How old were you when you started cycling?

[RoadRaven]

I learned to ride a two wheeeler when I was about 6, and rode to/from school til I was 18.

Then no riding at all, and at 39 hopped back on a bike.

I have been riding for 18 months now and fitter than at any other time in my life!



Haven't ever won a kayak though - that must have been dayam cool Sandy

[Lise]

I guess this year I am going to take up kayaking since I won a beautiful new Hurricane kayak in a drawing I entered at a cross country ski event last March. Lucky me! I think that I am just trying to prove to myself that I am not too old to be doing all of these foolish things. So far it seems to be working!

I love this-- you won a kayak at a x-c ski event! Oh, man, my 50s are going to be great! I'll be 46 in July, and expect to have my best tri season ever this year, then plan to do a 1/2 IM at the end of next season. Who knows what other sports I might pick up? I am delighted to be around you inspiring women!

[mtkitchn]

Rode a lot as a kid until my mid teens. Took up biking again in November at age 40. Plan to do a century ride sometime this year. Love to show off to my little brother that I'm in better shape than he is.

[jobob]

I biked around a lot in junior high & high school, especially before I got my driver's license with my trusty tres-kewl baby blue CCM 10 speed.

My biggest crash to date knock wood was way back then when I was riding with my best friend on our way back from tennis lessons at the community college across town, and I looked back to say something to her and neglected to notice a station wagon (this of course is mid-70s, no such thing as mini vans or SUVs back then) had stopped directly ahead of me. I saw it just in time to do a perfect 90-degree low-speed T-bone into the back of said station wagon. I kept going over the handlebars and did a face plant into the back door.

When everyone picked me and the bike up from the ground, I was spitting out little bits of tooth which was disconcerting We checked out my bike it looked OK at first, but the front wheel wouldn't turn. It took a moment to figure out that the fork had bent back perfectly symetrically (owing to the precise right angle of my collision ) and the front tire was smooshed back against the downtube. I remember crying "my beautiful bike!!" (see, I was One of Us even back then). Station Wagon Mom - who was understandably a bit shaken up by the fact that a teenager whacked herself into the back of her car - drove me & my bike home and made sure I was OK. I found I had a little inverted v-shaped chunk missing from the bottom of my 2 top front teeth where they met. I hightailed it to my dentist, who found no major damage and filed down my 2 front teeth so the ^ wouldn't be so obvious. (So my 2 top front teeth are to this day about a mm or so shorter than god originally intended)

Dad took the bike back to the bike shop where we bought it, and either they didn't have a replacement light blue fork available or it cost too much (we were not well off and this was the least expensive 10-speed in the bike shop, I think the bike had cost $95 on sale and my parents balked at the price), but next thing I knew they put an uuuugly unpainted steel replacement fork on it. Whaaa, they ruined my beautiful bike.

I still toodled around on it but it wasn't quite the same, I thought it looked so dorky with the steel fork, the rest of it being such a pretty light blue. I brought it with me to college and my BF at the time told me he'd "fix it up" for me but instead he messed it up somehow and it never quite shifted right again. bozo. The bike eventually was stolen but it was no biggie for me by then.

Fast forward almost 25 years. Lee and I decided we were getting entirely too fat so we bought hybrid bikes to toodle around on. He took to it like gangbusters and started losing lots of weight. There was a road bike he was longing for, I urged him to get it, after a few weeks I asked if I could try it, and I wouldn't give it back until I got one of my own. That was Pokey, which marked the start of when I really got into cycling. It was December of 2003, and I had just turned 44.

So there you have it.

[Brandy]

I love reading all of the stories...thank you so much for sharing!

[jobob]

There seems to be a lot of us in our forties, esp mid-40's. We might be near the top of the bell curve here !

- jo "46.5" bob

[RoadRaven]

Yeah, Jobob... certainly a pattern here... alot of us cycling loads in our teens and then stopping for kids, career, marriage etc and coming back to it in our late 30s and 40s

I think its fantastic!

We rock, Bike Goddesses!!!

[easterbird]

never biked as a child...grew up on a farm in southern PA. Took a used bike to college but never rode it around campus because I really didn't know how and how could I learn?? Fast forward many years to Sept 2005, I am overweight,retired and ready to take on life but my knees quit...osteoarthritis. A physical therapist mentions as part of rehabbing that biking might be good exercise for me. The rest is history for me(recent). First bike ride Sept 12 2005. Bought Giant Sedona comfort bike Oct 2005, bought Giant OCR C2 Mar 2006. I am hooked and I love it.So far have logged ~2500 miles since the first 'bite'. I just want to ride and ride and ride. Nothing is as much fun or lifts my spirits like feeling the wind in my face(alright, I hate a head wind too!) and the power of pushing the pedals and myself. Know what I mean??

[RoadRaven]

I just want to ride and ride and ride. Nothing is as much fun or lifts my spirits like feeling the wind in my face(alright, I hate a head wind too!) and the power of pushing the pedals and myself. Know what I mean??

Absolutely Easter!!!
Wonderful - its freedom... its one thing where we are completely in control... its moving meditation and I love it... Always thrilled to hear your kind of story.

Now just to convince my boss to keep paying me while I solve problems on the road... there must be a way to frame the idea so he actually believes me...

Hmmm ---- hes a triathlete... maybe I could convince him that we have team meetings in a bunch ride...