What’s a great way to start a Saturday? At 8:00 am have your husband talk you into doing a mountain bike race that starts at 9am. It was a lot of fun especially since the last time I was on my mountain bike (or any bike) was when I did basically the same race for my 40th birthday (Sept 2010). As you can imagine, races have a slightly different vibe here and that makes it very casual and fun. I was happy to get there and see a few other women that I know also doing it just for fun. I knew I was in the right frame of mind when on the short ride to start with Matt he turns to me and says “Oh, by the way, you can’t use your front derailleur”. And I said “ok, no big deal. I can just use the gears I have”, but what I was really thinking was “Yeah! Now I have an excuse as to why I’ll be so slow”. Anytime I wanted to really shift in the front during the race I had to dismount and manually move the chain.
You wouldn’t believe how fast these guys can ride with their tire sandals on the Chinese phoenix bikes that have no gears. The competition.
It was really hot and I rode most of the way with the other Lisa (Lisa Peterson). We both ended up “in the money” which really means we finished mid-pack, but it’s so much more fun to say that I got 4th place for the women and won 20,000 T-shillings (about $15).
A couple that plays together stays together. Matt also won some money (12th place overall)
And you know how I’ve wanted to get a great picture of the maasai that had just gone through their circumcision ceremony with all of their ceremonial make-up? Well, it’s just as much fun to have them cheer for you during a bike race. The kids and families cheering for us from the rural villages was so also much fun.
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