04.23.2014 | 7:34 pm
A Note from Fatty: To read Part 1 of this race report, click here.
In the first installment of this story, I noted that I am a liar. But the truth is, everyone who races is a liar. We lie to ourselves. Whether you’re racing people in real time — like I was in the 6 Hours in Frog Hollow — or racing against other people’s best time-shifted efforts — like everyone does with Strava — you’re lying to yourself.
You’re lying to yourself that the race matters. You’re lying to yourself that the race is somehow an indicator of how fast you are. When, in truth, the race doesn’t matter, and your relative speed is only an indicator of how fast you are in comparison to other people who are also lying to themselves.
And you know what? Those lies facilitate an incredible, wonderful truth. By telling yourself (and believing) these lies, you put yourself in the position of going as hard as you honestly can. And the feeling you get when you do that is as perfect and genuine as any emotion there is.
Racing may in fact be the most beautiful lie we can tell ourselves.
Great Escape
I had lied (to myself) incredibly convincingly during the five mile climb. I believed myself when I told myself that I was having a banner day. And why shouldn’t I believe that? I was passing people. I felt good and strong. I looked back and saw that the people behind me were getting further behind.
And then I began the downhill. On my hardtail singlespeed (34 x 19, for the three of you who care about singlespeed gearing), with only the barest whisper of front-end suspension (a Rock Shox SID).
The thing about the Frog Hollow downhill is that it’s fun. Wildly fun. So wildly fun, in fact, that as you ride you are in real danger of forgetting that you’re racing at all, because the hard-baked desert singletrack is just so good and fast. And fun.
But I did not forget I was racing. I pedaled until I was going so fast that pedaling didn’t make any difference (this happens at a lower speed on singlespeeds than on geared bikes, alas). I was setting up my turns so that I could keep as much speed as possible.
I did the first big drop without slowing as much as I was comfortable with, went into the second drop with speed, and came to the bottom with just a little too much speed. I washed out into the sand at the outside of the turn, put a foot down, and kept going.
“I don’t think anyone could take this part of the trail any faster than I am,” I lied to myself, and then looked back to see if anyone was catching me.
I couldn’t see anyone. I was staying clear.
I got to the most technical section in the race: go over an iron arch, down a rocky ledge, execute a quick hairpin turn, more drops, another hairpin, and then go.
I rode it — not fast, but I didn’t put a foot down. By doing this, I passed a person who had taken a more cautious approach to the ride.
Then, down through the dry river bottom, back up onto singletrack, and more go-as-fast-as-you-dare racing.
The Not-So-Great-Capture
I could say that I don’t see how anyone could catch me when I was going as fast as I could, but that would be a lie. The day before, as we practiced the loop, Heather routinely disappeared far in front of me.
“But that’s because she’s on a geared bike,” I had lied to myself that day. Which didn’t really explain anything, because Kenny was dropping me even faster, and he’s on a singlespeed geared almost identically to mine.
The truth is, they were faster than I am because I am slower than they are.
And as I hit the second section of the singletrack — the same kind of terrain, but not as smooth, thanks to traffic on the trail when it was muddy — I could hear two riders approach as they caught me.
At first, I said nothing. “If they want to get by, let them ask me to yield,” I thought.
I kept going; they stayed behind me, saying nothing. “I guess they’re happy where they are,” I thought.
I got to a brief, rocky series of climbing ledges. It’s good stuff. Stuff I like. I weaved through some, wheelied over others, and just powered up some.
I heard the riders (I could hear there were two) behind me. One had a drivetrain problem as he went up one of the rocks — sounded like his chain dropped off — and he stopped, forcing the person behind him to stop.
I didn’t look back. I rode on, alone again, nobody on my tail. I was racing, and racing is very important.
And then they were with me again. Pfff. But still not asking to go by.
Finally, I decided that they might just be being too polite to ask if they could go by, so I asked them myself. “Do you guys want to get by?”
“No,” one of them called out.
“Yes,” the other called out.
