happy thoughts...

There is a section in every cross race I've done so far, that is normally dry or flat and I can happily throw down a hammer or two. Riding hard and fast - passing a lot of people and feeling accomplished. And then... well, there is that other 80% of the race that normally requires me to get off the bike and haul it through several inches of deep sticky mud; thereby sucking my momentum and allowing half of the race to pass me. It is masochistic, humiliating and I wonder for the love of God, why I am doing it. I push myself to barely trot along, all the while digging myself out of mud and cleaning it out of my eye for the 16th hundred time.

It is in the mud that I find myself longing for those those flat, dry sections. In fact, I look forward to those flat dry sections around every mucky dirty bend. Sadly though, by the third lap I realize there are not enough of those flat dry sections to make a difference and I start to get discouraged about the mud and myself.

I mean don't get me wrong, I enjoy the mud... but not really.

Honestly, I like going fast and for me, riding through this muddy shit and carrying my bike is just against everything I love about racing.

It is at that moment, I have a minute of heightened sense of clarity: I love bike racing enough to hate it.

Granted, that might not make any sense at all... but I realized that by halting my speed and keeping my forward progress to a bare minimum, that I really really love going fast (and riding in circles) and I am good at that. I discovered that by putting myself in the most horrible conditions I can imagine, counterintuitive to everything I enjoy, that I can appreciate what I really really love even more. That, and I love a good challenge... and cross is just that, a challenge. As well, I can feel the humility in sucking ass at things that other people excel in. I mean, we can't all be awesome at everything (well, not most of us anyways).

Oh summer time, I look forward to your next season. I look forward to your warm days and your dry pavement and your fast laps. I look forward to a place where I can go as fast as I want to and I never have to slow down or lose momentum because of mud.

I mean don't get me wrong, I enjoy the mud ... but I like going fast more.