I'm Back!!!

It's been a long time since I've written about my rides in and around NYC...a year! I have no good excuse except that I was not motivated to write.....but, now that has changed. I'm back! And I'm ready. It's been a year of metamorphosis for me and now I am feeling like I'm coming out the other side. A sort of rebirth. A sort of homecoming. I've been riding more than ever...and harder than ever. I am at the peak of my cycling fitness, feeling better than I've ever felt on the bike(s). I'm fitter, thinner, leaner, faster, and hungry to ride any and all terrain. I've been riding 4-6 days a week, burning down the miles on the road and on the trail. I've been riding for my life. Riding to live. Living to ride. That's what this blog is supposed to be about. Riding. Riding for fitness and good health....physical, mental, & psychological. I've been riding my skateboards a lot too. It makes me feel good. Makes me feel free. Like I was when I was just a boy seeking the freedom outside and down the street and the adventure of discovering that I could ride the drainage ditch or the empty pool or the skatepark or the half pipe or just cruise anywhere I wanted to go. That's what the riding does for me....bike, skateboard, snowboard. The riding helps me find that freedom in my soul and lock into that groove that propels me forward in life. The rush and the feeling of finding the flow and riding it out. It's there for the taking. For me, for you, for anybody. You just have to step up and grab onto it and push yourself, commit to it, and follow through.

Last week I took a friend mountain biking for the first time. I got the right gear together to make sure that we had all the right stuff so that this first ride would be a great one. My friend is already a great street rider/commuter and I knew that mountain biking would open a new window (Ventana) into cycling with the new technical aspects of trail riding and the benefits that it brings to street and road riding. The ride was a huge success and my friend was a natural on the trail! I felt happy and I felt proud that I could show off this new great world in the woods where nature is alive and us mtb riders are at one with the bike and the trail. It made me feel great! And I remembered how great it is to be turned on to something new and fun and good for you in so many ways...It made me envious that now my friend would hopefully embark upon this path and get the mtb bug and begin to ride better and faster and have more and more fun on each ride and take on small challenges at first as the confidence and skills grow and then take on bigger challenges and meet those challenges and feel satisfied and purified at the end of each ride. It's a lot like life. Wherever you live and whatever you do. NYC, Jamaica, California, Colorado, Oklahoma, Maryland, New Jersey, United Kingdom, Senegal, Ethiopia.... Bicycles are everywhere in this world. All anyone has to do is get on a bike and ride...find that freedom. Open your heart and mind and body. Let it in and let it out. At the end of my friends' first mtb ride I asked "when do you want to go again?" and the answer was...."soon". Then, 2 days later I got an email from said friend which read " I definitely want to go mtb riding again this weekend!" Then I knew I had done something good for both of us. And it made me want to ride too. And to discover new things in life. And to pass on the positive things that I've learned to others so they may benefit and enjoy and find more of the passion that drives us to live.

So...I'm back. And I'm asking you to do what I did. Turn someone you like onto riding. Whatever kind of riding you do....bike, board, whatever. Pass on the passion and watch what it does and how good it makes you and others feel. And you'll see it move through people as they spread that riding passion like you did and in the end this world will be a better place for all of us. Ride on....

Fresh Mushrooms at Rocky Point, LI, NY

West 19th Street, NYC