DFL But Not DNF

Wasn't sure what to expect for the outcome of this race. My training, while not non-existent, has been a bit sporadic due to work and family travel. On top of that, throw in a self-diagnosis of giardiasis that made it hard to keep any food in for the previous 4 days, I was thinking I'd be lucky if I finished. But who am I kidding - secretly I wanted to be sharing the podium with Cathy and any other NEBC woman who showed up (wouldn't that be cool?!?!).

Pre-rode the course with Cathy, Mike and Wayne. Knew right then I was in trouble - instead of being fun and easy, I was holding on for dear life and marveling how fast those guys rode so effortlessly. During the pre-ride, we came up to THE LOG (same from last year) that I didn't ride because the girl in front of me endo'd. I dismounted and was about to step over when Cathy chided, "Ride it, Teri!" So, I backed up the trail and rode it! There's even photographic proof (thanks, Mike! Pic on left stolen from Cathy's camera.) The course was fun, twisty single track. No rock gardens, no stream crossings, pretty much just plain fun. Loved it. Better than last year's beginner course which had a lot of fireroad.

I spun out in the sand at the start of the race but passed two women who got stuck in the stand at the uphill right turn. I held my place for the first bit (including dusting a few riders as I rode THE LOG -thanks, Cath!). By the time we hit the first uphill section, I knew I was toast. I had absolutely nothing. HR was pegged at 95% and I was going miserably slow and being passed. Wah.

During the second lap, besides feeling horrible I had to deal with the masses of men sport riders passing me. Not fun and really messed with me getting in a rhythm. I did manage to pass two of the older male sport riders. Gotta count the little victories. As I finished the second lap, all the men were heading for the finish line. Very hard to go out for another lap.

Third lap was all about survival and just finishing. Which I did. (Click the map to the left to see all the gory details). First sport XC race completed. Compared to my performance last year, my skills have really improved. No falls, rode everything. Never dabbed once. For me, that's an accomplishment. Just have to get the fitness back to last year's level (or better). Best part: seeing Cathy and Wayne on the podium (I missed seeing Mike up there as I had to leave early.) I think I have some new converts to MTB racing!

Desperate Measures

Our kitchen has been demolished for three weeks now. Many of you who know me know I really don't enjoy camping so this kitchen thing is pushing me to my limits. S is traveling this week and when she's gone, I like to slum it with a garden burger and tater tots for dinner. So today while driving home in a foul mood (they've canned my project at work and while they've offered us positions somewhere in the company, it's all very vague - need to find new job. Anyone need a software engineering manager who specializes in video? I found a outdoor instructor position at REI I thought was enticing. No, I'm not kidding.), I tried to cheer myself up with the thought of snarfing 20 mini tater tots. Uh oh. No oven. Time to improvise. A tin foil boat on the BBQ works very nicely. :) I may not have a job (more time to train!) but at least I have my tater tots.

Day at Sea

We spent it boogie boarding and rock climbing (really like that- I
think I've found a new sport. Fun!)

And So The Fun Begins...

Can't believe they make us do the lifeboat drill.

First Race of 2008

Yesterday was the King of Burlingame MTB Time Trial in Charlestown, RI. I signed up a few weeks ago when I realized that I'd be missing a bunch of races in April due to "Family Cruise". The race came a little early for me. My training hasn't been exactly to plan due to work/kitchen renovation/lousy weather/work travel and other events conspiring against me. I figured by signing up for this race, I'd put a stake in the ground and feel at least somewhat compelled to not embarrass myself.

Drove down to RI very early in the morning. Geez - last year, Beginner races were always at 9am. This race had Sport (my new division) at 9am and Beginners at 11:30am. What's up with that? Low clouds, slight drizzle, and temps hovering around 40. RI for me is synonymous with college. As I passed signs for University of Rhode Island, I had the little diddy we used to chant in the dugout when we played them pounding through my head : "U-R-I! U-R-I! U-R-I-N-E!" (And, of course, the response from their dugout was "What's the color of Brown? S-H-I-T". Potty humor at the college level.)

Arrived at the race a little too late to do a pre-ride of the entire course. Rode about two miles in and then backtracked back. The first mile had probably the most technical sections in it: a couple of rock gardens, a couple of stream crossings (about 1/2 wheel deep), a few logs but nothing terribly hard. There was one uphill rock garden that I tried a few times and rode successfully about 80% of my attempts after I figured out a good line.

