Good friends

 Cycling good friends are there when you need them. 

Doing all the work at the front as we were approaching the final sprint. A selfless effort that condemns their chances of taking the sprint. A selfless effort they make because they know you are hurt and demoralised after yesterday’s ride - I’d place a link to yesterday’s ride here but Strava Product Managers are missing this engagement possibility not allowing links to Strava in comments.

Anyway, the point is I took the final sprint. By a big distance.

So much so, that it made me suspect the whole thing was a bit of a facade designed only to make me feel better.

It worked. I feel better. I am happy again.

It is so easy to make a cyclist happy.

The ride in Strava: https://www.strava.com/activities/20446318509

Take care of yourself

Javier Arias González

Jorge

Unlike me he is an honest cyclist and a nice guy. He doesn’t sandbag, he is very easy to get friends with. 

If he is not a strong climber it is because his form is not there yet. If he is not the most endurance capable cyclist of the group it is because his form is not there yet. If you don’t see him at the front all the time it is only because his form is not there yet.

But he is working on it. And he is very open about how he is doing it. Cyclocross here, a gravel ride there, Saturday gang rides like today. With the required humbleness of the one that is not there yet, but knows he will get there eventually.

I like it. It makes me feel like a front row spectator of the magnificent spectacle of seeing someone getting better as a cyclist. A witness of the miracle that consistent and conscious training produces. That miracle that produces a strong cyclist that is impossible to remember how it wasn’t that strong in the past. 

I chose to call him Jorge just to make it harder for my native English speakers' friends to pronounce his name. 

The only thing I don’t like about him is that he is a stronger sprinter than me. Today I lost against him my third consecutive sprint in a row.

That overcasts all the good things I have said about him. Unlike him I’m not a nice guy.

The ride in Strava: https://www.strava.com/activities/20432613188/ 

Take care of yourself

Javier Arias González