“I guess yes,” the first amended.
“I’ll pull over right, pass on my left…here!” I shouted, slowing and veering to the right side of the briefly-wider singletrack.
A guy on an orange bike — geared, so not someone I cared about — went by, saying “Thanks” as he went by.
And then, right on his tail — on what I now saw was a fully rigid singlespeed Spot — was Mike (whose name I did not yet know).
“Nice pass,” I said, respectfully.
And — right then — I stopped caring about all the other singlespeeders in the race. It had narrowed down to just this guy on the Spot, and me. I was (for now) faster on the uphill, he was faster on the descent.
Were we fighting it out to decide who was in fifth place and who was in sixth? Or fourth and fifth? Maybe even second and third?
I didn’t know. And, really, I didn’t care.
But I did know other things: First, I knew I was in a battle. And second, I knew that this battle was important.
Sure, I was telling myself a lie.
But it was as true a lie as I’ve ever told myself.
And that seems like a good place to leave off ’til tomorrow.
Comments (20)
04.22.2014 | 1:05 pm
A Note from Fatty: Thank you to everyone who has left encouraging messages and helpful feedback about doing the 100 Miles of Nowhere. It’s been just what I need; we’re definitely going to do it. I’m going to put together the necessary logistics (keeping it simple, though) and will have more to announce soon.
Prologue
I am a liar. You can go ahead and think about that previous statement for a moment and decide whether you want to believe it or not, but I promise you: I am a liar.
Here, for example, is a lie: I signed up for the Six Hours in Frog Hollow just for the fun of it.
The truth is, I signed up because I wanted to beat people. To feel, once again, how extraordinarily awesome it is to be the fast guy.
I — secretly, of course, and buried under twelve tons of self deprecation — wanted to show that I am not slowing down. That when I said that last year was the fastest I’d ever be and that I’d never be that fast again, that I was only joking.
And in short, I wanted to prove that I have not aged, and also that physics (I’m about eight pounds heavier than I was this time last year) do not apply to me.
Is that so much to ask?
About The Race
The Six Hours in Frog Hollow, for most people, doesn’t last for six hours. Indeed, the amount of time a person or team spends racing is almost guaranteed to not be six hours.
Also, you’re unlikely to spend any time whatsoever (leave alone six whole hours) in the hollow of a frog.
Which means, I guess, that the race name is almost purely ironic.
So here’s how it works.
You — either as an individual or a team — start doing the thirteenish-mile course at 9:00am, and you do as many laps as you can.
Once you cross the start/finish checkpoint after 2:00pm — five hours (not six) into the race — your race is done. So if you come through at 1:59 you can go out for another lap. If you come through at 2:01, you can’t.
Got it?
Oh, and here’s what the elevation profile looks like:
Ride uphill for about five miles, then mostly downhill for about eight. Rinse and repeat, as fast and often as possible.
The Race Begins
The thing is, for a racer like me, the course takes very close to an hour. So while I had great hopes that I’d finish five laps in under five hours — thus putting me in position to do a sixth lap and probably get on the podium — I really didn’t know whether I’d be able to do it.
The morning of the race arrived. I was racing in the Men’s Solo Singlespeed category. The Hammer was racing in the Women’s Solo category (she’s putting the singlespeed aside this year). And in honor of Easter, she had decorated her helmet (and worn socks that say “Cute Chick” on them):
What do you mean it looks like I’m sucking my gut in?
Starting together, The Hammer and I broke into a run at the Le Mans-style start.
Quickly, The Hammer developed a lead. Which expanded considerably by the time she got to her bike, jumped on, and took off.
I grabbed my own bike and gave chase.
And then my chasing gave way to marveling, because I was not gaining any ground on The Hammer.
And hey waitasecond, what am I doing behind my wife during a race at all?
I stood and attacked. Which made me tired, but otherwise had no effect.
So I backed off to the pace that felt right to me and resolved myself to my new reality: I have a wife who is at least my equal on the mountain bike.
