The day after the first time I ever rode the Alpine Gauntlet  (77 miles, 9350 feet of climbing) was a regular workday. I was tired and planned to do an easy, short, flat spin on the road at lunchtime to keep my legs loose. A recovery day.

And so, of course, Dug and Rick suggested the three of us do the Alpine Loop together: 42 miles, 2700 feet of climbing. Not exactly a recover ride.

I don’t know about you, but I find it nearly impossible to turn down a ride with my friends. And so I didn’t. I did, however, ask them to take it nice and slow. I was wiped out from my big ride the day before. They said that would be fine.

So we rode up Provo Canyon together at a nice, easy clip. Nobody shot off the front; everyone took turns pulling. And since it was just after noon (the Provo Canyon wind predictably blows South in the AM, North in the PM), we even had a bit of a tailwind.

My legs felt a little wooden, but I figured that as long as we stayed at an easy pace like this, I’d be OK.

 

Sundance

The hardest part about riding the Alpine Loop (starting from the Provo Canyon side, that is — starting from the American Fork Canyon side is a completely different set of obstacles) is the first 2.3 miles after you turn out of Provo Canyon and ride up to the Sundance (yes, that Sundance) ski resort. It’s just brutal. At my best, I’ll go into the second and third gears for parts of it — and that day I was not at my best. I dropped into my granny and tried to spin as easily as I could, not worrying about the fact that I was going no faster than 6mph. I still took my turn up front, but I was in no hurry.

And that, of course, is when Dug and Rick attacked.

Together, they stood up, ratcheted up two gears, and shot around my left, working together. Taking fifteen-second pulls, they quickly put an enormous gap on me.

I admit it: I was demoralized.

 

The Tunnel

As Rick and Dug built their lead, I saw three options: I could turn around and go home.

No.

I could continue at my current pace and see them when they wait for me at the top.

That might be OK.

Or, I could “enter the tunnel,” as I called it. That year, I had learned that I could push myself much further than I had ever expected. Specifically, I had learned that pain in my legs didn’t mean I needed to back off. I had learned that hearing blood in my ears didn’t mean I needed to back off. And in fact, I had learned that getting tunnel vision didn’t mean I needed to back off, as long as I didn’t let the tunnel get too dark.

The tunnel is a fast place, but it isn’t a happy place. I don’t think in words when I’m in the tunnel. I think in whimpers and pain.

Anyway, I shifted to fourth gear, stood up, and pedaled into the tunnel.

 

Fine. Be That Way.

I’m guessing that if Dug and Rick had seen me coming, they could have held me off. But the attack had taken it out of them, and they had backed off. And they didn’t expect me to try to bridge. So when I ripped by them — way on the left side of the road, so they couldn’t hop on easily — they were caught off guard, and without a sufficient quantity of whoopass jam to counter.

I kept on going, staying in the tunnel until I got to Sundance, then I backed off enough that I wouldn’t completely blow up and soloed, victorious, to the top of the Alpine Loop.

When they arrived, we did not speak of the attack. To acknowledge an attack even took place on a friendly ride would be poor form.

But I had triumphed. Big time. On the day after I had done a big ol’ epic ride.

 

The Part of the Story I Don’t Tell

While I didn’t expect Rick and Dug to try to blow me away on the climb, I did take some precautions so I wouldn’t fall too badly off the back. You see, this all happened back when I was experimenting with ephedra/caffeine/guarana/aspirin stacks. So before we took off, I doubled up my dosage, meaning I doubled beyond the already mind-blowing quantities of stimulants I normally took.

So while it’s true I beat Dug and Rick to the top of the Alpine Loop, it’s also true that I was unable to stop shaking the rest of the day, or get to sleep until about 3:00 AM.

Riding into work today, it occurred to me: almost all my friends are in their 40’s now. This was followed by an even more shocking realization: I’m less than a third of a year away from being 40, myself.

I can feel it: I am rapidly approaching the age where I do little but sit around and tell stories of my glory days.

Come to think of it, that’s pretty much what this whole blog is for already.

Damn.

 

I Shall Briefly Attempt Honesty, Just to See What It’s Like

The problem with my glory days is that almost without exception, they’re only glorious if I leave certain key facts out.

Over the next several days — until I get tired of it, basically — I shall tell you of some of my most glorious moments on the bike, in much the same way I tell these stories to people at work, at parties, and on planes.

And then I will tell the part of the story I normally leave out: the part that makes my story of glory rather less glorious.

Any questions? No? Let’s begin, then.

 

The Day I Beat Kenny Up Squaw Peak

Riding mountain bikes up Squaw Peak road to Hope Campground is an ideal training ride. You peg your heartrate during the 4.3 mile stretch of paved road, climbing 1800 feet. Then, as a reward for your hard work, you get to descend on a straight-down stretch of terrifying singletrack, hanging your butt off the back as far as you can in order to not flip over the front, and releasing the brakes to the extent you dare. It’s a huge adrenaline rush.

The first person to the top gets to be the first person down, and that person was always Kenny Jones. Now, I have never been as light or fit as the years Kenny and I rode together. If you ride with Kenny, you just have to learn to be fast. No matter how much I improved, though, I could never beat him to the top of a climb. He has the ability to put his head down, dial up a massive gear, and then just hammer away, suffering like he loves to suffer, leaving me — and everyone else — in the dust.

But once, I beat him. I beat him bad.

We started the climb as we always did, riding together at a medium pace. We went along, slowly driving up the pace, ratcheting up higher gears and inching ahead of the other guy to test for weakness.

It’s usually mile three that Kenny would start to pull ahead. He’d never just shoot off the front. He’d just inch a half wheel ahead of me, and I wouldn’t pull up alongside. Then he’d be a wheel ahead of me. Then a bike length. Before long, he’d be 20 feet ahead of me, and I’d be fully at my max, trying to bridge.

Then he’d be 30 feet ahead of me, and I’d crack. Dropping several gears and reducing my cadence by half, I’d drift backward while Kenny shot ahead.

This time, though, was different. At about the point I usually started falling back, I instead stayed with Kenny. And then I inched ahead.

I listened for the inevitable sound of him shifting up two gears. It didn’t come. I shifted up a gear, stood up, and attacked.

He didn’t respond.

In fact, he cracked.

Victorious, I distanced him and rode ahead, getting to the top of Hope Campground a minute or more ahead.

This was my one and only victory over Kenny, and so I treasure it to this day.

