When you should not ride a bike

It's a beautiful day today; happy Valentine's Day!

Yesterday, Salem and I rode up to Congamond to spectate the NEMBA ice race thingy. My right knee has been bothering me with increasing intensity and frequency lately. I think it's because I smashed it into a root and rock about a month ago. Some think it's because I have new shoes and the cleats aren't lined up perfectly. I lean towards the smashing, because I've never had cleat or float problems affect me while walking and this has started hurting me while I walk. Maybe that whole "shoes ruse" thing is correct, but I'm still blaming the root and rock. I almost didn't go yesterday because of my knee, but I shift my cleat a bit and I seemed ok riding to Constitution Plaza. So, we journeyed up and back. It was very nice. My knee started complaining a bit, but then when kinda numb and everything seemed ok.

This morning, there was a mountain bike ride at Meshomasic State Forest that Salem to which alerted me. My knee started to hurt me last night a bit, but I hoped I could either sleep it off or scare the pain with whiskey.


I woke and it was ok, but the more I used it the worse it felt. I debated going some more and sort of took my time getting ready, perhaps to erode my resolve. The bike still went in the car and was driven over to Glastonbury. Taking my time brought me there about ten minutes after the 9:30am start time of the ride, but I made out only one set of tire tracks, so I thought I might be able to catch up. That very quickly became an impossible proposition because my knee hurt so bad that I was only able curse at myself for getting out of bed. None the less, I followed the tire tracks for a good four miles before eventually giving up at riding back to my car. Ugh.

So, the lesson, I think, is that you should not ride if it hurts.