Meet the Cast of Characters
A mile or so of dirt-road climbing gives way to singletrack and fairly limited options for passing for the next mile or so.
So I watched The Hammer disappear in front of me, while I pedaled in a slightly slower group, knowing that there were too many people there for me to bother trying to pass all of them. I’d have three miles of steepish dirt road climbing to do my passing soon enough.
I looked a little ways up ahead and saw two guys on singlespeeds. One on a reddish bike that I didn’t really recognize, and one on a nice-looking steel Spot. That guy on the Spot, I would later find out, was Mike, from Boise, Idaho. I’ll explain later how I learned his name and where he’s from.
And why we wound up getting our picture together — like we’re best friends, instead of guys who were racing against each other — at the award ceremony after the race:
I love getting ahead of myself in these stories, dropping hints and stuff.
For now, I decided to mellow out and not worry about passing anyone for now. I’d attack the singlespeeds hard as soon as the road turned steep and up. Make a statement with my climbing, and then hopefully be gone before anyone had a chance to make a counterpoint, as it were.
My Big Move
And sure enough, once the big climb of the loop came, I stood up and did what I’m good at: rocking a singlespeed side to side while dripping sweat and snot off my nose onto my front wheel.
I caught the guy on the reddish-orange singlespeed. “Hey,” I said. Which, considering that blood was spurting out of my ears and eyes, was pretty darned friendly and outgoing of me.
Then I caught The Hammer. Yes, I am crowing about catching and passing my wife. “I love you, Beautiful,” I said as I caught her.
I want to be very clear on how sweet I was as I passed. Why? Because this will figure in to the story later on, that’s why.
And then I caught up with Mike. Knowing that I was only barely faster than he was on the climb, I wanted my pass to leave him unable to respond. So without announcing myself, I just settled in behind him, catching my breath. Gathering my strength.
Then, just before a steep grunt of a climb, I stood up and gave it everything I had. Attacked hard.
And it worked. I had dropped him. He didn’t try to stay on my wheel.
I didn’t know what place I was in, but I knew it was better than it had been a minute ago.
I got to the summit of the climb, turned right onto the fast downhill singletrack, and rode my brains out, happy to know I had seen the last of Mike. I also figured — less happily, but also a little bit relieved — that I had seen the last of The Hammer ’til the end of the race.
In both cases, I was severely wrong.
Which is where we’ll pick up in the next installment of this story.
Comments (22)
04.16.2014 | 11:33 am
Is it OK if, for today’s post, I drop the “beloved goofball” act and just tell you what’s going on in my life and what’s on my mind?
It is? Oh good. Thanks.
First, I’m employed again. I’m working at a startup, and it has me traveling pretty often. And when I’m not traveling, I’m still working. Really hard. To the point of not having a lot left over, actually, timewise nor mental-energy-wise.
That’s OK. It’s a startup; I knew I’d be busy.
But while I can live with the likelihood that I’m going to be continuing to be posting less often here than I used to — at least until I’ve got my new job figured out and a reasonable working cadence established — I’m pretty stressed out about one thing that I’ve dropped the ball on:
The 100 Miles of Nowhere.
I love the 100 Miles of Nowhere, and love that it raises a ton of money for great causes (my intention has been for it to raise money for Camp Kesem this year).
But I haven’t done a single thing about getting it planned. I haven’t got a date. I haven’t contacted sponsors. I haven’t got a t-shirt design even started.
So. I have a few questions. Answer honestly, using the comments section.
- If I were to put on a 100 Miles of Nowhere this year that happens in the Autumn (instead early Summer, as is usual) would you want to do it?
- What features of the 100 Miles of Nowhere are actually important to you? Which is to say, what would you feel bad about if it weren’t part of the event?
- Racer stories posted in the blog
- The race plate
- The race t-shirt
- The swag (energy food, energy drink, coupons, water bottle)
- The fundraising
- The silliness and absurdity of it
- The timing of it (i.e., Summer vs Autumn)
- What do you think of the idea of the 100 Miles of Nowhere having a minimal amount of swag, but a fairly major prize being awarded to a random participant?