Since it was a TT format, I didn't have to worry so much about being forced off my line, getting the hole shot, etc. My goal for the race was 1) finish 2) try to actually stay on my bike 3) catch the woman in front of me 4) don't let the woman behind me catch me 5) finish in 45 min. (I had looked up times from last year and settled on that being a decent time for me to shoot for.)

My division was small - only 5 of us. They started the men first - everyone going off at 30 sec intervals. Took about 30 min before they worked their way through all the guys and started the women. First woman goes off, 30 sec later it was my turn. I caught the first woman in probably less than 5 minutes in. About a mile in I hit the uphill rock garden. No one around, had the line I wanted and there was a small gap near the top behind two rocks. Wham! I whacked one of my pedals into the rock ("Your feet, Teri! Be aware of the position of your feet!" - I tend to talk to myself A LOT out there.) I didn't totally fall but kind of stumbled down the rock pile, lost momentum and then had to run up the rest of the hill. That's when the woman who started behind me caught me. Wah! Ok, get back on and use her as a rabbit. Go hard for her. Somewhere in the next mile, I got passed by the woman rider who started 4th. Grrrrrr..... But I could still see both of them ahead of me.

Around 3 miles in, there was a series of about 4 drop offs. None were truly nasty but they were about 2-3 foot drops. A single one is fine but given there wasn't much distance between them (10 feet or so?) they freaked me out a bit. Plus, I hit them with some speed since I hadn't ridden this part of the course so they came up a tad unexpectedly. I almost endo'd on the first one and quickly thought, "Better get my butt back for the next one." I over compensated a bit and went over the remaining ones like Missy Giove demonstrates in this picture here.

Now, one thing to be pointed out. Her back tire isn't buzzing her butt like this rookie's was. I have never been on that position on my mtb - not so sure I like having the saddle under my chest - and all I could think about was if I didn't get up, each of these landings were going to hurt. I also thought the tire had a great chance of wearing a hole right through the chamois and that definitely wouldn't be pleasant. :)

As I (successfully) landed the last drop-off, I said aloud, "Well...OK, then!" and my one happy moment was shattered by a "On your left!" as the woman who started last passed me. Plus, I thought she must have been laughing herself silly watching me negotiate that stretch. Oh, well. Onward.

The rest of the course was pretty much just fire road and a series of wooden bridges through a bog. I didn't have much left at that point. I just put it in the big ring and rode as fast as I could which felt fast to me but obviously wasn't good enough since none of the women who passed me could be seen ahead.

Finished in about 47 minutes. Haven't seen official results yet but I believe I finished 4th out of 5 starters. ~sigh. Welcome to the sport division. I did have fun, though. And it felt SO great to be out on the trails again even if the weather was nasty.

Details of the ride can be found here: http://trail.motionbased.com/trail/activity/5328072

Future Ski Bums of America

Ok, even though I have a race coming up in a few days, my training has pretty much been sporadic. Actually, that makes it sound bad. It really hasn't. I'm just having some trouble being a bit consistent. Lots of distractions. Last weekend the training schedule called for two long rides. Instead, I spent Saturday helping to pack up our kitchen for the remodel that was starting on Tuesday. Then my sister called and said, "Hey, we're going boarding tomorrow. Wanna meet us?" I should have been riding, doing some spring cleanup outside (like it's about time to take down the outdoor Christmas lights, don cha think?), etc. Instead, I headed to western MA for a day on the slopes. Sunny, warm, came back looking like a reverse raccoon due to goggle tan. :) Had a great time and the kids are good enough for the blues. A total blast to spend the day with them on the snow.

The 5 Year Milestone

Last week I had my annual appointment for my mammogram and check up with my surgeon at Beth Israel. Oddly enough, it was almost exactly 5 years from the day I had my first mammogram at 40 that I was certain I'd pass with flying colors but crashed and burned instead. I don't really stress about these annual checkups now, but this one was a biggie. 5 years means I no longer need to get all the additional mammogram views (top, bottom, sideways, magnified, stand on your head, etc. ;-) ) and my risk for recurrence while higher than the average woman, falls a bit.