 

The Part I Don’t Include

Of course, what made my victory possible was the fact that Kenny had just returned from a two-week vacation in Mexico, where he had:

• Drunk an awful lot of beer
• Eaten a lot of heavy food
• Exercised not even a little bit
• Contracted a stomach virus that gave him acute, persistent, intestinal distress

So the fact that I beat him isn’t really the story. The real story is that Kenny, in spite of all this, still very nearly outrode me.

In which case, you can bet that I wouldn’t be telling this story at all.

 

Bonus: Winner of the Banjo Brothers Bike Bag Giveaway

Karen sent me a picture and email that I just loved. I love that her husband actually has exactly the tattoo I’ve described. I love that he’s in his 50’s, is so fast, and has a tattoo. And I really love that his wife totally brags about her husband like this. Check it out:

I had to send you this pic of my 56 year old hubby, who has spent most of his life working and playing on various sprockets. He raced motocross for many years, taking the New England championship for three years. Now he is a radical mountain and road biker - rides with guys half his age, and usually kicks their butts (although he will tell you that he 'rides a little bit').  He's participated a lot in the Vermont 50 and came in second in his class a few years ago, when there was not a separate class for anyone above 50 — so he was riding with the youngsters.  Now he would rather get up at 3 or 4 a.m. and pre-ride the course.  His trails are some of the most beloved and fun in Vermont....not that I am partial or proud of him....

He got this tattoo several years ago, and when combined with some of the grease off his sprocket, I thought it made a good picture.  And I love to tease  him about his Cat5 tattoo, while many have regretted assuming that the tattoo meant he's a beginner.

Today’s weight: 167.6

 

Yesterday, I talked about getting a rookie mark tattoo, as a permanent acknowledgment that I am a permanent rookie. I always reconsider, though, thinking that it’s not something I’ll necessarily think is quite so hilarious when I’m living in a nursing home.

That, however, is not the only tattoo I have thought about for my calf. For years, I have privately promised myself that if I finish the Leadville 100 in under nine hours, I will tattoo my finishing time and the year I did it on my right calf, for all the world to see. Because that is something I’m pretty sure I’d be happy to talk about forever (whether I was asked to or not).

Since this year is pretty much my make-or-break year for getting that sub-9 time, maybe we’ll see if I follow through. I think I would.

Sure, I’d be laughed at for the rest of my life for getting my first tattoo at 40, the age at which most people finally know better and are looking into getting those tattoos they got at age 19 removed.

But I’d still wear it proudly.

 

Banjo Brothers Weekly Bike Bag Giveaway Question

What bike-related tattoo would you get, where, and why? Or better yet, what bike-related tattoo have you already got? Where and why? Bonus points if you’ve got a photo; email it to me: fatty@fatcyclist.com.

Oh, and by the way, congrats to the Banjo Brothers for getting some serious airtime on a local news program. Check it out here.

 

Today's weight: 169.0

There’s an easy way to gauge another cyclist's experience and ability: Check his right calf. If there’s a greasy chainring-shaped mark on it, be confident that you can outride him.

Unless, of course, you have a similar mark on your own right calf.

This mark — sometimes called the “Rookie Mark”  — tends to get pressed into your leg when you do either of the following:

• Stop  and rest while straddling your top tube, inadvertently pressing your calf up against your chainring, which is — sadly — lubed with an overabundance of greasy kid’s stuff. This produces a nice, sharp, tattoo-like rookie mark.
• Fall over while still clipped into your pedals. This produces a somewhat less aesthetically-pleasing rookie mark, because the grease gets smudged as you thrash around like a trapped otter.

With Experience Comes Wisdom. Usually.

As you ride more, you’ll find you get the rookie mark less often. You’re not overlubing anymore, you’ve learned not to lean your chainring against your calf, and you’re not falling over on your side like a keystone kop.

Unless you’re me, in which case you still come home with a rookie mark after pretty much every ride, in spite of the fact that you’ve been riding for ten years or so.

 

I Nearly Embrace My Inner Fred

In acknowledgement of the fact that I will likely forever be a clumsy oaf, I have actually thought about formalizing it, by having a rookie mark tattooed on my calf. I’ve never followed through, though. I always chicken out, thinking, “Will my sense of humor be the same when I’m 75 as it is today?”

I just can’t quite envision explaining my rookie mark tattoo to my grandkids, at least not without an accompanying vison of their parents later having a quiet talk about visiting the insane gramps guy a lot less often.

So, no tattoo. Yet.

 

A More Emphatic Rookie Mark

The thing is, as of last Saturday, a rookie mark tattoo may be beside the point. Nick and I were riding at Soaring Eagle Park, doing our three tries on log moves, as required by law.

We were trying a log I had never done before: it was about eight inches in diameter, but was not touching the trail. I’d guess it was resting about six inches above the ground where it crossed the trail.

That’s not what made it tricky, though.

What made this move tricky was that it was downhill, a much more difficult position to start the wheelie from. And the exit was an immediate sharp right turn, if you didn’t want to roll down a bank into blackberry bushes.

I missed on my first try; basically, it was nothing but a chicken-out. On my second try, I got high-centered and bailed out. On my third try, I went for it and very nearly cleaned it, then fell forward, over the bike. My chainring dug in.

I was wearing tights (very manly black mountain biker tights, mind you), which did not seem to be ripped. I dealt with the pain and we rode on.

When I got home, here’s what I found:

 

My fondest hope is that it will form a really cool-looking scar. Like a rookie-mark tattoo, but earned, instead of bought.

The details leading up to the crash are fuzzy. Was it five years ago, or seven? Was it spring, summer, or autumn? I don’t remember.

I do remember the crash, though. Perfectly.

Our riding group was pretty large: Dug, Rick, Bob (visiting from Seattle, turning the ride into an event), Jeremy, Gary, and me. There were a couple others, too.

We were doing a semi-epic ride: Begin the ride by climbing up Frank. That’s about 1800 feet, right there. Then, instead of hanging a left and going down, keep going up Francisco. That’s another thousand feet or so. And then the Five Fingers: Drops into and climbs out of five ravines of varying difficulties. That’s probably another 1500 feet of climbing.

Which brought us to the terraces.

 

Left or Right?

The terraces are strange. Created as part of the WPA program back in the 30’s (ostensibly to stop erosion, but really just to give some people work) these giant stairsteps are now a more-or-less permanent feature on the grassy slopes of several mountains in Utah.