- In a least-swag scenario, would you still want to do the 100 Miles of Nowhere if the only thing you got were a t-shirt?
I want to make the 100 Miles of Nowhere happen. And one way or another, I’m going to. Your feedback will help me get a sense of what’s important for me to get started on, and what I can let go, just this once.
Thanks,
Comments (163)
04.14.2014 | 1:06 pm
I’ve been planning to do an update on the Fatty / Beeminder Weight Loss Challenge for a while now. In fact, I was excited about it, because while it’s not like I’m high up on the Leaderboard, I’ve been doing really well. I mean, check out my progress on my Beeminder chart:
As you can see, I’ve been dropping weight, nice and steadily. Sure, it bounces around a little from day to day, but I’ve been staying on the yellow brick road. And for the past few days, I’ve even been on the low side (which is the “good” side) of the yellow brick road.
In fact, I had hit my halfway point: 164 pounds. Nine down, nine to go.
Thus, I had every intention of doing a little boasting today.
Spoiler alert: there will be no boasting today.
Disaster (AKA The Hammer’s Birthday) Strikes
Last Saturday was The Hammer’s birthday. She turned 46. Now, I know some of you are thinking, “What are you doing, revealing her age on your very public and award-winning blog?”
Well, if The Hammer were normal, that might be a problem. But she’s not normal. Not even remotely.
For her “birthday party,” for example, she wanted to go on a big mountain bike ride. So we did. A 41.7-mile, 6,000 feet-of-climbing mountain bike ride.
The Hammer got seven new QOMs. And she looked like this afterward.
When you can ride like that and look like that at age 46, you don’t need to hide your age.
Anyway, after the ride, we decided that between it being her birthday and the big ride we had just done, we deserved to go out to eat. So we went to one of our favorite restaurants, Settebello, where we met The IT Guy and ordered the following:
- A Caprese salad
- An Insalata Grande
- Focaccia
- A Margherita pizza
- A Settebello pizza
- A Vico pizza
- 3 Diet Cokes. Seriously.
That is, for three people, a lot of food. But, you know, we had ridden hard. We were hungry. It was — as I have mentioned –The Hammer’s birthday.
So we didn’t feel too badly about it.
Then we said goodbye to The IT Guy, and drove back from SLC to Utah County, where we decided that — just this once — we deserved to get dessert.
So we went to The Chocolate.
Usually (yes, we’ve been there a few [cough, cough] times before), we split a dessert: almost always a white chocolate macadamia nut Cazookie, which is a giant fresh-baked cookie in a pan of its own with a scoop of vanilla ice cream on top.
But it was The Hammer’s birthday.
So we each — and I am not exaggerating — got one of our own.
And that was stupid.
By the time The Hammer got through about half of hers, she was done. She pushed it aside, not feeling great.
So I finished hers (along with mine, of course) for her.
Disaster, Part 2
The next morning, I told The Hammer, “There is no way I am going to step on the scale today. I just don’t want to see the bad news.”
As it turns out, I probably should have stepped on the scale. Perhaps a small dose of bad news would have served as a reminder that there’s no such thing as consequence-free eating for me.
In which case, perhaps I would have skipped eating the cake and ice cream at The Hammer’s family birthday party that evening.
Or at the very least…I wouldn’t have had seconds.
And I probably would have avoided snacking on the (very delicious) leftover saffron-and-butter rice as I cleaned up the dishes after dinner.
Oh, how I wish I were making any of this up.
Today
Which brings us today, and me getting back on the scale. Allow me to show you how that looked in Beeminder:
See that tiny red dot waaaaaaay above the yellow brick road? That, my friends, is what a 4.6 pound jump looks like.
Yes, over the weekend, I gained 4.6 pounds. And as you can see, that puts me two pounds off the yellow brick road. And I have ’til midnight tonight to get back on it, or pay the $5 fine.
