There goes the fear again

It happened again. All set for a bike ride, just about to start off, and



Yeah, like that. I just stopped. I got The Fear, whatever you want to call it. Outside my own house, on a quiet suburban street, beautiful day... just couldn't go. I've never bungee jumped or skydived, but it was kind of how I imagine that would feel, that first step into nothing, and something instinctively going "noooo!". It was very weird. I ended up going inside to get a drink of water (well, just to get off the bike), shaking like a leaf, and eventually Mark came out with me and ended up physically getting me going with a big push. Deeply embarrassing - I felt like a complete idiot.

Happily, the rest of the ride was incident-free and really rather enjoyable. I didn't stop much, but I had to once or twice at junctions, and after a deep breath just got going again. I'm trying to fix those times in my mind ready for the next ride, rather than dwell on the weird vertigo thing.

Overall, I did just over 40km with an average of nearly 24km/h (and a maximum of 40 :) - that's a nice little ride. I saw more pedestrians, cyclists and horse riders than cars on the country roads, too. Definitely a nice day for it - I'm glad I made it out there eventually!


Photo of me just to prove I got out :)

Photo: Vertigo by darkmatter, on Flickr