The 401 in Crested Butte

Rode all the way up on the 401 Trail, a Colorado classic.

The view: gorgeous. The trail: thin singletrack, tall wildflowers just past their flourish of color and beauty. The pitch toward the end: wicked steep. The pain: tremendous. The riding time: around five hours.

That night’s sleep: ocean deep.

The quick scene, w/dialogue: A guy on his way down stopped and pulled off the track. He nodded his head, smiled, said “Yeah, dude. Get some.”

I got some.

The Weeks Slide By

How does time cruise by so quick?

Suddenly I wake up and it’s August, and I haven’t ridden in almost a week.

And I am already nostalgic about the rides I have taken, like the one at Buffalo Creek where my riding buddy Ed and I ran across this:

A horse in the middle of a national forest. There was no one around. She had blue eyes and was very friendly, but alas, she did not have wings or a curly horn.

Now that would have made my daughters very happy.

–MJH

Watching the Tour

I’ve been watching a ton of TV coverage on this year’s Tour de France. I’m watching to see who’s going to win that day, will those wild breakaways succeed, who’s in yellow. I want to know what those crazy-long stages look like. I want to be an HD tourist, gently flying over the ruins of Roman castras, the gorgeous French countryside, the vineyards and quaint little towns, the majestic cloud formations above the Alps. And to see those nutty dudes who run alongside the riders—often in silly outfits, or, um, naked—as they chug up the mountains.

But mostly—like many others, probably—I’m watching to see what Lance does. To see if he still has it, it being that ability to ride himself away from all other men and suffer an immeasurable amount of pain.

I read somewhere that Lance is able to ride like that because he knows pain intimately, has survived a level of pain that few others have ever known. In a way, his body has adapted to it—the unspeakable and indescribable pain and exhaustion that goes with cancer and chemotherapy—and it is this pain that has taught him not to be afraid of death, of all things. Because the mind’s response to such an output—when someone pushes themselves past the brink of what the body thinks it can do—is to tell the body to stop what it’s doing. Lance can break past that threshold because at one point in his life, merely getting out of bed felt like such a task.

So mostly I watch for Lance, and then I think of these things. I think of both my mother and my sister, who both endured (that is the perfect word for it) chemotherapy and invasive surgeries. Both women amazed me with their stamina, their ability to keep going no matter what. Their determination has always astounded me.

I seem to be in love with the pain of pushing myself to this brink when I ride to the point of exhaustion and the edge of fearing for my life, but I know that my effort is nothing compared to what they have done. Their struggle is one of survival; mine isn’t. I can always slow down and get off the bike. When my sister wakes up and gets ready for another round of chemo or radiation, there is no stopping or getting off the bike. She has to go on.

And I find that remarkable.

Confluence

Sometimes you get out on a ride and everything meshes together. Your bike shorts seem to fit perfectly–no binding, scratching, impinging on, ahem, certain special parts. The bike feels lighter somehow, it seems to want to stay underneath you and not get pushed toward lousy lines. The rocks on the trail don’t stop you, they merely thrust you onward and upward.

I had a ride like that yesterday, at the Apex Trail, with my friend Josh. I suppose part of it was because I didn’t think to much, I didn’t feel too much pressure to ride perfectly (where that pressure comes from, and how it sometimes goes away, I don’t know).

I pulled into the lot, parked the car, and thought to myself, I will clear all those impossible sections today.

And mostly, I did.

The nasty ramp about a half mile into the trail; the will-to-live sapping series of switchbacks in the north side woods; and riding down all the many nasty drops and narrow, dangerous sections, I bled fear outta my veins and let the wheels roll.

I have to say it was pretty cool. Considering how it went,  there are some lessons I’ve uncovered. To wit:

1. Don’t think too much;
2. totally don’t dread anything;
3. always bring enough water, so if you forget one of your bottles, you’ll live;
4. let go of the goddam brakes, choose a good line and let the bike carry you down;
5. doing wall sits actually can make your quads stronger;
6. ride with a buddy who doesn’t care if you ride well or not;
7. the Malcolm Gladwell 10,000 hour rule is about right: the more you do it, the better you get, though you probably can’t explain why or how, so when you’ve seen the trail for the 50th time, it’s suddenly much easier than those first 49 times, which means that small lessons learned coalesce and then become major breakthroughs.

I’m looking forward to the next ride. Though I feel like I’m getting a nice, blooming summer cold.

–MJH

The Trail Always Lies Ahead

The season has begun in earnest, though the weather has been incredibly bad here in Denver these first few weeks of June–daily tornado warnings, wicked heavy hailstorms. Plus, as usual, I am a very busy man, with classes to teach, kiddos to hang out with, garden plots to weed, lawns to mow.

Sometimes I wonder how much I would ride if I had no job, no home maintenance tasks, no kids, no worries. Every day? Twice a day? Or does this ironic idea exist somewhere in truth: you do it because you love it, and because you can’t do it every day.

Maybe I love it because each time I get out onto the trail, the suffering is pure and brilliant, and because it’s a precious and fleeting thing, something I have to fight for, something for which I have to sacrifice and stress.

It has value because it requires that I give up (or squeeze time and energy out of) other things: sleep, care, love, attention, writing, work, etc.

Just something to consider.

–MJH

Dream On

I keep surfing craigslist and ebay, admiring from afar–and in an abstract way–single speed 29ers.

I’ve converted my old 26er into a single speed, and rode it a few times last summer. It was, of course, a completely different experience, and an exhausting ride. And therefore a complete blast.

I really dug it, though during one ride up Mt. Falcon I kind of tweaked my knee, sitting and pedaling a bit too hard. Alas, I am getting old.

Maybe my knees won’t take 29er single-speeding, and certainly I shouldn’t blow money on something I can’t actually do. (I think as you get older it’s sometimes more fun buying expensive gear, and less fun actually using it. A very dangerous trap.)

I guess I’ll wait on that. Maybe I’ll do something truly profound: ride the bikes I already have in the garage.

Though, in the meantime, I’ve begun spying the process of getting my shock and fork Pushed.

Gotta spend money somewhere, right?

–MJH

The season Begins

Welcome to my new biking-specific blog.

I am a writer and I like riding, and so it seems only natural that I ride and write, write and ride.

Of course, the idea is not to write a boring personal journal about riding, but to tell stories in a way that engages and entertains an audience. You are out there, aren’t you?