Will I do it? I really don’t know. I will tell you that I am currently quite hungry. And that I furthermore had an awful lot of caffeine this morning, which facilitates rapid (albeit temporary) weight loss in at least a couple of ways I’m aware of.
But there is a silver lining, if you can call it that. And that is this, The Hammer’s weigh-in for today:
You know how they say “Misery loves company?” Well, that is never more true than when you have a sudden and sharp weight gain.
And while her gain puts her into — as opposed to below — the yellow brick road, that’s still a 4.2 pound gain. Which doesn’t exactly take away the sting of my embarrassment.
But it certainly helps.
PS: For those of you who are doing the challenge: How’s it going? Anyone else having monster weight spikes following a night on the town?
Comments (32)
04.10.2014 | 10:31 am
People email me all the time, asking me if I want stuff. Even more often — lately — they email me asking if I’ll write a post about their Kickstarter campaign. Which is kind of nuts, when you think about it: expecting someone to promote something that they not only haven’t tried, but which doesn’t even actually exist yet. And may in fact never exist.
(I of course reserve the right to reverse my philosophy on promoting Kickstarter campaigns when I inevitably start one of my own.)
Where was I? Oh yeah, getting stuff. Companies send me stuff, pretty often. And there was a time that when they asked me if I wanted their stuff, I’d say, “YES PLEASE SEND ME WHATEVER YOU’VE GOT.” And then I’d get it and discover I didn’t care enough about it one way or another to write about it.
And then I’d get a pang of guilt every time they followed up, asking, “When are you going to talk about this thing we’ve sent you?” because I knew that the answer was, “Never,” but I’m way too non-confrontational to come out and say that, and so would just mark their email address as spam.
(I’m pretty sure I just ensured, by writing that, that nobody will ever send me anything again.)
Anyway.
Now, unless I’m absolutely positively sure that I really really really want something, I let companies know that they can send me stuff, but I won’t write about it unless I actually love it. Not just like. Love.
And I’ve got a few of those things — stuff that’s stopped merely being a new thing to try out and has become a really good part of my life — to talk about in the near future. Like, for the next three or so posts, I’m going to talk about stuff I’ve recently fallen in love with.
Stuff I would — and do — recommend to anyone.
The Camelbak Relay
[Disclosure: Camelbak sent me a Camelbak Relay at no charge.]
I’m pretty sure Martha Stewart would back me on this: water is a good thing. Good water is even better.
And the Camelbak Relay — an ingenious water pitcher / filter —does in fact make water better.
Like, a lot better.
Basically you pour regular ol’ tap water into the top, at which point it gets filtered once.
Then, as you pour water out, it gets filtered a second time. The result is awesome, for a couple of reasons.
- It filters fast. As you fill the pitcher, it filters as fast as your tap (or at least my tap) can go. And when you pour water out of it, it pours nearly as fast as a free-flowing pitcher does.
- It filters great. I’m not putting the water that comes out of the Relay under a microscope, but I don’t really need to; the municipal water I have is just fine, microbe- and bacteria- and other-tiny-critters-wise (at least, as far as I know, and if it isn’t…well, I’m not sure I want to know). But I can taste the difference. And everyone else in the family can too.
And you know what? When you have fast, hassle-free, great-tasting water, you…drink more water.
What’s more, if you’re a cyclist, it’s really nice to be able to fill your bottles — this easily fills four bottles, so The Hammer and I are taken care of even for long training rides — really fast with cold, good-tasting water.
And — as long as people obey the rule of filling the pitcher when it gets close to empty — even with seven people living in our house (The Hammer and me, my four kids, one of The Hammer’s kids), this holds enough for everyone when we eat at dinnertime, too.
We’ve stopped using the filtered water dispenser built into the fridge; this pours faster and tastes better.
Basically, in the very short time we’ve had the Relay, it’s become a taken-for-granted part of our lives.
For cyclists — or for anyone — I can’t recommend the Camelbak Relay highly enough. If you like water, you should get one. And if you don’t currently like water…you should definitely get one.
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