When we got to the terraces, we had an option. Turn right, toward Little Baldy, keep climbing for another twenty minutes, then drop down into Pleasant Grove Canyon. Or turn left and begin descending immediately, riding the ridges of the terraces, eventually winding up in Dry Canyon.

Either way promised to be a fun ride, but when presented with the option of climbing now or descending now, well, what do you think the group decided?

Of course, we turned left. We’d ride the goat trail along the terraces, then hook up to Dry Canyon.

 

Unfolding Drama

I’m the acknowledged slowest descender of the group, so I generally don’t even volunteer to ride sweep; I just wait until everyone else has started. Ordinarily, this means I’ll watch everyone else disappear as they distance me.

This time, though, it meant I got to watch something extraordinary.

Just about the time I got a full head of steam, Dug — riding first — hit a dip that had been well-hidden by the deep grass. That dip wasn’t bad enough to knock him off his bike, but it was bad enough to throw him to the left, off his line. And since we were riding on the lip of one terrace, that meant he got shot suddenly and immediately down the steep slope to the next terrace level, at which point he endoed, flying high over his handlebars and landing on his back.

And then, a quarter-second later, Rick did the exact same thing. Ride. Dip. Jerk. Flip. It’s like they were synchronized swimmers. 

Then, as fast as you can read this, Gary, Jeremy, and Bob. Each person landed with their own special sound effect. Each separated from his bike in his own way. And they all went down so close together that things started getting crowded. One would be wise to pick one’s landing spot carefully, which one would obviously do if one were at all in control of oneself whilst being thrown keyster over teakettle.

 

I Will Not Fall Down

Of course, I’m writing this with clear hindsight. I now know what caused everyone to get flipped off their bikes. While it was happening, though, it was the strangest thing I had ever seen. When one guy goes down, it’s no big deal. But everyone was going down. I swear, it looked intentional.

I slowed down, cautious. Already, I was forming a plan. I would pull alongside all these fallen riders, shake my head in mild amusement, make a “tsk-tsk” sound, and then continue ahead, in a most dignified manner.

Then, just like everyone else, I hit the dip, jerked off course, flew off the terrace, and flipped over my bike. Just like everyone else had. To my relief, I landed in a clear spot.

I had made it unanimous. Every single one of us had crashed in the exact same spot. Lemmings on mountain bikes.

 

Back on Your Bike, Soldier

So now, like everyone else, I was lying on my back in tall grass. I sat up, startled to find I was completely unhurt. It had been the rarest of crashes: a no-cost endo. I looked over at Dug, who was just now stumbling to his feet, unaware — I think — of what had happened to everyone else. Then he looked around, seeing the around a half dozen bikes and riders scattered on the ground.

Dug sat back down, laughing. And within moments, we were all laughing, sitting where we had landed. A passerby — had there been even a remote possibility of passersby up in the terraces — would have certainly suspected substance abuse.

But it wasn’t. It was just a bunch of guys caught up in the moment of what was without a question the Best Crash Ever.

Eventually, we’d finish the ride.

You want to know the fundamental difference between mountain biking and road biking? If you crash frequently while road biking, you’re doing it wrong. If, on the other hand, you don’t crash from time to time while mountain biking, you’re doing it wrong.

So, if we take it as given that you will crash from time to time on your mountain bike, what can you do to get the very most out of the experience? How can you turn your wreck from a display of clumsiness and negligence into the kind of story that gets told around campfires and office coolers?

By following these simple steps, that’s how.

 

Plan Ahead

Think of some generic injuries you can claim when the moment is right. Here is a brief list, to help you get started.

• Internal bleeding: Keep this one in mind for the occasions when you’re hurt — no, seriously, you really are — but don’t have an injury that actually shows. Insist that you need to be taken to a hospital immediately. Once you’ve made this demand, however, you cannot back down. Follow through, even though you’ll probably feel just fine by the time you get to the hospital. When you finally get out of the waiting room, though, slip the doctor a $20 and say there’s another $20 in it for her if she’ll play along and tell your friends it is one of the most harrowing examples of internal bleeding she has ever seen, and that they’re lucky they listened to you.
• Ruptured diaphragm, preventing breathing: If you get the wind knocked out of you, you can claim that you actually ruptured your diaphragm, and now have only moments to live before you suffocate to death. Explaining later why you’re alive may be difficult. I leave that to you. (Thanks for the idea, Tayfur!)
• Torn ligaments: Good general-purpose, believable injury, and practically impossible to disprove in the field. Highly recommended.
• High Altitude Pulmonary Edema: Use this if you’ve been riding clumsily the whole day. It’s best not to say you have this ailment if you’re below an altitude of 500 feet.
• High Altitude Cerebral Edema:  Use this if you’ve been riding clumsily and saying stupid things.
• Total amnesia: Save this one for an accident you’d rather forget. You may want to consider downgrading this to Concussion, which allows you to say you don’t remember the events surrounding a certain time period. Which you choose should depend on how bone-chillingly stupid and predictable your crash was.

During The Crash

Sometimes, a crash is so instantaneous you have no time to react whatsoever. I once, for example, was riding along on my own when I suddenly found myself sliding on my face.

Other times, however, you may be luckier: you see a crash coming, and have time to add some theatrics. In this case, I recommend the following steps:

1. Unclip from your bike, if at all possible. Separate from it to whatever degree you can.
2. Flail. Wave your arms while you’re in the air. Flailing looks good on camera, and increases your chances on winning in America’s Funniest Videos.
3. Twist. If you’re in the midst of a good long fall, take a moment to try to do a 360.
4. Keep your arms and hands close to your torso. As your landing approaches, bring your arms and hands in close, so as to not snap them like twigs. It’s very easy for me to type this, although I have never successfully done it in my entire life. You would think that now that my right shoulder sometimes separates just for the fun of it, I’d learn. But no: I still reach out to catch my fall every time.
5. Roll. Roll once on impact at a bare minimum. If you feel you’ve got sufficient momentum, keep rolling. As you roll, ask yourself, “Am I badly hurt?” If the answer is “No, not really.” Try finishing the roll by standing up with your arms held high. Bow smartly.

After the Crash

Immediately after the crash, you have to make a snap decision. Will you go for comedy, stoic resilience, or drama?

