Moving On

There comes a time when you know your ready…..when things feel right and the place your at seems to not. Moving on to other things to other experiences. This is a context in which many events in life can be placed. Many important places; Job, City, Girl/Boyfriend…….Important steps, decisions in ones life. Racing your bike may not seem like something that falls into this category and require such perspective, but when you can’t shake it out of your mind, it never lets go and you find yourself visualizing the race weeks before it happens, you know what place it has in your life………The Passion…….The addiction…….the need. David Walsh put it this way,

"The severity of the sport examined a man's character, illuminating his nobility but also addressing his baser instinct. Perhaps most of all, it offered a challenge that allowed man to transcend his everyday self."

Sunday caused me to do something on Monday I have thought about since I was a kid. Moving on…. up to see how fast they really are. The first time I saw a bike race I knew it was for me, eventually. It took 20 years to get to the point where I was comfortable enough to deal with the pain of training and racing. When I was 12 and did my first bike race I was dropped. The next one…dropped. Dropped, Dropped, Dropped.

Up to that point I had been doing open junior races and competing against kids 4 to 6 years older than me. Men amongst boys, beards and all, sweaty dudes racing against me, the skinny kid. Then I went to Snelling and did a 12-14 junior race. I remember riding in the pack, listening to the riders shout at each other, rubbing wheels, and standing on the pedals as we rolled up the smaller hills, the group, the people at the start finish yelling…….it could have been just 10 people, but the noise was deafening. I remember feeling good. I remember thinking about setting up on the outside coming around the last turn and launching with 100 meters to go……..Throw my arms up and releasing the frustration of a years worth of getting dropped. F’n A that felt good. I still remember it vivid, fresh, yesterday, implanted in my memory…….See the mark and go….don’t hold back, go with everything you got…….after the line… spent, overjoyed, blown….what a rush.

You see the line coming, nothing else, nobody around, you might as well be all by yourself. Last Sunday it happened again, except this time I knew, I had been visualizing it all week, thinking about it, living it over and over again in my mind. Wait, wait…see the line and go…don’t hold back, pull with your arms, put your head down and explode. But…….. this time it was as if I had already done it….seen it, experienced it, expected it. I knew……….Time to move on.


Now the hard part begins, the pain starts and the suffering will be inevitable. Before, I knew I had a chance to win every time I lined up, now, I must be satisfied with small things, little accomplishments, and when or if that moment ever comes again……It will feel just like it did so many years ago ……..after the line spent, overjoyed, blown….what a rush.