The Philippine Outdoors

Few days ago, I told my wife, Leila, that there will be a cross-country race at Tagaytay highlands and asked her if she’s interested to join. To my surprise, she feels so excited by joining the race (ahem, napasubo yata ako….:-) ). It will be her first race if she intends on joining. So, I told her to practice first to improve her handling skills and stamina and proposed to ride the malipay trail since it is the nearest trail for us. Thus, we set the schedule to hit the trail, and that is today.
She’s not that good on mountainbiking, yet. Afterall, she’s not a regular weekend rider and it is her only 2nd ride for this year. But what’s good is she’s eager to try it out and willing to learn.

Lei tackling the uphill at the back of portofino village

We hit the trail at around 7:30 AM. At this time, the trail wasn’t crowded by mountainbikers, yet. But after a few minutes, they kept coming and the numbers grow. Malipay trail is a bit technical especially for a newbie lady mountainbiker. In return, she pushes her bike a lot. Of course, as a gentle husdband, i have to share the burden by helping her pulling the bike or ride it to the point where i feel she can start pedalling. haha….
How great it is that the sport I embrace was also embraced by my other half (my wife). It feels great that we share the same passion, and doing it together.
There is still a lot to improve on Lei’s mountainbike handling skills. I usually noticed that her front-end(handlebar) wiggled a lot due to her hesitation to hit any trail obstacle. I won’t push her hard, as I want her to feel comfortable.
Anyway, she got her first fall down(semplang) in this ride. While I’m taking a video of her on a slightly downward slope track, she pedalled a bit fast for her (but still slow comparing to my criteria) and when the track goes a bit upward, she leaned back, and wasn’t able to contol her handlebar. And viola! She slipped, and her right shoulder first hit the ground. I’m not expecting it to be hard, but she felt the pain. Until now while we’re back at home, she move her neck with caution. She still has the pain. In return, I gave her some soothing massage…

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