• Comedy is a surprisingly good choice, if you aren’t badly hurt and you’ve got an audience. Try saying, “Nothing to see here, move along” in your best Monty Python voice. Or, “I was pushed! I accuse you!” Or my favorite, “Ladies and gentlemen, the candlesticks are still standing!” Your audience is likely to laugh, even if you’re not funny, out of gratitude that they’re not going to have to perform first aid.
• Stoic resilience is risky. If, after you crash — especially if it looked bad — you get up as if nothing happened, you will gain respect from your peers as being tough, though perhaps not especially bright. However, this severely reduces your options. If you start out as stoic right after the crash, but then discover ten minutes later after the adrenaline rush fades that the bruises, lacerations, and compound fractures are hampering your ability to enjoy the ride, you still must be stoic. You can’t go from stoic to drama queen. That’s ten times worse than starting out as a drama queen in the first place.
• Drama is my default choice. It’s the safe bet. For one thing, crashes really do almost always hurt. For another, if I start out acting like I’m badly hurt and then discover that I’m actually just fine, it’s not difficult to make the conversion to comedy. Just sit up and say, “I’m not dead yet…I think I’m getting better…I believe I’ll go for a walk (Monty Python voice again). Or you can grab for the brass ring and do a drama-comedy-stoic transfer: suddenly go from rocking and screaming to standing up, dusting yourself off, and deadpan, “I now choose to internalize my pain.”

If you decide to go for the drama option (good choice!), you have a few moments after a given fall to think about what you will say to your riding companions. Use this time wisely.

First, choose your injury. If you are unsure which injury you are going to trumpet, go into the fetal position. The fetal position is a good universal symbol of pain, and gives you time to think.

Next, play it up. Don’t trivialize your pain. Never ever immediately say, “I’m OK.” Make them wonder for a couple seconds.

As you lay, moaning and dying, memorize your surroundings. It’s best if the wildly exaggerated tale you will tell later has some basis in fact. Your surroundings can help you find a good external cause for your crash, which is almost always preferable to, “I’m a bumbling fool.”

• Ledges: Going over an unforeseen ledge is a great cause for an accident. Highly recommended. Unfortunately, if you did this, you’re probably really injured. Sorry ‘bout that!
• Roots: Roots are tricky things that cause your wheels to change directions. Nobody will ever dispute the root reason. A suggestion: If you’re going to use a root as the reason you fell, always intensify it. Roots must always be slippery, slimy, wet, twisty, gnarled, or knotted.
• Scree: Scree is dirt and rocks on the trail. Most mountain bike trails are constantly covered with dirt and rocks, so scree is difficult to disprove.
• Rabbits with big, nasty, pointy teeth. Monty Python again. Sorry, can’t help myself. I’m definitely going to watch the Holy Grail this weekend.
• Too much speed: You’re a victim of your own mountain bike prowess and bravery, not to mention your outrageous athleticism. Very good.
• Gear: Chainsuck or a blown tire are great crash causes. They are verifiable, however, so don’t use them if they aren’t real, or at least if you have witnesses present. My best gear-related crash had me thinking I had actually been shot in the chest. It was back when Rock Shox Judy SLs were all the rage. The Judy used an elastomer stack for damping, which was inserted through the top of the fork, then secured with a screw-in cap. Coming down Mud Springs one day, I suddenly saw a flash of red, felt a sharp pain in my chest, and then crashed. I was sure some kid had shot me with a paintball. It turns out that the cap over one of the elastomer stacks had come loose during the downhill, and the stack had ejected, popping me right in the sternum.
• Despair over the state of _________________. Hey, why not turn your misfortune into a political or moral statement?
• Ennui: “I was tired of being on my bike, and thought I’d mix things up a little.”

Afterward

Later, you’ll have time to craft a fine story about your crash. As you do this, remember: what was going on internally is as important as what happens externally. And it’s much more difficult to disprove. Say things like:

• Time slowed down.
• I thought to myself, “I am about to die,” yet remained strangely calm. I was at peace with the world, almost eager to meet the earth as it rushed to embrace me.
• The pain was exquisite.
• My spirit left my body. I remember hovering over my carcass, asking myself, “Do I want to go back into that vessel, to endure the suffering that comes with reuniting with my body? Believe me, it was not an easy choice.
• No, seriously. My diaphragm was totally ruptured. I’d be dead if it weren’t for my quick thinking and a fairly unorthodox use of a patch kit.

Winner of the Banjo Brothers Bike Bag Giveaway

Congratulations to Wonderdyke, who gave the most cogent reason anyone would possibly wear the Davitamon-Lotto Team Presentation shirt:

I'd wear it to the hairdresser to get my Flock of Seagulls haircut.

Yup, I think I’d wear it in an 80’s Flock of Seagulls video, too. Or maybe if I were Howard Jones. Wonderdyke’s blog is highly recommended, by the way. Whether you’re a harried lesbian mom or not.

 

PS: Today’s weight is 168.8. Next week’s weight target: 167.8.

Some people listen to music while they ride. I never do. When I’m on the bike, I like to hear what’s going on around me, and I like to let my thoughts wander. 

Mostly, this is fine. My mind bounces from one topic to the next, sometimes landing on  a funny or interesting thought, or occasionally suddenly solving what I had previously thought was an unsolvable dilemma.

Once in a while, though, my mind gets stuck on something. On the way in to work Friday, for example, I found myself — for no reason I can think of — mentally chanting the list of common linking verbs a teacher had taught my class back in fifth grade.

I didn’t want it in my head. I tried to get it out of my head. But it wouldn’t leave. To make things worse, I couldn’t remember the whole chant. Just that one part. So while part of me was trying to get the stupid thing out of my head, another part of me was trying to puzzle out how the rest of the chant went.

Luckily, my ride to work isn’t that long, and the chant is now out of my head. Or at least it was, until I started writing about it.

 

Scar Tissue

Everyone gets songs (or, more rarely, chants about grammar) stuck in their head from time to time, but cyclists are especially prone to them. The rhythm of the cycling cadence, along with steady, fast breathing, lends itself to looping a song through your head, over and over.

It’s not always bad. I remember that for one of the laps of 24 Hours of Moab one year, Red Hot Chili Pepper’s “Scar Tissue” ran through my head continuously. Since Californication is in fact one of my favorite albums of all time, I was OK with this particular song auto-repeating in my brain, and even sang snippets of it out loud (causing concern among riders as they passed me or (less often) were passed by me). I hit the words at the end of lines with an extra-hard exhale:

Soft spoken with a broken jaw

Step outside but not to brawl

Autumn’s sweet we call it fall

I’ll make it to the moon if I have to crawl

To tell the truth, I would have preferred “Parallel Universe,” my favorite song from the album; it’s got a base line that forces a fast cadence. But one of the rules of endless-loop music seems to be that you don’t get to pick the song.

