I’ve been watching these three kittens run around for the past week and am amazed how agile they are. And how fast they are gaining coordination and speed. I compare that to the average human and we pale in nearly all aspects of athleticism. I’ve addressed this before, but it never ceases to amaze me.

On the ride yesterday, we just rode out a new rails to trails path that is here in the city of Topeka. It is a big deal around here because Kansas doesn’t have much public land. In fact, by percentage, Kansas has the least amount of public land with over 99% of the state being in private hands.

Anyway, while we were riding out the trail, I was thinking that it doesn’t seem that outrageous to think that the average person should be able get on a bicycle and ride the 15 miles out to the end of the path and back. But, obviously, that isn’t the case. I don’t think the average American could go out and easily walk for an hour. Something is wrong with that.

On Friday I saw a couple yard guys riding motorized fertilizers. I’d never seen such a machine. It seems that we’re coming up with more and more personalized robot type things to transport us around for doing just about anything. Riding mowers, golf carts, scooters for meter readers, electric carts for grocery shopping, the list is never ending.

Obviously, most of us do a lot to try to be fit. Athletically fit and generally fit. And no matter how much we train, most untrained mammals can take us to the cleaners in most all athletic endeavors. That is just the way it is.

But, the automation of nearly everything is definitely adding to our deficit. We don’t even expend any energy to manually roll up the windows of our cars anymore. I wonder how many calories we’d burn if there weren’t remote controls for our TVs? But, TVs don’t have buttons anymore, do they?

When I was in NYC a few months ago, I was surprised that nearly everyone there was pretty thin. Not necessarily healthy looking, but definitely not fat. It has to be the amount of walking the average New Yorker does.

I’m going to make it a point to start always taking the stairs when available. Especially after watching the USGP in Louisville yesterday and seeing how many stairs and run ups there are going to be in Louisville in January. If a few more people would do that just every once in a while, then we all be better off in the long run.

Bromont had such a heavy exercise schedule this past weekend that he already has to nap by 9 am this morning.

I got a Locust thorn in my tire on the ride yesterday. I need to seal them up with latext.

I made tapioca pudding yesterday. Nothing but tapioca, milk, egg, sugar and vanilla. I love it.

Plus, a pumpkin pie on Saturday. It is about the same for ingredients, but the crust isn't that good for you. I don't really care, because I love it too.

Yesterday was Bernard Hinault’s birthday. He is 57. Cyclingnews did a short article here celebrating a little of Bernard’s career. The name of the article was “Bernard Hinault: The greatest of them all?”

That was a nice thing for those guys to write. It really was. And I know that you have to come up with some kind of spin to try to get people to read your writings, but I’d personally have to disagree with the title.

Don’t get me wrong, Bernard Hinault was a very, very good/great cyclist. He did win 5 Tours and a multitude of other races, about anything he wanted to win if he put his mind to it. But to imply that he was the best cyclist of all ages, that would be a stretch.

I had the pleasure of racing with Hinault quite a few times over the years. Usually racing against him, but also as a team mate for a while. While I did witness some pretty great bike riding, I never personally saw him do anything that was super human, something that I couldn’t have done on my very, very best day.

I don’t have the knowledge to be able to compare riders from different eras of the sport. But, I can compare riders that were from the same era and Greg Lemond was a far superior natural. I know his results don’t outshine Hinault’s, but when I had the opportunity to observe, Greg’s feats were off the charts incredible. I saw Greg do many things on a bicycle that I thought were impossible. Sometimes when Hinault was in the race, sometimes not. Given, I’ve had to opportunity to race with Greg many more times than Hinault, thus having much more opportunity to watch Greg do his thing, but I’ll still have to stick with my belief.

I honestly think that Hinault would not have stopped racing at such an early age, 32, if Greg Lemond would not have come into the sport. Hinault saw, first hand, how great Greg was and saw the writing on the wall. I don’t blame him.

Anyway, I feel fortunate and honored to have been able to race bikes with both of those guys. They both showed me a much higher ceiling than I could have imagined on my own. Something to try to aspire to, even though most it of it was way beyond me.

Me, Thurlow Rogers and Hinault before the start of the 2nd to last day of the RCN in Columbia. Boy, don't we look happy? We'd all crashed a bunch and were just trying to get to the finish.

Bernard pulling with me sitting. We're not off the front here, but just the opposite.

Hinault in the Reno Criterium in the Coor's race, me in 2nd. He wasn't a big fan of crits. Here he pulled the first 5-10 laps continually, super fast, 30+mph. I won close to $1000 in primes because of his method of staying out of trouble.

Lemond and Hinault in their last Tour together.

And I'd go with Bernie to take Greg in a fisticuff for sure.