Bikefrog

Given that today was the last day that studded tires can legally be on cars in Washington State, I figured I better take my car to Les Schwab to have my tires swapped out for the unstudded variety. The Tire Guy told me that it was going to be two and a half hours, I decided to just walk the 3/4 of a mile home and go on a bike ride with my 13-year-old son Xander while I waited.

Xander’s bike needed more air in its tires, so he started filling them up. Unfortunately, he snapped the tip off the presta valve on one of the tires so he ended up having to replace the tube. Since this was his first time replacing a tube on his own, so it took about half an hour.

We decided to take the short 13.5 mile Valley Grove road route since our time was limited today. I told Xander that maybe we should take it easy on the way out, since we had a pretty good tailwind and we did not want to wear ourselves out before we had to fight the headwind on the way back. Well, “taking it easy” didn’t last five minutes, and soon we were both racing past each other.

Usually, I can hold my own downhill and on the flats, but Xander has the climber’s build whereas my build is closer to Santa Claus. I somehow managed to beat him up the last hill before we were about to turn on Valley Grove road.

There was a bunch of gravel at the intersection which I navigated through without any difficulty as I was riding my mountain bike. Xander threw caution to the wind as he took the corner a bit too fast (given the gravel and that he was riding a road bike) and he ended up taking a spill. Xander a few bruises and scrapes but nothing was broken. After his obligatory, “Ow! Ow! Ow!” commentary, Xander’s first question was, “Is my bike alright?” The bike also had a few minor scrapes but luckily it got through the ordeal intact.

We decided to ride back the way we came, since it was a little bit shorter. No racing ensued, but Xander remained in good spirits, as you can see in the picture below:

Overall, Xander had a few good biking firsts: First solo tube change and first significant road rash.