Alas.

 

Birdhouse in Your Soul

This repetitive song phenomenon is no big deal, usually. Sometime soon after the ride ends, the song fades and you get on with your life.

If you’re on an endurance ride, though, an endless-loop song can become downright evil.

Several years ago, Dug, Racer and I drove to Laramie, Wyoming for what would turn out to be the final Laramie Range Enduro (that was a good course, rest its soul). As we parked the car and unloaded our bikes, They Might Be Giants’ “Birdhouse in Your Soul” came on the radio. Not paying much attention to it, I finished unloading my bike and lined up at the start.

About twenty minutes into the first climb of the race, the song came back to me. The problem was, I didn’t know the lyrics to anything but part of one verse and the chorus, and was even sort of sketchy on that. So I’m singing:

There’s a something something of me

Of my primitive ancestry

Who stood on something and kept the something shipwreck free

Though I respect that a lot

I’d be fired if that were my job

After killing Jason off and countless screaming argonauts

Something something something

Something it’s always near

Look at a canary over by the lightswitch

Who’s watching over you

Build a little birdhouse in your soul

Not to put too fine a point on it

Say I’m the only bee in your bonnet

Build a little birdhouse in your soul

And while you’re at it

Keep the nightlight on inside the

Birdhouse in your soul

Even taking the “something somethings” into account, I could tell I was getting it wrong — I couldn’t get the words to fit the meter. And the more I sang it, the worse it got, until I could no longer be sure I was getting the lines even remotely close to the right order.

And still it played on. For five hours.

After a while, I started looking for a suitable cliff to ride off, so I could end that infernal song. I imagined the conversation other racers would have as they saw me go over:

Racer 1: That guy just rode straight off a cliff! On purpose!

Racer 2: Did you notice the insane grin on his face?

Racer 3: More importantly, why was he singing that “Birdhouse in Your Soul” song as he went over?

Racer 1: I don’t know, but he was getting the lyrics all wrong.

I had a really fast time at that race, but took no pleasure in it. My dominant memory of that day is of that song, playing over and over and over.

And over.

I will hate that song forever.

 

It Gets Worse

As long as you don’t have children, you can at least take comfort in the fact that it’s your music that’s getting stuck in your head. Once you have kids, though, it’s a whole new ballgame. For example, my wife, in a fit of temporary insanity, purchased the animated video, “The Princess and the Pauper.” That would be awful enough, but the DVD comes with a bonus soundtrack CD. Which, of course, the girls want to be played in the car CD player. Always. And since there are only seven songs on that CD, you get to hear each of them quite frequently.

So: if I ride my bike head-on into traffic someday in the near future, you know why: I was doing whatever it took to get “You’re Just Like Me” out of my head.

 

PS: Today’s weight is 171.2. So my goal for the rest of this week is to undo the damage I did last weekend — get back to 169.0 — and then not hoover up every particle of food in sight in a 72-hour eating binge this upcoming weekend.

You know, I had something I was going to post last Friday. Seriously, I did. I was writing during my lunch hour when stuff started happening, which prevented posting the aforementioned post. 

I shall now tell you the story of what happened.

 

How to Suddenly Find Yourself with Time to Ride

It was my lunch hour. I was just typing. Seriously, that’s all I was doing. Just typing along. Then without warning (I wonder what form the warning would have taken, had there been one), the LCD went white. Then it went magenta. Then it went into a sort of interstitial dance of random pixeliciousness.

 “Hey, look at the fireworks I’m getting!” I called out to Brad, who works in the adjoining office.

“Very nice,” said Brad. “Have you saved recently?”

The answer to that questions is in fact, “Yes, I actually developed the habit of saving at the end of each sentence back when I worked at WordPerfect, and that habit has served me well.”

In this case, though, it wouldn’t have mattered if I had developed the habit of saving after each vowel. The motherboard’s toast. I’ll get the hard drive back in a couple of days. We'll see what survived then.

“Hey Brad, it’s a nice day out. Did you bring your bike to work?”

“As a matter of fact, I did.”

“How about a ride around Lake Sammamish?”

 

How to Help a Teenage Driver Feel Better About Herself After She Hits You With Her Car

You know what’s great? Leaving work early on a Friday afternoon, guilt-free, to go on a ride. And even though it’s February, it’s warm enough that you can ride with shorts and a long-sleeve jersey.

And besides, Brad and I spent at least a third of the ride talking about work, so it actually qualified as a highly-productive meeting.

Brad’s new to road riding, and so I tended to lead a little bit on the climbs. Which turned out to be a good thing for Brad, because as I rode past the Thompson Hill Road intersection on my right, a car rolled through the stop sign, turning right, and clipped my rear wheel.

I swerved wildly, corrected, swerved again, corrected, and then just wobbled a bit. I rolled to a stop, threw up my arms in a “Hey, you just hit me!” gesture. No, not that gesture. Really. Ask anyone who knows me if they’ve ever seen me do that gesture.

The car pulled over, and the most embarrassed, penitent, remorseful teenage girl in the world ran over, apologizing at — let’s face it — a comical rate.

“I can’t believe I did that,” she said. “I am so stupid. I could have totally killed you if you had been a half-second slower. Let me buy you a new wheel. Your wheel’s OK? Are you sure? Let me buy you a new one anyway. Oh, I can’t believe I did that.”

I am confident she is still apologizing.

So here’s the thing. This is the third time I’ve had a close encounter on a road bike, but by the time I parted ways, I was laughing. I can’t stay mad at someone who admits they made a mistake.

‘Course, I may have managed to stay angry if she had rolled over my leg, even with the apologies.

 

How to Ride Over Lots and Lots of Logs

On Saturday, I finally got to go back to Soaring Eagle Park to check out a little more of what I have been missing for the past couple years.

Yeah, the purple dotted lines represent the singletrack network. 627 acres of it. This is half a mile from my house.

Sorry, I'm still kicking myself over not having ridden this 'til now.

In shorts and short-sleeved jersey, I went on a three-hour ride, just seeing if I could cover all the singletrack in that park.

