We reached the top of the Zen. Due to the climb and the allergy induced liquid filled straw I was attempting to breath through, I was gulping air like a drowning man. I dropped my head to the handlebars and attempted to drop my heart rate. ProZac came up behind me in much better shape followed by Travis who was spinning his way up the mesa, seated, comfortable.
I looked at his bike and thought to myself, “Why do I do this?” There was no apparent response other than stupidity. However, almost immediately, and for no known reason, my brain switched to my personal mantra as of late, “If you can’t ride it on a rigid singlespeed, harden the fuck up!”
My breathing slowed and we sat and enjoyed the morning light as it scattered across the St. George desert.
I’ve had many moments recently where the all-too-familiar landscape somehow speaks to me. St. George is my hometown. I’ve been rocking out on a bike in this area for almost too long and yet, lately, the landscape has engulfed me. Even though I haven’t left, it feels like it is inviting me back home, opening itself to me and letting me back in. There is something special about this place.
http://www.cyclingutah.com/april/Cycling-Utah-April-2015-Issue-counter.html
It’s about this time, at the top of the Zen that my choice in bikes always seems like a bad one. My legs are pissed that I just made them work that hard to go such a short distance and my shoulders and wrists begin their whining about what is inevitably going to happen. About the time my lungs stop screaming, the conversation dies and we are back on the bikes for the downhill.
Travis jumps out in front and I follow. He pulls away from me without ever pedaling. I let my arms and legs go actively limp turning themselves into what could be described as hard Jello. The bars and pedals jolt up and down being absorbed as best as possible by the articulation of my joints. There’s nothing more to it. I either absorb it and deal with it or get bucked off, which has happened plenty of times. This time it does not.
We hit Billy Goat Hill. It hurts. There’s some hopping going on, but after dabbing a few times already, I’m pretty motivated to make it stick. Somehow I pull it off and reach the top. Once again, I collapse onto my handlebars, lungs screaming, legs pissed, arms numb.
It repeats in my head, “If you can’t ride it on a rigid singlespeed, harden the fuck up!”
I’m not evenly completely sure where the phrase came from or why it keeps repeating itself, but it’s there and I can’t deny it. I ignore the warnings from my body and jump in line behind Travis. My mind focuses in on the 15 or so feet in front of my wheel.
The downhill is a constant barrage of letting go, clenching up and slowing, readjusting the wheel, letting go. Through my peripheral I can see my arms blurred in the up and down that they are being forced through.
We drop out the bottom and then hit the Lower Zen or maybe it hit us, it certainly felt like I had been kneed in the balls. It wasn’t there. I didn’t have it in my legs, in my head. Why? I don’t know, maybe I haven’t been riding enough. Maybe I’ve been riding too much. Maybe it was the stupid fucking bike I chose to ride, it’s not like I don’t have options. And there I am on the one bike that has no bells and whistles, no extras to make the ride easier.
And maybe that’s the point. Maybe that is why the landscape has been speaking to me so much lately. Returning to the way I learned to ride, rigid, in the place I learned to ride, SG, it is like coming home feeling the landscape through every rock, drop and turn echoing through my body. It hurts, but like everything that is worth doing, the hurt only leads to euphoria and a sense of accomplishment when it’s over.
IYCRIOARSS,HTFU