S and I headed downtown early Thursday morning and headed for the radiology department at Beth Israel. Get undressed, put on one of those stellar johnnies, and hang out in the waiting room until they call you. I still think they should offer manicures and pedicures in there while you wait - make some use of the time! While I'm there for a routine mammogram, there are other women there waiting for more advanced procedures like getting a wire marker inserted before heading off to lumpectomy surgery. Having been in their hospital slippers before, part of me wants to say to them, "Don't worry - it'll be ok." But I never do because I remember how much I hated hearing that said to me at the time. I always wanted to calmly reply, "No, we don't KNOW it'll be ok. But we can hope." So sometimes I just catch their glance, kind of nod and give them a look of encouragement.

Finally they call my name. My technician let me look at the digital pics with her and while I certainly can't say I'm an expert in reading mammograms, I do know what my first ones looked like. Happily in the magnified version, I didn't see the the telltale clusters of microcalcifications which resemble a beautiful view of some distant galaxy and yet instill a feeling of dread. Headed back to the waiting room to nervously look at (but not really read) one of the magazines on the table while the radiologist reads the mammogram. Finally the tech returns, calls my name and instead of telling me to go get dressed says they need to take a few more shots. ~sigh . Brain goes into overdrive.

What did they see? Is it back? Which side is it on? What will treatment be like this time? Can I still ride my bike? Will I be ok by 'cross season?

How is it possible to think all that in a split second? The tech tells me they spent so much time getting multiple shots of the left side, they forgot to do a side view on the right. :) So we have some more fun with the mammogram machine, back to the waiting room again, and finally I can get dressed to go meet with the radiologist. She briefly comes out to meet me and tell me everything looks good! Yay!

Next, we head upstairs to see Dr. Troyan. She performed my lumpectomy and skillfully removed the area on the first try with clean margins. The mammo technicians always comment, "That Dr. Troyan does GOOD work." when they try to find my scar to mark with the wire for the mammogram. And she's just plain nice - I'll always love her for crafting a safe way to attach my lucky Abominable Snowman finger puppet to me as I was wheeled into surgery. Had a great checkup, took a few pics and was totally playfully ridiculed when asked if I had any complaints and replied that I had gained 3 lbs since last years checkup.

After the visit, we headed out for a day of celebration. Every year it's something different. Last year, spent way too much money at French Dressing but lingerie shopping after a mammogram/checkup just somehow seems very appropriate. This year, since it was even relatively warm out, we strolled upper Newbury Street. Bought a very appropriate tshirt at Life Is Good and some sweet recycled seaglass plates at Fiddlehead. Then lunch. Last year - fancy lunch at a wine bar on Charles St. This year I felt like slumming it and headed over to All-Star Sandwich in Inman Square. Falafel burger and huge plate of fries. Not the healthiest choice but yummy and washed down with a really good coffee porter from B.B.C.

A good day. No, a REALLY, REALY good day.

Mangia!

Last week we ventured out with our friends Mary & James to a new restaurant (for us, at least), Gran Gusto. We had a fantastic time and the food was really suburb. Almost all of us got the arugula salad with special truffles flown in from Italy (which our adorable chef shaved onto our plates at the table). I had a seafood ravioli which totally paled in comparison to Mary's asparagus and goronzola risotto, Serene's homemade hand rolled pasta with shrimp and James' crispy eggplant lasagne. Excellent wine, traditional dessert and a waitstaff that was attentive and fun. We met the owner as well and learned he has another restaurant in Ridgefield, CT (which happens to be where my sister lives). Now I know where to go when she refuses to cook when I'm visiting. ;-)

Anyway, go to Gran Gusto. And if you don't want a full meal, I hear their pizza is amazing as well.

Making The Most Of It

A little reminder to myself to stop whining over the weather. At least I can ride the rollers. This New York Times article reminded me to make the most of those workouts because you never know...life can change in a second.

Not A Happy Camper

I'm SO not happy. I DID drive the MINI today, top down, beanie, gloves and heated seat on HIGH. The sun felt good. Looks like it's going to disappear soon and I'm going to be doing some long sessions on the rollers for the remainder of the week. Wah!

I Hate March

Woke up this morning to yet another coating of snow on the grass and a frozen drizzle, sleet, nastiness raining down from the sky. The workout plan for today called for 2.5 hours at endurance pace with a few townline sprints thrown in the first hour.