As I rode, I followed these self-imposed rules:

1. Avoid doubling back on yourself if at all possible. Crisscross all over the place, but never turn around.
2. When there’s a log in the trail, ride it. Even if you don’t think it’s rideable.

I obeyed the first rule until I found what must be the best section in the whole network, and found myself thinking, “Too bad I can’t double back on that and see what it’s like going in the opposite direction.” At which point I recalled the mountain biking prime directive: “Have fun.”

I smacked my head, turned around, and rode that section in the other direction.

Just as good.

The second rule — ride all the logs — taught me a lot. Specifically, I learned that the real trick to riding over logs is to just keep pedaling, even after you think you’re going to fall. In fact, make that especially when you think you’re going to fall. ‘Cuz right at that point where you’re high-centered and feeling all unnatural-like, if you keep pedaling you’ll probably clean  the log. If you stop pedaling, you’ll fall over sideways.

By the end of the ride, I was a better cyclist. How often do you get to say that?

 

How to Sabotage Your Diet So Completely that a New Law of Physics is Named After You

I started Friday morning at 169.0. Basically, by going totally hardcore for half a week, I managed to lose the weight I needed to meet my goal. When I got home from riding around 45 miles Friday, though, I was hungry. It wasn’t the kind of hungry that a meal fixes, either. It was the kind of hungry that makes you wander around the kitchen, stuffing things from the fridge and pantry into your mouth while you wait for the microwave to finish. Did you know that it’s possible to eat most of a bag of chocolate chips in less than five minutes? Did you know that saltine crackers taste great dipped in peanut butter? Did you know that saltine crackers with a little piece of cheese on them also taste great dipped in peanut butter?

Is there anything that doesn’t taste great with peanut butter?

Once I had blown it so utterly before dinner, I had an, “Oh well, today’s shot, may as well enjoy it” attitude and just kept eating. I figured I’d go back to the diet on Saturday morning.

I did not go back on the diet Saturday.

Nor on Sunday.

And it’s not like I just didn’t diet. I anti-dieted. I ate all the junk I’ve been avoiding. And I ate monster portions of everything. Very clever.

I did not weigh myself today, because I am terrified of what I might find. I’ll weigh myself tomorrow and set a new goal, and will absolutely be more disciplined next weekend.

Unless, of course, I’m not.

 

PS: How to Give Credit Where Credit’s Due

When, last week, I said that Carb-Boom’s apple-cinnamon energy gel tastes just like McDonald’s apple pie filling, I should have mentioned that my riding bud Eric Gunnerson told me this exact thing about a year ago. I just didn’t believe him. Well, he was right.

Eric is, by the way, currently engaged in an interesting new blog project called Explanations, wherein he moderates an ongoing inquiry into what the cute little sayings on the inside of Dove’s candy wrappers mean.

And for that reason, I am changing my rating of Eric from “Evil Genius” to “Evil, Whimsically Misguided Genius.”

 

PPS: See this Movie if You Have Four-Year-Old Kids

I took the twins to see the Curious George movie over the weekend. As a person who loved Curious George books as a kid, I thought this was a great re-imagining of the Curious George story, especially how instead of having the man in the big yellow hat capture and remove George from his home it has George steal aboard the boat. Also, at long last, we get an explanation for the yellow outfit and hat.

Seriously, I enjoyed the movie. My four-year-old girls did, too.

And I ate the maximum amount of popcorn allowed under Washington State laws.

Back in November, I wrote a review of the energy gels I have tried. The short version of that story was: gels are a necessary evil. Except the necessary part, maybe.

Then, toward the bottom, I said:

There are a lot of brands out there I haven’t mentioned. Carb-Boom, for example. If they’d like to send me a batch, I’ll try it and even write about it.

To my surprise, I shortly afterward got an email from Mike of Carb-Boom, asking for my address. Turns out he took my offer at face value.

 

Big Box of Goodies

Mike didn’t just send me four packets of gel, either. He sent me several single-serving gel packets, two “Big Boom” bottles, some of their Pro-Boom recovery gel, and a few servings of their Hydro-Boom sports drink.

Here’s what I thought.

• First and foremost, Carb-Boom energy gel absolutely rules. My main complaint about other energy gels was that they tasted so nasty that I looked for reasons to not use them. “Hey, it’s only been half an hour since I last sucked down a gel. I think I’m good for another ten minutes.” The Carb-Boom flavors, on the other hand, actually taste good. In particular, the Strawberry Kiwi, Banana Peach, and Apple Cinnamon flavors, instead of just being purely and overwhelmingly sweet, taste like actual fruit, and have an element of tartness to them. And they give you the same energy boost you expect from any other gel. Maybe it’s because they had the audacious notion of using real fruit for their flavoring, but Carb-Boom is has overcome the previously-insurmountable “tastes nasty” barrier.
• Apple-Cinnamon Big-Boom Rules Even More. Big-Boom is a twelve-serving bottle of Carb-Boom, available in (caffeinated) orange-vanilla and apple-cinnamon. And while the orange-vanilla didn’t do much for me, here’s the thing about the apple-cinnamon flavor: it tastes exactly like a McDonald’s apple pie. Except the flaky crust, and it isn’t hotter than the sun. I’ve found my new endurance food, kids. Two of these bottles — which comes out to 2640 calories — and a couple cans of chicken soup should be all I need to get me across the Leadville 100 finish line in style.
• Hydro-Boom: What? A Sports Drink that Isn’t Sickly Sweet? The first impression you get with Hydro-Boom is that it’s salty. Turns out that’s sea salt, which I have a vague impression is somehow better for you than regular salt, though I have no idea why. I do know that when I’m riding I get sick of the “sweet” taste of most drinks pretty fast and so have in general just switched to water, even on endurance rides. Would I be able to drink this all day? I don’t know, to be honest. I’d be willing to give it a shot.
• Pro-Boom: The consistent theme with everything Mike from Carb-Boom sent me was that it tastes great. That was true of their recovery gel, Pro-Boom, too. The thing is, though, it’s hard to gauge whether a recovery gel has done its job. I’m pretty sure Pro-Boom would go great with nachos, though.

Banjo Brothers Bike Bag Giveaway Winner Announced

I couldn’t help it — I was swept up in Dope Control’s beautiful dream. Its wildness, weirdness, and completeness captivated me.

