http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rWoD2sQ9LiU
There's no crying in bike racing.
There is no crying in mountain bike racing.
But in pre-riding the course? Different story.
On Saturday June 9th Bob and I headed out to Williams Lake to pre-ride the mountain bike course for the Williams Lake Classic the next day. On our pre-ride lap I broke that rule about not crying. The narrow singletrack was twisty and rocky-and after a day or two of rain, wet, and slippery. My wheels slipped everywhere. My bike tried to dump me every chance it got. I cried in frustration, then despair.
Oh, the shame.
I didn't injure my pride. It was in a coma.
After losing all desire to try, I walked some things knowing I could ride them. Bob tried being supportive but it was tough riding for him too. Mostly he left me alone then waited til I caught up. Finally he made fun of me. I DID laugh while I called him names and hit him. But after going over one lap of the course (about 5 miles) I had just about had it. My front brake line failed right after that lap and the chain wouldn't stay in one gear in the back. Minor mechanical issues compared to my mental ones.
Back in the parking lot, Bob worked on my bike. There we met Abbey Alexiades and her husband Alex, who had also been pre-riding the course. Abbey emailed me some time ago about maybe getting some mountain biking in together. We immediately commiserated about the course and even if I hadn't fessed up to crying the whole time around my red eyes would have made it obvious. I think we both felt pretty relieved not to suffer alone. Male stoicism works for men, but women normally band together and commiserate. Sometimes that really helps.
All four of us headed to Favata's Table Rock Tours and Bicycles (about 45 seconds down the road from the race course) to try and resolve our bike issues-my front brake line, Abbey's headset. The shop was open. Big sigh of relief.
Bob got my bike working with a little help. I didn't want to ride any more that day. But Bob did. So I went with him. The course had dried a tiny bit and so had my tears by then. We picked a few sections, rode them better than before, and called it a day. I began considering my options for Sunday's race while we navigated to our lodgings and dinner. I only had two:
1) Fake a flat/injury/mechanical early on and withdraw.
2) Suck it up, and TRY. Isn't that the point?
AS IF I'd pick option 1.
I'd already signed up to race. As long as I TRIED, I could live with myself.
I posted on Facebook the night before that I expected to build character on Sunday.
Last Christmas Bob's parents gifted us an overnight "Romantic Getaway" package at a bed and breakfast called Le Chambord in Hopewell Junction about 45 minutes from Williams Lake. This is a very fancy place featuring four-star cuisine, room service, multiple-course meals, and three-digit prices on the wine list. Our package included a 5-course dinner, "chocolates at turndown," and champagne in the room. The food tasted bewilderingly rich and the portions were huge. I think both Bob and I had a difficult time imagining how someone could clean their plate.
We shared an appetizer and dessert, skipped a few courses, and saved half our entrees for the next day. When we asked the waiter to opt out of dessert he said the chef already had it in the oven. So the waiter delivered creme brulee to our room and we shared it along with some of the champagne.
Granted, I didn't feel like celebrating after the day I'd had.
So how did the race go? I had a BLAST. So did Bob.
My warmup (pedaling around for maybe 15 minutes) did absolutely nothing to help my brain. I'd convinced myself this was a running race where I carried a mountain bike and would get to hop on and coast a little here and there.
By the time we lined up to start I felt simply resigned to riding what I could and hiking the rest. We had six women in our category 2 (Sport) race. We started with some female masters riders and a beginner or two and a very friendly group of girls they were.
We lined up to start, and I felt very calm. What would happen, would happen. On the whistle a girl in a pink Sturdy Girl kit took off and the rest of us followed after. I started out at a brisk but comfortable enough pace-definitely a few notches below "cyclocross start" but in the first section of grass and dirt road moved up to sitting right behind Sturdy Girl as we came around to the climb that started the course. I could already hear her breathing before we hit the climb. I shifted gears as we started up. Nope. One more gear to go. Chunk. My chain came off. I sighed, got off the bike and yanked it to the side of the trail. Not only had the chain come off, it had fallen down between cassette and spokes then partly INSIDE the cassette. And did I mention jammed?