~sigh

Headed to the basement for a few hours of fun on the rollers. I tried music, I tried TV, I tried imagining chasing down the leader in a mtb race. The only thing I didn't try was putting on a headset and phoning friends, family, anyone who could keep me from being bored. I really need better weather.

After finishing that, headed upstairs for my smoothie and toast. I was reading VeloNews while eating my breakfast and came across this ad on the left.

Ok - I'll ride rollers for hours and won't complain if it means I'll ride (and look!) like Gunn-Rita. :)

Not A Washout

Summary of IM session with Julie:
J: What ya doin' this weekend?
Me: Nada. S is surfing is CA, I'm off to Seattle Sunday.
J: Wanna go boarding?
Me: It's supposed to be a torrential downpour all weekend.
J: So what. We're still going. Bring snowshoes just in case.
Me: Game on! I'm in!

So I worked the early shift Friday and headed up to J & W's place in Conway. Unfortunately, they couldn't hit the road until 6pm so I had a 3 hour head start on them. My plan was to get up there, throw my stuff in their chalet and do a bit of outlet shopping in North Conway. After the 3 hour drive, I decided to grab some cheese, crackers and wine and spend the time on their couch with my book instead. It was a good choice - peaceful, quiet and restful.

Later that evening, we checked the forecast and thought, eh, no way we're going to be able to board - too much heavy rain in the forecast. Too much rain even for snowshoeing. Lunch and outlet shopping would be our backup activities.

Saturday morning, I wake up to more quiet. The Ski Chalet has a tin roof and I was expecting to be awakened by loud, drumming rain. Peek through the curtains and it's almost but not quite a blue sky. After a brief discussion and look at the radar, we decide we can get a few good hours in before it starts to rain heavily. Off to Attitash!

And so we had a great 5 hours of boarding. While I'm a more conservative boarder, J likes to push the envelope and talked me into doing every trail at Bear Peak. Double black diamonds and all. On one run through the mogul field, I let J go first. Made it look easy on a board. I head down, got 4 or 5 nice turns in and then rammed the nose of the board into one of the moguls. Flipped head over heels, landed on my feet (and board) only to nail yet another mogul directly in the side. Head over heels again. (Very reminiscent of my boogie boarding thrashing at Big Beach, Maui.) I landed so hard on my head I had to scrape snow out of the vents in my helmet. While sitting there in the snow, cleaning my helmet vents, catching my breath, I watched J down below. Sure enough, she did the same cartwheel. Soon I heard her laughing. Two of us, sitting in the snow, picking snow out of our helmet vents, laughing hard. Totally fun.

By 1:30, the rain started. We were pretty toasted anyway so met the others for lunch at the brew pub. Awesome day - fun boarding with friends and then some good food and beer. Made it all that much harder to leave Saturday evening in order to catch my flight the next day for Seattle. Blech.

Gracie Gets A Poodle-Leg

Both S and I were traveling last week so the felines were on their own from Sunday afternoon to Thursday evening. Apparently, they had a wicked house party because Gracie was still hungover when we returned home Thursday. (Our cat sitter didn't see her on Tuesday but that isn't highly unusual).

I took one look at that cat and said to S, "Something's not right." Super lethargic, wouldn't play with any toy (and this is a cat that will say no to treats if you put her favorite toy in view), puking up yellow stuff constantly and if she walked was all slinky, tail down, sad looking. We decided if she didn't look better in the morning, we'd take her to the vet.

My guess was she had eaten a part of a toy and it was wedged in her intestines. X-rays at the first vet showed nada. Same with the blood work - nothing unusual. The vet recommended bringing her home, keeping her quiet and bring her to the emergency vet for an unltrasound if she continued vomiting. As soon as we got her home, "Blech". Twenty minutes later, "Blech Blech!" Of to the emergency vet. The ultrasound showed nothing but by now the poor thing was super dehydrated so she had to spend the night there with an IV.

We got her back Saturday evening. She was pretty low key Sunday. By Monday she was pretty much back to normal. But due to the IV, she had one of her legs shaved in a poodle-like fashion and her belly shaved for the ultrasound. I'm happy to report she's back to terrorizing the household.

Running in Rainville

6 miles around Greenlake (Seattle) in 49 degree heavy drizzle. Still
dark at 7:15 am when I finished. Reminds me of why I moved away from here a few years ago.

