. I jumped in halfway through their training. As we got to our 50, 60, 70 miles training weeks, my sis couldn't/wouldn't keep up. I explained that we needed a month to finish this up, and then we could go back to our usual cycling. I was surprised when BIL called the week before and said he was still in--I thought he had bailed. Whether it was related to the cycling or not, she refused to participate in our century weekend--not even meeting us at the finish. I'm still waiting her to cool off, so we can go back to our casual rides. I'm hoping she's mad at him and not me!

Doubt myself? All the time. But I'm pretty bull-headed. Not a natural athlete, but stubborn. Tell me I can't and I WILL! (DH learned that very early on--I don't respond well to NO)