I got back into biking a few weeks back, but today was the first day I was actually impressed with myself.

Someone suggested that biking to Shoreline from Capitol Hill was unreasonable. I assumed it was just a dodge, but I took it as a challenge, so I looked it up on Google Maps, which told me it was probably about 11 miles out, then called up Greg and said “Hey, want to go for a bike ride?” He said he just needed to finish his laundry, so I rode up to the U District.

We biked up to a little south of where Google Maps tells you to go when you feed it “Shoreline,” rode around aimlessly for a while, then headed back. We stopped for a sandwich in Northgate, then took a moderately hilly route back to the U District. Chris was at home, and reminded us that the Dead Baby Downhill Race was tonight–and that we should probably leave in about fifteen minutes if we wanted to go.

I was pretty tired by then, but we biked back up Capitol Hill, made it to the race in time, and biked from there down to Georgetown. There were probably something like 400+ bikes there, eating up the road and blocking traffic. (This was incredibly fun, and I may write more about it later.)

After the race’s after-party we biked back up to Capitol Hill once more–12th has a nice gentle slope and we were taking it slow. If Google Maps is to be believed that puts today’s ride at about 25-30 reasonably hilly miles. My usual daily ride is about 15 and it’s flat for most of the way.

I’m pretty much exhausted now, of course, but it didn’t kick my ass nearly as hard as I thought it would. And I could probably have kept going–possibly not up all of Seattle’s hardcore hills, but definitely most of the places you can get to easily from Capitol Hill.

All this on an old, fairly cheap (on the high end of cheap, though) mountain bike, with its fat knobbly tires and its way-too-heavy frame. It’s a good feeling.