2009 Polar Bear Ride!

[cheriann]

Our local group got together on January 1st for our annual Polar Bear ride! It was a great success again! Two chapters met up in our area and we had 17 people! Then we rode 60 miles to a nice family style diner. Along the way we met up with two other chapters local to the diner area. By the time we were ready to be seated, we had 32 people. This is SUPER great because is was SO DARN COLD! When we left our house it was 29 degrees and only averaged as high as 31 degrees for the whole ride.

I have a confession to make too....I USED to be very proud of the fact that I had never dumped my bike....until now... :'(

I was following behind Chaz and the Road Captain when we approached a sharp left turn we were taking, the kind that is almost like a u-turn AND we were on an incline uphill. I was cruising along, following Chaz into the turn. However, after Chaz crossed over, a car suddenly appeared over the hill from the other way and I had to make a sudden stop. I KNOW that is what messed me up!!! So, then I had to go into the sharp turn from a stop. I didn't pay attention to my handlebar position and I must have had it too sharply turned because when I started to throttle for the turn, my bike went down to the left, almost in slow motion.....fortunately I wasn't hurt and neither was my bike. It just fell over slowly on the crash bar. The thing that WAS hurt, was my bruised ego!! The people there were GREAT! A guy ran over and lifted my bike for me, two other riders ran ahead of me and blocked traffic coming over the hill from the other side.

I am still SO MAD at myself!!!! DUMB, DUMB, DUMB!!!!!

Well, I made a video slide show. YouTube made the pictures blurry now, but you can still get an idea of the amount of fine people that showed up to ride and break bread together for the New Year!!!