My island was constructed in the South Atlantic by the extra terrestrial race credited with the construction the pyramids of Giza and kick-starting such advanced ancient civilizations as the Incas and Mayans. For them, it served as a runway for their colossal spacecraft, but today it is visited only by a publicity-shy collective of super-intelligent highway surface engineers who use the island as a test bed to further their quest for the perfect road surface. They do this at night.

The island is 25 miles long and 30 yards wide.

At one end of the island lives a small community descended from two aliens that were left behind when their comrades departed Earth for the last time. Their staple diet is hot dogs - it is all that they can eat.

At the other end of the island is a hot dog factory. The aliens have recruited a legion of truck drivers to satisfy their huge appetite for the hot dog, who spend their days driving from one end of the island to the other at terrifying speed, though never once losing control of their vehicles or straying from a perfectly straight path.

My bike is not visible to the naked eye. It is a product of the world's finest nano-technology lab, and though it boasts conventional frame geometries, its tubes have the tensile strength of spider's silk the thickness of a waitress's arm. When I ride it, the frontal area I present to the wind is smaller than the surface area of a bottle top.

On the island I hold time trials.

Email me with your address, Dope Control, and I’ll get that seat bag out to you.

 

PS: Today’s Weight is 169.8. I guess when I stick to my diet and exercise, I can lose weight. Amazing!

Is there a more hackneyed conversation starter in the world than, “If you could bring only one _______________ to a desert island, what would it be?”

The answer to that question is, of course, “no.”

But I’m going to ask it anyway.

If you could bring only one bike to a desert island, what would it be?

 

First, the Island

If I’m going to a desert island, I get to stipulate the island’s terrain. So I pick an island that is mountainous. It is forested on the south side, while it is truly desert-like on the north side, with lots of sandstone.

Deer and goats live on this island, and they have been busy for centuries walking the same routes. Insta-trails! Also, for some reason, the goats like to frequently walk the perimeter of the island, which is much less technical and rolls pleasantly.

The daily high temperature is 68. The daily low is 62.

It rains for half an hour each day, enough to keep the trails from getting dusty.

 

Now, the Bike

There’s no bike shop on the desert island — for some reason, while it is the absolutely most perfect place in the world to bike, nobody rides there — so I want a bike that is super-reliable. Let’s make it a singlespeed. In fact, let’s make it a fixed gear. And I want to be able to do both technical mountain biking, and spinning.

So let’s make it a cross-style bike, with extra clearance for big fat mountain bike tires (while there are no bike shops on the island, I do get to bring as many kinds of tires as I like, and the island has the magical property of bikes never getting flats or wearing out their tires. Or — what the heck — of needing chain lube) when I want them.

The material? Titanium. Doesn’t corrode. Bombproof when well-made.

Oh, and it’s set up for panniers, so I can go collect coconuts and go on goat-hunting expeditions and stuff.

Basically, this is the bike Matt Chester’s going to build for me someday. Now all I need is to find the island.

On this bike, on this island, my riding style would have to change. I’d gain all kinds of new skills as I learned to ride technical terrain on a fixed-gear bike. I’d become stronger as I climbed on a singlespeed. I’d generate massive endurance as I rode my perimeter course (which is exactly 100 miles long).

 

The Banjo Brothers Bike Bag Giveaway: Your Turn

What’s your island? What’s your bike? You saw these questions coming a mile off, didn’t you?

 

Today’s weight: Today I weigh 170.8 pounds, meaning I need to lose 1.6 pounds in the next 48 hours, or give up the jackpot.

AUSTIN, TX (Fat Cyclist Fake News Service) —  Members of the Discovery Cycling Team claim to be saddened by the news released to People Magazine last Friday, that Lance Armstrong and Sheryl Crow have broken off their engagement.

Said a racer who wished to remain anonymous, “I am deeply sorry for Lance and Sheryl, and send them my best — albeit anonymous — wishes during this difficult time for them. I am also deeply sorry that this means OLN’s coverage — if it even covers the Tour de France, now that Lance is gone — will have to be about the race and riders, instead of hobnobbing on-camera with some pop star who has exactly two interesting songs in her entire catalog.”

Said Johan Bruyneel, Directeur Sportif for Team Discovery, “Lance and I are very close, and so it breaks my heart to know that he and Sheryl are no longer together. And while part of me is relieved that we won’t have the security nightmare that comes with having both a biking and a rock celebrity touring with us, not to mention the way they’re always demanding a better room, asking for organic vegetables, bringing their entourage and near-infinite quantities of luggage from city to city, and….”

Bruyneel paused to collect his thoughts, then continued. “Um, as I was saying, I’m very disappointed Sheryl won’t be along for the Tour this year.”

 

Armstrong’s Publicist Reacts

“Lance is very careful to separate his personal relationships from his professional life,” said Armstrong’s spokesperson. “Take, for example, his first book, It’s Not About the Bike. Why, he barely mentioned his (now former) wife in that book. And with Sheryl, he’s been very private about that relationship all along. You hardly even knew they were together. I mean, it’s not like he went on Oprah and proclaimed his love for Sheryl there or anything.”

“So,” continued the publicist, “when Lance and Sheryl ask we respect their privacy during this difficult time, it’s of course quite reasonable that you do so, since they have never, to this point, beaten you over the head relentlessly with the fact that they’re dating by appearing on TV constantly together and having photo op after photo op together and writing, producing and performing love songs about each other and doing these strange combo bike ride / soft-rock concert events that scream, ‘We’re one of the most public couples in the entire freaking universe!’”

“They have always been private people,” the publicist concluded. “Please let them continue to be private during this difficult hour.”

 

Ullrich’s Sympathies

Jan Ullrich, whom Armstrong has consistently identified as his greatest TdF rival, also conveyed his regrets. “As a racer who has also struggled with relationship difficulties, I can understand how difficult a time this must be for Lance,” said Ullrich. “What I cannot understand is how he always manages to have his breakups in the off-season, even after he’s retired from racing. Man, that guy is truly disciplined.”

“I must ask, however,” continued Ullrich, “Why couldn’t he have had that breakup late last June?”

 

Every Cyclist In The Universe Comments

Cyclists throughout the world did their level best to express something besides ambivalence about Armstrong’s breakup. According to every cyclist currently living, “Armstrong’s a great racer, but he’s no longer racing. I actually don’t care even a little bit about whether he marries or not. In fact, the only way this shocking revelation could be interesting to me would be if Armstrong decided to fill the hole in his life with another TdF. You think he might do that?”

