Did I cheat? Did someone fudge the results? Was I using drugs?
I re-calculated just to make sure, and I still got the same answer. If circumference is equal to pi times the radius squared, the answer to two decimal places is 11.45 out of ten!
And that is the cleanest and simplest way I could describe childbirth. An 11.45cm wide thing out of, I’ll leave it there.
Post ride with a peaceful pēpi
Today marks six weeks since a small human being with a head, limbs and a torso fought it’s way out of my pelvis. A small being with a head in the 95th percentile. That is the sentence I repeat to myself whenever I get tempted to run. I think of how my pelvis felt, and immediately all thoughts of running dissipate like pee in a birthing pool.
I decided last Saturday that today was the day, and I would go for my first ride post baby and post episiotomy. It had been so long that I had to really think about what to wear, what to take with me, what to leave at home crying and covered in milk.
HAPPIER TIMES WITH MY BIKE! Living the dream.
The thought of sitting on my bike again was terrifying. The diameter of that seat is roughly 10cm at it’s WIDEST point. If I went for a ride, would the seat be swallowed up? Would I be stuck riding around the Bay’s in some hellish loop until my chain rusted and my tyres popped and the stem fell of the bike with me fused to it? You can’t get saddle sores if the seat isn’t under your bottom right? Always look for the positive in any situation.
Standing on the side of the road outside my house, gloved hands finding their familiar groove on the handlebars, Jawbreakers making the world look positively rosy, I waited for the familiar beep of the GPS to tell me it was time.
Beeeeep.
One leg strains and stretches over the top tube, a shoe finds the pedal then ‘click’, we’re going forward! As I rolled down the street and lowered myself down towards the seat with the care and precision of a neurosurgeon, chamois met seat and went no further, I was sitting on a bicycle!
That time I kept up with Ben Barry on a bike
Free falling, spinning fast down hills, wind whipping my helmet strap into my face, cold air making my nose run, it was blissful. The road, my house, the dependant baby, it all disappeared behind me and for the first time in a month I felt like an individual. I wasn’t a frazzled and nervous new mum, I wasn’t carrying a fragile newborn, I was just another lycra-clad wanker on a bike.
I blew my nose onto the ground with vocal and forceful sniffs, I spat big stringy goobies on to the side of the road, I snorted, I did all the things that are not socially acceptable to do while you’re pushing a dear little child in a pram. The glorious ride lasted all of forty minutes, and when I got home little Miss was waiting for me and complaining that she was hungry.
Tired much? Should have left my glasses on.
I’ve said to myself and multiple others that I will do the Lake Taupo Cycle Challenge in November. I think that having a non-running goal to work towards will be good for me in returning to fitness. It takes the pressure of trying to return to running too quickly, and I won’t have time to run too much if I try to get bike fit.
I know that it will be hard to get back in to good form for running, and I don’t want to compare myself or my performances to what I was doing pre-pregnancy and baby. I know that I would feel a bit inadequate and disappointed if I was taking a long time to get ‘fit’ again, or if in fact I never got back to the same level of fitness.
I had a go on the wind trainer this week, I forgot how much NOT FUN AT ALL it is.
‘Make the most of them while they’re little’ they say to the new Mum. I’ll be making the most of them while they’re big, thanks.
I set myself up in front of the TV, baby asleep, house freezing cold. Conditions were prime for my first sweat session. Setback one was me playing a bike-packing movie on Netflix, ‘Pedal The World‘, to motivate myself. They were ambling along, taking in the culture and the scenery and really there was not a lot of action. So switched on Stop At Nothing and watched all the doped up cyclists smashing themselves up hill climbs and in sprints, day after day, year after year. Watching Lance go ball-to-wall was a bit more exciting than watching Felix talk about his feelings. Sorry Felix.
Setback two was that I managed to burn rubber in to the carpet. Twice. I blame the rusty old wind trainer for this unsightly mark in the middle of the living room. At least I know exactly where to set up next time (larger darker mark, slightly to the right is the perfect spot).
The baby did it.
Today we bought a new wind trainer! So Taupo needs to become a reality to warrant this purchase. I did worry that I would never use the bike but that turned out to be the best damn purchase ever, so I’m sure this one will be the same.
Bring on the 80km, or 160km, which distance I enter depends completely on peer pressure.
My Romance With Running 