Judging Self-Worth Through Insignifigant Cycling Achievements

Like, for example my fitness. I have been feeling pretty good about myself and my results (minus Phoenix) as of thus far this year. I was able to wrap up this spring with a 7th place at the Santa Ynez National leaving me 5th in the series (in semi-pro) after 3 races. I tallied up 08′ so far and had a 4th over all (first in singlespeed) at a 12er in January, a second overall at Cool, a few 3rds at some cccx races, a 7th overall at a state race (napa), A 9th, 23rd (poop), and 7th at the Nationals, and 6th at Sea otter. There were also a couple of local road races that I did well in and a local mountain bike race or two in which I was beat up on by Weir and a couple other WTB guys.

All this patting myself on the back took place right after the Santa Ynez race which was three weeks ago. At this point I decided that I really needed to start to work on riding my single speed again and get in shape for some endurance racing, and ride a single speed I did. With no rest at all after a peak period. We learn from our mistakes. I quit a particularly hard 12er up in Weaverville after only 4 1/2 hours last weekend. That was the first time that I have ever dropped out of a race before. I can sit here and make excuses all day, it was raining, and muddy, and blah blah blah. But really my heart just wasn’t in it at all and for the first time EVER I was having no fun at all during a race. When I quit the race I was about 3 minutes behind Sloane Anderson (endurance pro from oregon who is consistantly top 10 at 24hoa worlds) and Dez Wilder (who WILL, in my opinion, win the single speed category of 24 worlds if he goes this year) and didn’t have any excuse at all to quit, just not into it. Strange…

I figured that it was a combination of weather, no fender, too many hours, and the fact that hanging out at my parents house with the little lady sounded a lot more cozy at the time. Once I got back home I tried to go out and “really hit the trails hard”, to get back into shape, right? The result is a complete loss of fitness. I went and did a cccx race today, which I should normally end “in the money”. Today I couldn’t even keep with the front group, some guy with a camelback passed me. That’s almost like getting chicked.

End result; One week without even touching a bike. Then a return to a brief period of base training and a few months of build with late August being a peak period. Since sswc08 is the week before the NMBS finals at Brians Head I figure it would be a good time to have a good showing.

Second end result; No 24Hoa worlds this year. The deal that I was offered earlier this year just got less and less sweet until there was no deal. Just a bike that can’t use a rear rotor any bigger than 140, won’t accept a bottle cage on the down tube, and has horizontal dropouts. Luckily nobody really reads this blog or I would feel like a cock badmouthing Spot. They have been very friendly to me and the bike was free, they even offered to pit for me at Worlds.

So there you have it, I suck at riding bikes right now but I can still fix cars better than you can so go F-yourself and watchout come August!! I’ve just gotten my motivation back after a brief episode of depression and soul searching. Turns out that I DON’T want to revert back to being a pot head or alcoholic or anything like that. I just wanna take a week off and then work on getting ready to beat YOU at a bike race in late summer.

Post script, I’m brushing the dust off of the Gary Fisher Rig frame that I raced on last year. All of my goodies are coming off of the Spot and going back onto the Rig. The Spot is gonna get set up as a rigid v-brake bike and will be used purely for fucking shit up eluding Rangers on Mt Tam