Lately...

Lately, the tires on my road bike have been flatter than Nebraska—not the north western part of Nebraska where the Black Hills of South Dakota poor across the border to delight hypnotized drivers. Nope, the part of Nebraska that is supported by John Deere and government subsidies. I get a flat almost every time I turn around; I have been twice at the complete mercy of strangers. I don’t know why. The city has street sweeping services, and the bike paths are pretty clean. I have only picked up one of the infamous goat heads (for the reader not sure what exactly a goat head is, imagine a stick tight with two thorns protruding from either side). More intriguing still, I have only a slow leak in my tubed mountain bike tires. I have been dodging cacti and jagged rock with almost nothing to show. I reckon, I can’t complain.

That said; I have acquired a whole new disdain for cacti. The trails around here do a superb job of tricking me into riding fast, railing corners, and gliding over rocks, and then I round a corner. I feel a dull thump and then a sting, followed closely by restricted hand movement. Sometimes I ride farther, but inevitably, I stop and pull a dozen or more cacti needle from my knuckles or arms. More inevitably still, some of the needles are lodged so far into the skin that upon pulling them out a steadily flowing rivulet of blood instantly works its way across my skin.

Anyway, enough of this killjoy talking. I have met and ridden with plenty of awesome riders, who have given me some good local insight, stories, motivations, lactic acid baths, et cetera. My friend Mario has introduced me to his teammates and many other cyclists and even coaxed me into racing my road bike. He invited me on a ride last weekend and introduced me to his coach and friend, John. Some may know John as the guy who makes Mario race with a power tap. However, he is better known as the guy who make Jeremy Powers race with a power tap. I think he knows everyone and has coached most of the currently awesome and formerly awesome U.S. U23 cyclocross racers. He’s “not fast,” but has raced against Davis Phinney, Bob Roll, Erwin Vervecken, etc. Now, I may not be serious enough to get a coach or financially able to get a coach, for that matter, but I know I will benefit from following John’s wheel and will always enjoy his conversation and stories. He’s a nice guy (like most cyclists) who knows his stuff.

Mario, et al. is doing an excellent job at getting me stoked to suffer and get faster. They tell me about all the fast elite racers (e.g. Kabush) who train in the area. They say the race scene isn’t so stellar though. I suppose, if it is not so stellar, that promoters are not doing a good job of encouraging entry level racers (just my guess). As much as the fast guys give legitimacy to a race culture, beginners compose the skeleton that supports said culture. Hopefully, this is not true. Hopefully, the locals are only comparing themselves to Colorado.

I will find out soon enough, I suppose. My first race is July 11th. After over two months off racing, it will be a guaranteed doozy. The Sandia Peak Challenge begins climbing for 8.2 miles from more or less the get-go. Then racers descend about the same distance and do it again. The expert race is just less than 34 miles. That’s one long XC race. So in preparation, I have focused my training—lots more intensity. I have done intervals and a crit this week. Thursday’s night of super steep hill repeats had my legs feeling about as flat as my road tires. Ouch. Yes, so dedicated to suffer am I that while racing the crit I altered my strategy to produce more suffering. At first, I was doing the cliché make-all-the-splits-stay-near-the-front thing, but then I realized how much more I would suffer if I soloed off the back of the pack into the 200 mph headwind. So, I did. All of this points to an awesome first XC race of the season. I am going to kill it. I just don’t know what “it” is…