There's a long, steep hill to climb from "better than average" to "one of the best." Anyone who has tried to race knows this.
The rider is both driver and engine. These two functions operate separately more than you might realize. The pilot knows what should be done, but the machine doesn't always provide it.
"Scotty, I need more power!"
"She's givin' all she's got, Cap'n'! If I try to get more out of her she'll explode!"
Nothing feels better than digging deep and finding what you need. If you choose your companions right, you can have that feeling from your teens all the way to your 60s, perhaps older. It's all relative, of course. I'll be riding to work after a couple of days' rest, feeling pretty spry because I'm pushing the big ring and down around mid-cassette in the back. Then I do the math and realize I'm pushing what was my early season lowest gear in the 1980s.
The reflex to attack never goes away. The ability to do so definitely diminishes. So far, however, I have been able to exploit terrain, wind, and the scavenged draft of passing vehicles to meet the most immediate desires, like making a green light at the only traffic light on my commute, or sticking an elbow into the flow on Center Street inbound to work.
The sight of another rider sparks that hunting instinct. In an individual time trial, a competitor chases the clock, but also anyone who started earlier in the queue. In a road race, riders make their attacks and others chase. This can go on for miles. In short-course races the same thing happens on a smaller scale. The snake eats its own tail as the attackers thread through the stragglers. Officials will pull slow riders from a short course, just to clear up the clutter. I hated short courses and was usually pulled.
Racing balances a paradox: to be competitive, you have to go to the edge of everything: traction, strength, endurance, power, fear, without losing control and taking out a bunch of other riders. If you seem erratic, out of your depth, other riders might actively seek to weed you out. Sometimes, they would do it anyway just because some of them decided that you didn't belong with them. You have to risk everything without looking like you're risking anything. Push the margins of control without revealing that you're at the margins of control.
Over time I discovered that I didn't like racing as much as I liked training, and that I didn't like actual structured training as much as I liked just riding how I felt on a given day. Racing was too disciplined and becoming increasingly scientific, not to mention expensive. That's only gotten worse.
There are more than 50 distinct shapes of disc brake pad, not including ones that have already been discontinued. There are several different pad compounds, which might be described in different ways, such as: metal, metal ceramic, metallic, semi-metallic, organic, resin, or sintered. Some brake rotors can only take resin pads. But good luck finding a quality bike with rim brakes anymore. Everyone assumes that disc brakes are entirely superior in all respects. So what happens if you're out in East Bumfleck and you need a pad shape that the local shop doesn't have? Hope that Amazon drone delivery can find you? Stock up on pads and make sure they're always with you? People with electronic shifting go on trips and leave their chargers at home. You think most of them will remember to have brake pads in their kit? And that's only a fraction of the complication and expense. In general, a racer will be out there flinging around a bike that cost anywhere from $2,000 to $10,000, come what may.
As Lance had ghost-written for himself in the 1990s, it's not about the bike. But the bike is the machine that extends our capability and desire into motion. Racing eats people and equipment. You can't refuse technology and remain competitive among real racers really racing. And among the dubs and dilettantes you are even less safe. Those riders are liable to blow up at an inopportune time, like the middle of a tight corner, a crowded field sprint, or a twisty descent. Or maybe it's you who blows up.
Heart rate lags behind effort: you launch the sprint and the old ticker might not hit full bpms until you've leveled off. Pain lags behind effort: you attack that climb or push the pace because you feel good, and the legs feel like lead the next day. Each day of the commuting week gets harder anyway, because the demands of traffic management and hilly terrain make it impossible to avoid some level of destructive exertion. The commuting life is a stage race.
Riding alone, I get to choose when to let up. As soon as another rider is on my wheel, I can't slow down when I feel like it, because I might be that guy who sits up and takes out a whole paceline, or blows out of his line in a corner and sends the riders outside of him over the median.
A rider ahead presents a different prospect. It's fun to chase them down -- if you can -- but then like the proverbial dog, what do you do when you've caught the car? When I see another rider on my commute, I'll close distance to see if I know them, but if I don't it gets awkward. If I've caught them, it's because they're going slower than I want to go. To maintain my pace to work, I need to pass them. But then I look like the old fart on a heavy bike trying to prove a point. I'm not, really. I'm just trying to be on time to work, or get home for a shower and supper.
A couple of weeks ago, I chased down a rider on 28, thinking it might be a guy I know whose commute sometimes coincides with mine. When it turned out not to be, I still hung back there because he was a sparky racer type maintaining a decent pace. But then we hit a little jumper of a hill, and the guy stood on the pedals and dogged right out, rather than shifting down and pushing into it. Over the crest on the flats beyond, he didn't really pick it back up. On the next little drop, aided by the draft of a passing pickup, I sling-shotted around him.
"Late to work!" I said on the way by, to excuse the maneuver. I figured he would counterattack or get on my wheel, but when I finally could glance back he was nowhere. It seemed odd, since I was riding those high-to-me gears that are low to anyone young and in shape. Maybe he was just being nice to the elderly. No time to muse, I had to keep going to work. It was true.
As I noted in the previous post, I pay attention to the feedback from my body. You hear all the time about people who "died doing what they love." That can be poetically beautiful, but what I really love is remaining alive; getting home to a nice supper and some snuggling with the cats. Hanging out with my spouse when she's in town. I got lucky in the genetic department, but I know better than to think I'm immune to aging. I know other riders who were looking good until they developed issues that seem to stem from pushing too hard for too long. That urge to attack will lure a committed athlete to dig too deep and scrape something down in there that doesn't heal.
I keep hoping there will be time later to plan the purposeful "last hike" or other exit strategy, when I feel more like exiting. But one never knows.
No comments:
Post a Comment