First ride of the year. Also, first ride in 3 years without pain.

On Sunday, I went for a bike ride. And it was awesome. It was very short - perhaps 30 minutes. It was mostly gravel trail, with a bit of single-track and some nice rooty climbing, so it was super easy. But it was perfect. Perfect because my leg didn't hurt within five minutes (which is its usual habit) and even perfect-er because it didn't hurt after 30 minutes, or the next day either.  It truly was the first ride I have had in three years that didn't hurt in any way. Which, on Sunday, was nearly tear-inducing - but ended up being beer-inducing, which is to say, I celebrated  in the sunshine with a cold bottle of, well, beer. 

And, even better, on Monday morning, I had a great workout, which involved split squats and glute bridges and hamstring curls and other exercises which would have ordinarily caused serious leg complaints following a ride (or run) - but didn't - which was cause for more celebration. This time without beer (workday, after all).

I am hopeful. 

I am, actually, more than hopeful. I am energized. I am totally thrilled to have found a way back into biking - which I really must credit to the workouts designed by Steve Neal. His insistence on perfect form and on developing genuine core and hip stability seem to have made all the difference. 

And so today I am going for (oh me oh my) another bike ride. Similar to Sunday's ride (in fact, probably identical). My toes are crossed that it will be another pain-free ride.

What the dog did. 120 lbs of canine enthusiasm.

To give you an idea of how big Jake is, compared
to me: Yup. We're just about the same size.

Meet Jake, the world’s best dog. Well. He's the best dog in the world most of the time, anyway.

So, we’ve talked about how I hurt my leg originally. Then came the two subsequent injuries, about a year and then six months after that – both thanks to Jake.

Jake has a thing for squirrels. And we, every day, put three paw stamps on the daily walk sheet of his life. These walks generally take place in the park that is directly behind our house. About 100 metres from the back gate of our yard, there is a nice stand of rather mature maple trees. Squirrels love these trees. And, every day, the moment Jake’s nose goes beyond the back gate, he is in super-dog-squirrel-hunter mode. I know this, so he doesn’t get to have room on his flexi-lead until I too have scanned the landscape for squirrels. But there was this one day (there’s always that one day) when I wasn’t paying attention so much, and Jake shot out of the gate in pursuit of a squirrel, right to the end of the 16 feet his leash would allow, which was, naturally, about 200 feet short of where the squirrel was (sigh). He yanked me off my feet, quite thoroughly, and of course I went over on my RIGHT ankle. More sighing.

So that hurt a bunch, and ended up being a minor sprain. Which added to the whole right leg problem, now extending down into my ankle.

The next incident was much the same, except Jake spied not a squirrel, but rather a most unusual dog – a German Shepherd Corgi cross (honestly, the oddest looking dog I have ever seen) – I am pretty sure Jake didn’t actually perceive it as a dog, which led to his great excitement to get closer and check it out. The problem this time was much the same as the squirrel incident, except I managed to start running with Jake, but just couldn’t quite get the big guy under control, and tripped. On the same right ankle. Sprain. Again.

The whole point of the ‘what the dog did’ story is that my right leg has really suffered its fair share of injury over these three years. I’m sure these two incidents have helped create this everlasting inability to keep it stable. The good news is, my ankle doesn’t hurt anymore – but that took a really long time.

And Jake is getting a lot more mellow about squirrels, and we haven’t seen that odd-lookin’ dog. Just don’t lets talk about groundhogs, and we’ll just pretend that I have Jake under control all the time.

Woof.