“No, that’s just silly,” the collective cycling universe said to itself. “Armstrong would never tease us in that way. He’s not the kind of guy who would say, ‘Maybe I’ll race this year, maybe I won’t.’ Or, ‘I’m retired, but maybe I’ll come out of retirement. No, no I won’t.’”

 

Movie Implications

A spokesperson for Sony Pictures, which is producing the Lance Armstrong Movie, said that this turn of events does not impact the planned film at all.

“We’re going with the film just as we always have,” the studio representative said. “In fact, in some ways this event gives our next steps some clarity. We had planned to combine the Kristin years with the Sheryl years, kind of blurring the two people into one. This now makes better sense than ever.”

“The only way we’ll tweak the generic wife / girlfriend character is,” continued the spokesperson, “we no longer plan to give her a name, or any speaking lines. Considering that this film won’t be out for at least another eighteen months, I think that’s the prudent course.”

“We have yet to decide,” finished the spokesperson, “Whether to pixelate her face.”

# # #

 

Today’s weight: 171.6. Hmm. That’s not the right direction. I need to step things up.

Bob and I took off early from work to go complete the ride we had flatted out of last week. You see, Crop Circles is just part of an incredible little network of trails in Renton, WA. The other three, Tapeworm, Parasite, and Mr. DNA, follow the same trail philosophy: squeeze as much trail as possible into the smallest possible space.

The result? An incredibly twisty trail where you are almost always entering or exiting a hairpin turn, climbing or descending a short (but steep) hill, threading your handlebars between close trees, riding over roots and logs, or working on one of the constructed moves.

It was glorious.

 

See-Saw

Until yesterday, I was ambivalent about the idea of having human-constructed moves as part of a ride. I mean, aren’t the moves that occur naturally good enough? Do we really want to turn a beautiful trail into an eyesore?

Now, however, I am firmly in favor of building cool little moves into trails — owner permission permitting, of course.

This change of heart happened when I swallowed my fear and rode up and over a see-saw. The board is about nine inches wide and about eight feet long, with the fulcrum about eighteen inches high. As you ride up the first time, you naturally think that the board will tip as your body passes the fulcrum.

It doesn’t.

You keep riding up, wondering when it’s going to go. Then, just about as you stall out, the board tips suddenly. Wham! In an instant, you go from pointing straight up to rolling straight down.

It was a rush. Bob and I rode the see-saw at least a half-dozen times each. That slow…slow…slow…FAST feeling never got old.

 

A Clean, A Crash, And A New Term Defined

Next up, riding up and over a very narrow series (three inches or so) of slats, nailed together on a board and leaning on a log — like a very skinny ladder. Then you go down the other side on a similar series of slats.

I only tried this move once, because I cleaned it on the first try, much to Bob’s amazement.

Alas, the story does not end there.

I brought quite a bit of speed into this move, figuring it would be easy to keep the straight line necessary if I had momentum. This was correct, but it meant that I was going pretty fast as I came off the last slat. Unfortunately, I had not scouted out the rollout for this move, and it turned out to be a rooty ledge drop with a sharp right turn.

I endoed spectacularly.

I instinctively grabbed for a tree branch as I was in the air. This was a bad idea, since I grabbed with my bad shoulder — the one that dislocates just for the hell of it. I heard a “snap,” which, I thought as I flew, was a good thing, since a full-on dislocation sounds more like “SKRROPP.”

You know how there’s a spot on the inside of your knee that if you hit, hurts much worse than it ought? Sort of the knee-equivalent of your funny bone? Well, as I continued my brief flight, that’s the part of my knee I banged hard against my top tube.

I stayed on the ground for several minutes, rocking back and forth, willing myself not to scream and waiting for the pain-induced nausea to subside.

This gave Bob time to think.

“You have just experienced,” Bob said, “what I term a ‘Peak Confidence Event.’ (PCE)” Bob went on to explain that a PCE is what happens after you crash and suddenly find yourself very timid on all moves for the rest of the ride. It is mathematically impossible for your confidence to return to the level it was at just before you crashed.

Bob speaks the truth. It’s a good term for a mountain biking axiom. PCE: Make a note of it and integrate it into your lexicon.

Thank you.

 

More Moves

Eventually, I felt good enough to ride again, though gingerly. There were more fun constructed moves ahead of us, and I had to decide whether to try them. I figured that PCE or no, I would at least give them the three tries allotted me.

There were several bridges and curvy ladders made of slats, most of which were not difficult. There was a two-foot high stack of logs tied together that looked forbidding. Bob gave me an excellent tip: it’s easier than it looks. Bearing that in mind, I just rode over it.

There was a 10-foot-long log. I cleaned it on the first try. There was an uphill ledge followed by a pair of logs. I missed it on my first and second try, but then — hooray — cleaned it on my third. It was at this point that I coined an axiom of my own: When doing a three-try move, it is best to get it on the first. Failing that, it is better to get it on the third try than the second, because it’s more dramatic. If you get it on the second try, really you’re just demonstrating that it wasn’t that hard of a move to begin with and you should have gotten it on the first try.

Bob and I are not only extremely excellent riders, we’re very, very smart.

 

Thank You, Dahon

The Dahon Flo I’ve been riding was a dream this whole ride. I don’t think I’ve ever felt so confident on a bike (at least, until the PCE). It's not just a good bike for travelling; it's one of the best mountain bikes I have ever ridden. Who would have ever expected that from a break-apart bike?

 

Moment of Pride

There is one slat-type bridge that I would not have thought I’d clean. That’s because you have to wheelie up to it — about 20 inches, I think — using a single log as a ramp, then heave your rear wheel up onto it and continue riding a nice straight line, so you don’t fall off the side of the one-foot-wide bridge.

I got it on my third try.

 

One Last Epiphany

I could write tons more about yesterday’s ride, which reminds me of why I write this blog. I need to spend more time riding, or this blog is going to start getting very boring.

 

Banjo Brothers Bike Bag Contest

For today’s Banjo Brothers Bike Bag Contest, you must do two things:

1. Tell me of a bike-related epiphany you have had. Or failing that, describe a biking axiom.
2. Guess my weight.

There will be two prizes: One for the best epiphany / axiom, another for the person who comes closest to guessing my weight, which will — once again — become a daily feature starting tomorrow, along with the Fat Cyclist Weight Loss Sweepstakes.

 

Bonus Additional Reading About Yesterday’s Ride

Today, Bob wrote an excellent Top 5 about yesterday’s ride. Read it now.