Let's Hear It for the Boy

I admit it: I have been unfair to mountain biker boyfriends and husbands.

I have previously expressed the opinion that males are incapable of teaching their female counterparts how to ride a mountain bike well.

"Tell me to pedal harder one more time. I dare you."

This assertion is not entirely without reason, however. I have heard many stories of women being put on mountain bikes with pedals to which they are not accustomed and taken on rides too far above their skill level at the time. Further evidence of this practice can be found in abundance on Craigslist, where countless posts begin with some iteration of “I bought this for my girlfriend/wife. It only has a couple of rides on it.” (Subtext: “I took her on a ride that was too hard, she cried, and now she never wants to touch this bike again.  I’m not going to get any action until I get rid of it. Help.”)

Nonetheless, I owe a serious debt of gratitude to my husband Mike, without whom I may never have thrown a leg over a real mountain bike on an actual mountain. I can give myself some credit for persevering after my bumpy introduction to trail riding, but Mike is largely responsible for fostering my enthusiasm and creating opportunities for me to push myself to become a pretty decent rider.

Now I’m at the level where I’m teaching other women the fundamentals of mountain biking. I love that they continuously get their minds blown by basic skills that they’ve been doing wrong for years. In some cases, they have been told to do the exact wrong thing by the gentleman callers in their lives; for example, when I told a woman in Hurricane that she should neverevereverevereverever grip her saddle with her inner thighs when coasting or riding downhill, she said her husband had told her to do it. I asked for his phone number so that I could yell at him.

"You have a specific set of very terrible skills..."

But you know what? He may be solely responsible for getting her on that bike in the first place. I would take her being on a mountain bike with terrible form than have her never get on two wheels at all. And who’s to say that my metaphorical trial by fire of being thrown into the metaphorical deep end with only a metaphorical punctured rubber ducky for support didn’t make me the capable rider I am today?  We’ll never know. What I do know is that Mike is my forever riding buddy, and that makes me happy.

Even when he's a zombie.

So to be fair, I will update my assertion that husbands and boyfriends are abominable mountain biking coaches to this: Spouses/partners/lovers should not coach each other.  For whatever reason, we just don’t want to hear advice coming out of the same face that we wake up to in the morning. Go to a VIDA clinic or on group rides with your friends for progression and encouragement. Then when you go shred with your honey, the only things you need to say to each other are “Nice job on that gnarly switchback/sick drop/smooth non-technical doubletrack” and “Your buns look scrumptious in those shorts, darling.”

I just saved your relationship.  You’re welcome.

So let’s hear it for the spouses and romantic partners who introduced us to a world of awesome that we may not have discovered otherwise! Thanks guys and gals.  We heart you.

smoochies!

(And, of course, to those of you who picked up mountain biking on your own: you go on with your bad selves. You rock.) 

And everybody watch this video, because it's funny: