If You Don't Go When You Want to Go...

"Riders ready..."

I have a personal New Year's resolution this year, but I am also going to have lots of them for cycling, as well. Some of them are pretty straight-up training goals, like adhering to a fully periodized riding program (per Joe Friel) for the first time.

Others are a little more incendiary. I plan to participate in my first cycling race in 2009. That's a pretty exciting one, init?

The thing that makes me most nervous about that one isn't the idea of losing, or winning, or crashing, or even having no #$?%&! idea what I'm doing. (Those do make me nervous, by the way.) The most scary thing about it is that I'll like it.

I already spend quite a lot of time training on my bike, or fixing my bike, or buying stuff for my bike -- or thinking about training, fixing or buying stuff for my bike. I have a somewhat obsessive personality, and if I jump into this whole culture around bike racing, I could be done for. There's so much to learn, so many ways to improve, so many events to try, books to read, goodies to buy.

Yipe!

I've been waffling about this a long time. I've gone over and over the (perfectly sound) reasons why I shouldn't try racing, things like "I'll be 45 in a couple months, I'm older and more tired and more physically fragile and more busy, and involved in a really good marriage I'd like to keep that way, blah blah blah blah blah..."

Yeah, right. And then I look at those perfectly functional guys in their 50s and 60s still rippin' up the field every weekend. And I know in my secret little black heart that I am envious of them. End of whining.

Then there are other reasons, too, some of them strong, most of them not. All of them have buzzed around in my head for a year or more.

On the other hand... I can't stop thinking about it.

My wife and I were watching a fun little soap-bubble of a movie last night called, "The Fastest Indian in the World." Anthony Hopkins plays a quirky old gearhead whose life consists of upgrading his beloved 40-year-old Indian motorcycle. (Hmm, constant absorption in a two-wheeled vehicle... sound familiar?) His dearest dream is to travel with it from his native New Zealand to Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah, to see if he can break the land speed record. It won't surprise you that a heart-warming series of events allows him to go. As he's leaving, he turns to a young boy, a neighbor who's worked his way into the old man's heart. He winks at the boy and spits out a homespun Kiwi aphorism: "If you don't go when you want to go, when you do go, you'll find you've gone."

Corny as it was, it hit the inner nail right on the head.

If I continue to flip-flop about racing, the excuses I mentioned will get more true every year. Or, I could admit to myself that my constant picking at this question tells me there's something in there for me. If I love it -- or even just can't let go of it -- then there's got to be something in it custom-made for me to learn from, grow by, chew on. Of such stuff is the righteous life made. And if I don't like it, at least the question will be settled. But I have to try it.

I talked it over with my wife, to make sure I had her support. I made certain promises (e.g., not to disappear from her life, not to get too whiny if I get hurt or injured, that kind of thing) and the deal is on. (She's a real good'un.)

So, there's a big one for Aught-nine. I guarantee you you'll be hearing more about this. Stay tuned.

"Go!"

Take the Poll!

I know the topic isn't the freshest news by now, but I'm certainly still thinking about it, and I really want to know what you think. My readers' worldview is important to me.

It's in the upper part of the right-hand column. It takes one click.

Oh, yeah: Happy new year!! I'm off to ride the rollers, because it's been in the single digits most of the day and most of the roads are ice and snow. Kind of hard when the sun is blasting; I have to remind myself once an hour, "Just because the sun is out doesn't mean I can ride!" Almost every day, I have this moment where I can feel spring, way off in the distance... but coming. It's like it's here for a moment, laid over the ice and snow: A clear black ribbon of road, green everywhere, and a warm breeze, whispering, "Come ride for hours!"

The Velophoric Year

I love this cartoon. The first time I saw it, I was standing in the service area of my former LBS (much lamented), where it was posted on the wall. (Click on the graphic to enlarge it.)

The beauty behind the humor, of course, it's that there's so much truth to it. Cycling can be much, much more unpleasant than work. And I'm not talking about the long hill-climb or final interval unpleasant; we all not-so-secretly love that pain, or we wouldn't train in this crazy sport. I'm talking about frustration... dark nights of soul... cursing the day you first rode a bike... That kind of thing.

Now, Velophoriacs don't come to this blog for sarcasm or hopelessness. I fall into the "What you put your attention on, grows" school of thought, and, being a therapist myself, I try really hard to walk the talk of staying positive. But it's also important to be real, and part of reality is that even the best parts of life have some extremely crappy moments. Sometimes, especially the best parts of life. So, given that New Year's is right around the corner, and in the spirit of making light of the darkness, I'll do a classic "Year in Review" type piece by re-capping some of my low points for the last year.

In the 15 months since I started training again (after decades away), most of my frustration has come from injury, as is well documented here on Velophoria. Maybe four or five of those months, at most, have been free of worries about or pain from recurrent knee problems. And there were far too many rides cut short, the second half of which I usually spent cursing and grinding away in pain, trying to spin and get home with as little further injury as possible. Also, lots and lots of riding hours spent soft-pedaling, wondering when I'd be able to discover my limits again. Better than not riding at all, but pretty gray winter days, nonetheless.

There were sources of frustration beyond injury, too. I haven't had the money to get the equipment that reflects the type and level of riding I do. I also don't have the money to get a proper, full-scale bike fit, which would probably alleviate the recurring injury. There have been repairs during which I have crouched sweating and cursing next to my bike, running through the directions for the fourth time and still not getting the right results. There were the six or eight weeks of barely riding while recovering from classic overtraining (written up here). I was caught in numerous thunderstorms of biblical proportions 20 miles from home (like this one, for example). The one in Acadia National Park was just miserable, though the first half of the ride was blissful.

I was pretty frustrated when I first moved out here to beautiful Western Massachusetts, because the terrain is way more hilly than eastern Mass; my average speed went way down and I felt like a much weaker rider all of a sudden. That's changed a bit since then, and I've become a stronger rider for it, but I'm still adjusting to the hills to some degree.

Finally, there's the frustration that comes from being a fan of the sport and having to constantly adjust one's head to the "new normal," all the doping, the scandals, the politics and idiotic moves from governing bodies. I took that one head-on in June, in one of my favorite posts ever.

Now, I could sit here and spin all these frustrations into positives, and it's no surprise to loyal readers that each of these challenges has produced its own excellent crop of rewards and lessons for me. I won't bore you with that here. I was just looking through old graphics files and came upon an excellent Calvin and Hobbes, and decided we could all use a laugh, before we turn the calendar over and bump up into Base 2. Happy Season!