Rollers Are A Contact Sport

Who knew? Today we opted for a workout on the new rollers. S and I have our rollers set up side by side with about a 3 foot space in between. Eighteen minutes into the workout, we're both imagining warm weather, nice beaches and palm trees while watching Step Into Liquid on DVD. Out of the corner of my eye, I see S swerve and hear, "Whoa! Uh oh!" Wham! She flies off the rollers to her right and takes me out off my rollers. We both just sat there for a few second, took injury status (we were both fine) and then started laughing. Thankfully, the new rubber floor cushioned our falls a bit. We still haven't figured out exactly what happened. She thinks she simply forgot she was on rollers, started looking around a bit and then just lost it.

I did discover a bit later that my bike bit me as I fell on it. Damn Ankle Biter! Got a bruise inside my knee as well. I'm almost feeling like it really IS mountain bike season. I've been missing my collection of bruises and cuts. :)

Stop The Madness!

I'm so DONE with the snow. Even me, who would love to be out snowboarding today had to take a pass due to dealing with taxes, bills and other way fun stuff around the house including shoveling 6 inches of the sloggy mess. At least we got a snowman out of it. If only he had a brain, he could do my taxes. I REALLY despise this time of year. The weather makes me crazy and I have to face the reality of how many $$$ I let W waste. Grrrrr....

And the snow....early this morning I could hear the plows going by which led to my nightmare of being stuck on the cruise ship in a snow storm. As I tried to get out of the snow, I was lost below deck as I searched to find the gym. Geez.....

In order to cheer up, I signed up for my first bike race of the season, The King of Burlingame MTB Time Trial. April 6th. A month away. Better get riding.

Finished Up The Floor

All the beveled edges were delivered yesterday. This morning I put them all down. I insisted on keeping the sample orange corner pieces, though. My special touch. :)

Data, Data, Data

Since the skies still insist on dropping the white stuff on it (Yay! - for riding on boards, Boo! - for riding on bikes), I've been doing my training on the Rollers For Idiots in the basement. I'm seriously starting to love those things. I've also set the Garmin Edge 305 up and have been using it with the GPS off for the inside rides. The graphs and numbers are interesting but I should really be training with a plan. Right now it's more like, "I guess I should go do an hour." but no specific stuff in mind. You can kind of see that in the graph above. 60 min ride. Got on and bored myself for the first 30 min (actually, I was mesmerized by a DVD of Madonna's Confession Tour ;-) ) Once I finally came to my senses, I thought, "Hey, why not throw in a few intervals." Kind of cool to see that reflected in the graph.

First Ride On The New Board

Headed up to Sunapee yesterday to try out the new board and bindings. OMG! What a huge difference! The new board is an Arbor Push and I picked up a pair of Salomon eLite bindings on sale at REI. Sweet! Absolutely perfect conditions - sunny, warm (40-ish), perfect snow and no lift lines. Only complaint is that today I sound like Cartman, "Ow! My ass!" due to moron skier who rode up the chair with me and then turned right in front of me as we got off. Clueless.

My initial impression came on the first chair ride up the mountain - it's significantly lighter. My left leg wasn't getting that "huge piece of gear hanging off my foot" sensation. Second impression, a fresh coat of wax makes a board VERY slippery (duh). Now I know why I had a bit of trouble keeping up with Frank and The Columbian on some of the flat traverses in Tahoe. I was slightly worried about doing tight turns with the board since it's 5cm longer than my old one. After I slid a few feet further than I expected off the chair (due to the new wax), I had a narrow trail to take ride to connect up to the runs I wanted to do. The board handled great. Hit one of the wider trails and pointed it straight down the mountain - way smoother than my other board at speed. Nice! My turns seemed better, the board tracked better and even on the steeps, held a great edge. No, I did not go into the terrain park. I am starting to think about building a small jump in the park near my house to work on getting some air and landings. I had a blast the few times I inadvertently went flying off a few small bumps. Would love to get better at it. Another foot expected in NH today. Hmmmm....throw the Treo in my pocket and head up again later in the week? Tempted.