Every other woman in my field passed by and disappeared while I tried to gently and then not-so-gently extract my chain. A few minutes went by and I kept chain-wrestling. Unsuccessfully. The Cat 3 men's field began passing by. A young man named Cameron in a blue jersey with a camouflage Camelbak took pity and stopped to help me. He struggled too but his more patient and systematic approach seemed promising. Meanwhile men kept passing by. Bob came riding up and asked if I was all right. I told him we had it under control and keep riding along, so he did.
FINALLY Cameron's patience paid off and he succeeded in prying the chain free. I thanked him a third time, threw a leg over my bike and got cranking while re-evaluating things in my head. while pedaling. Mentally I pointed at myself in the mirror and LAUGHED. The whole time my chain was stuck, all I could think was, "Man, I wanted to race. I don't want my race to be over NOW."
Yup. And yesterday I had looked for excuses/ways/reasons to drop out. Today my excuse had been handed to me on a silver platter and now I didn't want it.
I got moving. I caught up with Bob, struggled, got off my bike, ran some, got on. He told me to keep going, go go...so I did.
I pedaled my bike. I had FUN. A couple of miles down the trail I saw a woman walking her bike in one of the rocky, tough, wet-root scary bits. I rode part of that section, jumped off where I got stuck, and ran past her, remounted and rolled along. Obviously if one woman wasn't that far ahead, other women could be riding just around the next corner.
I kept racing and started to move faster. The monsters that wanted jump up and BITE me yesterday returned to being simple obstacles today. I felt calm and happy, and I figured out the rules as I went along-it just started making sense and working. I started using my head.
Here are my race rules:
1. TRUST YOUR OWN JUDGMENT. ALWAYS.
2. If you KNOW you can't ride something, just get off and run. If it's too bumpy to roll your bike, hook the saddle on your shoulder and run. While you're running, watch the people riding. See what works for them.
3. If you RUN where other people walk, great. You're moving forward and getting ahead.
4. If you see what you THINK is a good line, and you THINK you can ride it, commit to it and TRY. 5. If you don't make it, you'll probably LEARN what you should have done to get through. Maybe you'll learn that if you were a little more committed it would all have worked out.
6. If you DO make it-YES. Bonus points! Stoked! Winning!
Oh, and sometimes you will do things that look really stupid.
Sometime somewhere someone will eventually post a video from Williams Lake which includes embarrassing things done by several people on mountain bicycles, and features me nearly falling and flailing with a leg to catch myself and then nearly going off my bike sideways. Good to know that's on camera...
But I rode and ran and rode on. At some point I realized this course had beautiful flow to it, and I started looking to find that flow in my riding. I got little tastes of it here and there. So I pushed more and more into the second lap. I began riding things I didn't on the first lap and running faster where I still couldn't ride. I was passing other women. Some were masters riders, some were Cat 3s. It didn't matter. I knew I was moving up again. Everyone I saw on course had problems here and there and it made me feel much better.
Oh and THE CAVE was magical. Imagine on a hot, humid day you're racing a mountain bike in the woods. And all of a sudden the course twists and ducks down and you roll into this cool darkness where there are two rows of little red lights like a runway showing you the way out, and you can't see the floor but feel your wheels rolling along it. Just magical.
I began taking risks and nearly ate it countless times. For some reason it didn't bother me. I just got bolder and bolder. Granted I still followed my rules, but I could feel my comfort zone changing and I just LEARNED so much. At one point I nearly endoed on a very short descent because I momentarily stopped paying attention and my front wheel drifted left and slowed my bike. I started coming up over the handlebars. I grabbed a small flexible sapling to my left, halted the forward progress of my body and let my bike catch up as I redirected the front wheel. Then I let go and rolled down the descent. The guy behind me thought that move was pretty cool. I told him I was not a mountain biker, that I just have occasional ninja skills.
As luck would have it, I caught up with all of the masters Cat 2 women, and also caught and passed two of the Cat 2 women, and all of the cat 3 women. Ended up third in my field. I call that having a pretty good day because who knows how long I hung out on the side of the trail with my dropped chain. And WOW did I have fun.
So to summarize a few key points:
1. There's no crying in baseball.
2. There's no crying in mountain bike racing. Although there may be crying during the warm-up lap.
3. Once you're done crying, start using your head. It's that lump three feet above your ass.
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