The Chase Instinct

It's been a couple months since I parked my road bike and took up the little hybrid-cruiser upright-position town bike. It's been cool, just piddling around, not doing any big rides. To be honest, that seacoast century was kind of out of control. One-hundred-twelve miles or whatever it was in one day was about as much cycling as I'm interested in doing. You might say it cured my addiction to cycling.

But the other day, I was cruising around downtown, on the upright-bike, when I saw someone on a road bike ahead of me. I was taken with an almost overwhelming instinct to chase. I was powerless to do anything about it though--it would have been impossible to catch him on my bike.

Chase is an instinct. Animals have it. If you ever see a lion in the wild, don't run. That will set off its chase instinct. CAKE, they say. Chase, Attack, Kill, Eat. The best thing to do in the unlikely event of seeing a lion in the wild is to act casual. Bored, even. Food isn't casual, it isn't bored. Lions know this.

So the next day, I woke up early and knocked out the old loop, down route 1 and up 1A. It felt good. My cardio has gone very awry, but the first stirrings of winter training have begun.