Winter Riding - Inside

I couldn't take it anymore - the trainer was killing me with boredom. Generally, I can keep myself occupied for 1.5 - 2 hrs. I can even tolerate Coach Troy. But given that I have trouble focusing in general, I would really space out on a trainer. Looking for a bit more excitement, I decided to switch to rollers. I didn't think S would appreciate me throwing a set of rollers in one of the upstairs hallways so decided to go for the new e-motion rollers from insideride.com (a.k.a. rollers for idiots). These rollers float inside a frame on giant elastics so the bike is allowed more movement and really does feel like riding on the road. It's also way easier to stand out of the saddle and sprint (I would definitely biff it big time doing that on normal rollers.) I'm really enjoying the challenge of learning something new. I've done about 50 miles or so on them so far and it's making my inside training way more fun.

The new rollers also inspired us to clean up the basement a bit and put down a new workout floor in the area we've been using as our mini gym. Almost finished - just waiting for the bevel edges pieces of the flooring to be delivered.

More Winter Riding

Hard to believe, but I haven't boarded with TCB (a.k.a. "Frank") in over three years. We kept talking about it but never got it together. Finally, the stars aligned and due to business travel to the west coast, we made plans to head to
Tahoe for the weekend.

Gotta love packing a snowboard bag for a business trip. No, Gracie didn't managed to get stuffed in there. Fortunately, United hadn't instituted their new policy of having to pay to check a second bag.

Wanting to avoid the crowds, we decided we'd play hooky on Friday and left San Jose Thursday evening. The Sports Wagon was stuffed with both of our snowboard gear, my 10 days worth of luggage, Frank's suitcase and spin stuff (she had to teach spin class before we headed out.)

We drove as far as Auburn that night. Well, Frank drove, I slept. Spent the night at the local Best Western which had make-your-own-waffles (including regular and individual mini waffles) for breakfast. Yum.

After breakfast we headed to Sugar Bowl. It felt SO good to be out of those long days of meetings followed by dinner/events with coworkers. It was a perfect day - sunny, blue skies, warm and little wind. This was my first time at boarding there. The snow was decent snow (yes, I'm getting spoiled by all the snow on the east coast this year) and it was great to try out some new trails. We kept it easy and I managed to not let Frank into talking me into hurling myself down some of the black diamond cliffs - we'd save that for later in the weekend. ;-)

The Columbian joined us on Saturday since he was also out west for our work meetings. We decided to board Homewood because we'd had a previous epic day there and plus the views of the lake from the are just incredible. I'd forgotten just how incredible when on my first run down High Grade I caught a glimpse of the lake out of my peripheral vision, felt like I was going to fall right off the slope and into the lake and almost biffed it. IMHO, that is the most spectacular view from any ski slope I've ever encountered.

Awesome day of riding. Got my own chicken sandwich for lunch (usually split one with Frank - it's tradition) but we were both too hungry. And it seems that all the leg work in the gym is paying off. My legs lasted through most of both days of boarding without a problem. :) Followed up the day with some pinot and great Italian food at a small place called Fiamma's in Tahoe City. Yum.

Winter Riding - Part Deux

Ok, winter riding - THAT'S what I'm talking about! Valentine's Day brought me something extremely fun. My new Arbor Push. I've been lusting over this board for a few months. And despite what the Columbian says, I don't just buy myself whatever toy I want. In fact, I blew my snowboard dispensable income on new rollers (post on that coming soon) instead thinking I'd get more use out of them.

Thanks, Sweetie! Let's ride! :-*

Winter Riding

Being an East Coaster, I'm pretty much used to working out during winter months. I've slogged hundreds of miles through snow and slush and over ice while training for the Boston Marathon. I like playing in the snow - snowshoeing, XC skiing, and snowboarding. But typically, when it comes to riding, I call it quits when the roads have been made slick and narrow by our winter storms. Add to that the ouch factor of a 20mph headwind and fuggetaboutit - I'd rather go to Abusive Spin Class (I REALLY need to write a post on that.)

But - riding in the woods - totally different game. No headwind (I can't ride fast enough to generate one and the trees block the natural wind) and with the snow and ice, it's so damn hard I'm generating more than enough heat to keep me and any squirrels close by nice and toasty.

In order to facilitate some of this off-road, crazy idea of riding on snow and ice covered trails, I sprung for a new set of Nokian Extreme 294 studded tires. My bike looks totally buff with them (even with its girly pink new derailleur cables I put on this fall.)

Of course, after I finally mounted them I had to fly off to the 70 degree weather of the Bay Area and saw people riding in shorts. I wondered yet again why we subject ourselves to living here. It's gotta make us tougher and better riders, right? ;-)