RIDE without fear

[bcipam]

I ride alone alot - I usually ride in familiar areas and feel safe (although traffic does bother me at times) but I have at times pick silly, unsafe routes like once when I tried to ride to work (from South Bay to Mid Wilshire) or through Santa Ana. Also a few times checking out trails while moutnain biking I thought someone could get me and no one would know at least for awhile, but generally I'm OK.

[emily_in_nc]

I won't ride alone now except on my mountain bike on the trails on our property. If there were bike paths nearby, I'd probably ride alone on them, but there are none that are particularly convenient to where I live. Other than that, I ride with a girlfriend (mountain biking) or my husband (on the road), primarily because we live in a rural area, and I'm not 100% trusting of some of the bubbas in pickup trucks around here. And after my dog accident (fractured my pelvis in three places and had to have surgery to repair the damage), I get very nervous about the possibility of a problem with loose dogs and not being able to handle the aftermath by myself. Mountain biking, I don't want to risk falling and not having someone with me if I were seriously injured.

Yep, I fully admit that am a nervous Nellie. I wasn't always this way, and it's too bad, but having a serious road cycling accident and a few minor crashes as a mountain biking newbie has made me very careful. I would love to feel the way I used to feel about riding alone. I miss that.

Emily