A very good Saturday...

Today was a good day, worked with a chainsaw most of the morning cleaning up the broken limbs from the snow, then took a bike ride to the library and had a nice lunch with a new friend and fellow cyclist. Later I rode the bike to visit with the inlaws and rode back home. Riding in the cool evening air is one of my favorite things...but I'm pooped now! Sleep should come easy tonight...ZZzzzzzzzzz

The Final "History"

Here are some miscellaneous photos to get you up to date with Bicycle Bill! I have purchased used bikes for my wife, children, their spouses, my grandchildren, my sister, and a couple of friends. We've been on a number of group rides, and I have accumulated my share of spandex and lycra! I'm still going to do the rallies, and plan to do the century at Wichita Falls for many years to come, but I have also discovered the great benefits of using the bike for transportation. More on that later....

A little more history

We rode a couple of more bike rallies on the mountain bikes, but it was becoming clear that if road bike riding was to be the sport we wanted it to be, we would need to move up to road bikes. I knew very little about bikes at all, certainly nothing about road bikes, but I started reading about bikes both in printed literature and via the internet. In October 2006, I went to an estate sale and ran across this 1983 Trek 510.
I absolutely could not pass it up, since the price tag was a measely $5.00! I knew enough to know that Trek was a quality brand, and the bike had obviously been well cared for; it had all original components, right down to the Avocet leather seat, and even the leather was in great shape!

I updated the stem and bars, put on new tires and tubes and eventually upgraded the saddle. I started taking longer rides on this bike, and in 2007 completed my first century at the Hotter 'N Hell Hundred in Wichita Falls, Texas. It was difficult, and I could never have made it without my son T.J. pulling me along, but I did finish it, and that was when I really felt like I could call myself a "cyclist", and I also felt like I was fully recovered from having stents put in my heart the year before.