Tim Danner

I first rode the MS150 in 2005. Since I was new to road biking, fear motivated me to take the training seriously. When you’re new to the sport, 180 miles sounds like a long ride. Still does. I rode well in excess of 1,000 miles to get ready that year. And it went fine!

Last year, I no longer had the fear. I still trained, but it was definitely less than the 1,000 miles some recommend. Nevertheless, I opted to ride “The Park,” which is the more challenging route for the first half of the second day. It was awesome — the best part of the ride, hands down. Less crowded, more scenic, and lots of fun little downhill curves. Those come with uphill sections too, but let us not speak of those.

This year I not only lack the fear, I have an exciting new job in Austin. All this travel and excitement has put a serious crimp in my training. I’m not totally flabby — I’ve been jogging a fair amount — but the bike odometer is looking pretty pathetic. A couple of weeks ago I went to ride with the Northwest Cycling Club. I went with the 16–18 mph group and only kept up for 4 miles. Very discouraging.

I concluded that with only 6 weeks to go, I was irretrievably far behind. I told Ed, our team captain, that he should offer my MS150 spot to some other more diligent rider. (This year MS150 registration capped before Thanksgiving so there are lots of people who want to ride but don’t have a spot.) He responded with words of encouragement and pointed out that lots of people on Team Trinity have been slacking off this year.

A bunch of my teammates were doing the 40-mile Tour de Houston, so I registered to see if I could keep up with them. No problem! It was a nice ride despite the fact that the route was crap this year. (The first two years of the Tour de Houston went through West University, River Oaks, The Heights, and other scenic inner loop neighborhoods. This year’s ride featured a trip down State Highway 3 past a Waste Management landfill.) I told Ed that I would keep my MS150 spot after all.

All of this is just a long way of saying that I expect riding the MS150 to be much more challenging this year. On the idea that endurance events for charity attract donations in proportion to their difficulty, my ride this year should be more worthy of support. Right?

The National MS Society does good work helping to fight a horrible disease. The MS150 bike rides (there are three — the Houston to Austin ride is by far the largest) are basically the sole fundraiser for the Lone Star chapter. Last year they raised $11.4 million. According to Charity Navigator, a service that rates charities based on their financial efficiency, they spent 91% of this on program expenses: research, education, and support for MS sufferers. Charity Navigator gives them four stars out of four. The four star rating mainly means that they do a good job of spending donations of their stated mission rather than administrative expenses (fancy offices and Land Rovers) and fundraising (spamming the world with direct mail and other crap).

The goal for this year is $11.5 million with the same number of riders as last year. My goal is $400. Please donate. Thank you!

On May 18 at 7 P.M., Houston cyclists will gather at the Hermann Park/Zoo parking lot and ride in silence to downtown and back in honor of cyclists killed on the roads.

• March 12: Continental Airlines Cycling Classic (results: 64.0 miles, 15.5 mph, very challenging)
• March 19: Tour de Houston (results: 37.1 miles, 15.0 mph, a cakewalk with potholes)

And probably others, but that’s what I’m registered for now.

Because New Year’s Day fell on a Saturday this year, my employer elected to give us Presidents’ Day off rather than January 3^rd. I decided to spend the day on a solo bike ride. For Christmas I received a copy of Best Bike Rides in Texas, with a foreword by pre-Tour de France Lance Armstrong.

For today I chose #38, the Washington-on-the-Brazos Challenge, which is a 42-mile loop starting and ending in Chappell Hill (a tiny town on 290 between College Station and Brenham) and passing by Washington-on-the-Brazos state park. The book describes the terrain as “gently rolling hills.” I suppose that would be considered accurate, but as my cycling thus far has consisted entirely of ultra-flat coastal plains it was definitely a Challenge for me.

Today’s ride also impressed on me the benefits of riding in a group. When it got windy, I wanted nothing more than to be able to tap my hip, say “out,” and drop back behind a double paceline of fellow travelers/windbreaks.

I had hoped to get out from under the Houston gloom, but it didn’t work. The weather was just as overcast out there as it was here. You can’t escape February that easily.

Even so, the ride was much more pleasant than how I spend most of my Mondays.

Friday night I went to hear Abi Tapia sing at a coffee house with a friend from work. A good time was had. Subsequently, Eric talked me and a few others into heading to his house to watch The Notebook. Since it was already 11, I figured that would cost me my Saturday bike ride, but why not? When the movie was over, around 2, I drove home and decided to set my alarm anyway.

In an uncharacteristic move, I actually got up at 6:30 when it went off. This week the group was riding the “Wee-Mart route,” a 60 mile circuit through League City, Dickenson, and Alvin to a little run down convenience store in central nowhere. On return (tired!) my trip meter read 61.82 miles, which is (only!) 99.5 km. Maybe next time.

Last October, the Rice Young Alumni newsletter announced an informational meeting for a Rice MS 150 team. It specifically declared that beginning riders were welcome. I hadn’t been on my old mountain bike for any distance since the end of biking HPER (a phys-ed class at Rice) several years ago, but that sounded like fun. So I went to the meeting, confirmed that beginners were in fact welcome, and decided to buy a road bike.

After a bit of shopping, I picked a 2005 Trek 1000, which is an entry-level 24-speed road bike with an aluminum frame and a carbon front fork.

One of Carrie’s classmates suggested hooking up with the Space City Cycling Club, an informal group which rides from the Bay Area Blvd. Bike Barn every Saturday and Sunday at 8 AM. They leave as one big mass, then break up into various speed (from as slow as 16 mph up to the hard core 24 mph guys) and distance (usually 40-60 miles) groups.

The downside of living near the middle of a sprawling city is that I have to drive half an hour to get somewhere with long, low traffic roads for a good ride. This means that I have to get up by 6:30 to eat something, load the bike on the car, and drive out there. I’d rather be sleeping then, but it’s probably good for me.

And it’s worth it–I’m having a good time and noticing improvements in my capabilities. According to my cyclocomputer, so far my longest distance is 50 miles and my fastest average speed over a full ride is 18.5 mph. I think that was a 40 mile ride. When nice weather–which I define as morning temperatures greater than 55°F and a sky more blue than gray–returns, I expect it will be even better.

In the end, the Rice team didn’t get enough takers to actually happen, so I need to find another team [note to self: do this soon]. In addition to the MS 150, I’m planning on doing the recently-announced Tour de Houston.