Nut Huggers and Tea Bags

I had some interesting e mail exchanges with some amigos today about bike shorts. It basically boiled down to the fact that some of us (me) pretty much ride in good ol' spandex nut hugging shorts/bibs all the time, and other folks (them) pretty much wear baggies all the time.

A couple e mails were exchanged, some analogies were made (Shrink wrapped tea bags?? Really?? I was eating!), some lines were crossed, and some laughs were had. All this from one question about the in-stock status of a certain pair of bibs.

When you get down to it, it's what you feel comfy in and what gets you on the bike that matters, but I still couldn't help but think of my own bike short evolution. It sort of went like this...

'92- Jean shorts. HOLY TAINT RUB!

'93-94'-ish- Baggy mountain bike shorts and maybe one pair of "in-between" baggies. They were form fitting, but not true spandex.

'95-'05- All spandex shorts. I can't wear baggies anymore. I don't even own any. There are none in the house.

'06 to present- Bib shorts only. I can NOT wear regular spandex shorts anymore. I love no plumber butt and the added belly retention ;) Have you ever been in a race and get stuck behind a dude with his big white hairy ass staring at you? Damn I hate that. Get some bibs! I will say I want to fly into rage when I see folks wearing bibs with no shirt on... ON THE TRAIL! WTF? Or OVER their shirt! Again- WHAT THE F*CK??

Now I'm not one these folks that can just waltz around in their spandex and not feel like a dork. I still wear over pants to the trail head, or when leaving from work and I'm rarely seen in my neighborhood wearing my spandex. It's not that I think I look bad, I just don't like to deal with the comments. Plus there are women and young girls in my neighborhood, and when you bring "the goods" to the table like I do... let's just say there could be repercussions. ;) JESUS! I'M JOKING! I'd just feel like a knob in my hood.

Anyway, yes I'm a proud spandex wearing race weenie. Nothing against baggy wearing folks. God knows I get crushed by a ton of them on the race course and my local trails, it's just a personal preference. Who knows what the future holds? Maybe some short running shorts will replace my bibs?

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I was crushing (note sarcasm) the big ring with an hour of 50 RPM, BM inducing hill climb intervals. These are some of my favorite intervals to do. It's about as close as I come to "strength training" with equipment. It adds a nice mix to the week's work outs. No ride tomorrow. Saturday looks like it will be either the trainer, a snowy rail trail ride or maybe even a hike. I have a feeling snowy rail trail will win. But we'll see.

Plans are getting firmer for the January 31st Snotcycle race at Leesburg. I'm 90% in for it. 32 Riders in Sport?? WTF? HOLY OPEN CLASS! I'd like to do the Expert race for the length, but I don't want to set and "expert" precedent for XC racing, and risk term "sandbagger" being used when I race XC at the WVMBA races in Sport Vet. But 30 miles of racing on a course I will be doing a Solo at in a few months is sort of tempting to risk said label. Hmmmm.

Later.