If it wasn't clear before, it's clear now: I have no idea what I'm doing.
If my incompetence wasn't clear after my whole "flat tire debacle" in the Tahoe City Xterra Triathlon in June, it's impossible to deny after Saturday.
Tracy and I were on our typical Saturday trail ride - Fairfax, Marin County, Mt. Tam loop. We love this ride. In fact, we are so fond of this ride that it's pretty much the only one we do. Last year, we bought a book on mountain biking in Northern California. This Fairfax trail is one of the first we read about. We've done others, but we always come crawling back home to Tam. It has everything you want in a ride: solid climbs, thrilling descents, breathtaking views, changing landscape, friendly riders, plenty of sun. It's perfect. But I digress.
It's about 4:30 pm when we unload the bikes from our new bike rack, gear up, and hop on the saddle. We're like cooped up pups breaking free and chasing down the tennis ball in the park. By the end of the week, we need this. We hit the trail and start our climb. As the incline increases, I'm forced to adjust gears to ease up the resistance. This is standard procedure. But as the hill steepens, something starts happening.
"Clunk, chink, chank! Ggggrrr... Ka Clunk, Ka Chook, Chink!"
What is going on?! Coming from my pedals is the sound of mini fireworks exploding. With each pedal stroke, the crackle of a small explosion follows. Oh this is horrible. This is... This is... just horrible.
It's my chain. It's hiccuping every other time I pedal. It's more frustrating than a scratched CD skipping every 5 seconds. Each time it hiccups it feels like the floor is coming out from under me.
It's my chain. It's drier than the Prohibition. A cactus has received more love and affection than my bike chain. And now, it's protesting. It doesn't want to ride today. I understand. Why should it? I have abused and neglected it. I have failed to supervise. Failed to set up proper and timely services. If my bike was appointed an attorney in bicycle welfare proceedings, my bike would be removed from my custody immediately, with all parental rights terminated. It would be in a new home, with a new caregiver - one that would provide for all of it's needs. This all dawns on me as Tracy and I are only ten minutes into our ride. We realize there's no way I can continue. My chain is in desperate need of oil. And neither of us have any. I dribble some water on it from my bottle. This just seems to make things worse. The grinding sounds even louder. We decide to turn around. That's it. Ride's over.
I'm fuming as we sail back down the hill. 45-min drive for nothing. But Tracy's not as pessimistic. She seems to think that someone back in the parking lot might have some oil. Right.
We're back in the parking lot in just a few minutes. Before I can unclench my jaw, Tracy is a few cars down approaching a plumb middle-aged man in a Chelsea Futbol jersey. He's getting out of his minivan. He already has his helmet on. It makes him look like a six-foot mushroom with an overgrown stem (his body). Oh, God. That guy? Really? You think that guy is going to have some spare oil? That guy?! The only way that guy could help us out is if we were in a crisis where the solution involved needing to find the nearest pub or brawtwurst.
I can hear the guy say something as he opens the back of the van. His Irish accent confirms my hunch regarding his pub-finding abilities. But before I can bask in my stereotype victory, I hear Tracy saying, "Oh! Thank you so much!" She skips over to me with a poised, self-satisfied smirk across her face, can-o-oil in hand. I lift my jaw off the ground.
Five minutes later, my chain is greased up and ready to ride. Wow.
I'd like to say that the rest of the ride was perfect and hiccup free. But it wasn't. My chain still rebelled a few times. But I was able to get through the ride. That's all that I needed. My mind swirled for the next two hours on the trail.
When it comes to mountain biking, I'm somewhere in the middle. On the sliding scale of mountain bike obsession/interest - where on one extreme is the obsessed triathlete-bike-mechanic-devotee, and on the other is the person who owns a bike and rides a few times a year - I'm right in the middle. If anything I probably tilt more toward the less obsessed side of the scale. And that's not because I don't love it. I do. Mountain biking is one of my favorite things in the world. But what keeps me from tilting toward the totally obsessed side of the scale is my total lack of care of my bike - and lack of interest in bike care. I wish this weren't so. I wish I looked at my bike as something worthy of my time and care. I wish I was fascinated by it's mechanics, it's function. I want to be! I've read Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance! I want to relish in the spiritual bliss of man's two-way relationship with technology, our symbiotic relationship with machines! But I'm not there yet. And this chain incident, the flat tire incident, it all shines a spotlight on this.
There's an insecurity when you're somewhere in the middle. I can't brush off my ignorance as a dabbler can. It's harder to be humble about my lack of knowledge. It's complicated. When I don't really care about something, or don't spend much time doing it, then it's easier to ask for help, it's easier to laugh at yourself. Your fumbles during your first few weeks of a new job are excusable, but those same mistakes two years later aren't. You don't take yourself seriously when you're a novice or newbie - your ignorance is expected. But when you spend every weekend doing something - when you've completed triathlons riding on that something! - and yet you really know nothing about what you're doing, well, it's hard to swallow. Because you know that you should know what, in fact, you do not know. And to compensate for being in this middle zone, there's this part of me that wanted to shout at the Irish guy, "I've done two triathlons!" But I didn't. Thankfully.
But the other extreme is scary too. It's intimidating. You know, the extreme cyclists you see on the weekends and early morning weekdays. The full spandexed, the full-body shaved, the totally obsessed. The one's that size up your bike and calves simultaneously as they ride past. They make me nervous. It's not easy to tap into this world. I've walked into bike shops where I've felt more unsure about myself than a high-school freshman at a dance. I've felt more comfortable discussing car problems with a mechanic. It's intimidating. There's so much I don't know. There's so much to learn.
Why haven't I taken the time to learn about my bike and to care for it properly? I've treated my bike as if it were a pair of running shoes, throwing it in the closet the minute I get home, not looking for it until it's time to ride. How can I expect it to perform when called upon, despite it not receiving necessary nourishment? It's not right.
This negligence runs counter to most aspects of my life. Of recent, it runs counter to my new project - barefoot running. [I plan on writing about my humbling, excruciating and exciting transition to running in Vibram FiveFinger barefoot shoes in my next post].
The most compelling idea behind barefoot running is it's natural connectedness to our bodies (our machines). We've evolved over thousands and thousands of years. We've done so well in the evolutionary game because we ran - and of course due to other reasons, such as social ability. But we ran and ran and ran. All without Nikes, amazingly. Running without supported shoes is how our machines were initially made. Our feet receive nourishment from contact with the soil. Our running form takes proper shape when we discard the hoofs. We're more engaged and focused when we run barefoot. We sustain less injuries. We have more fun.
Maybe this is what will happen when I decide to take a look under the hood of my bike. I'll feel more connected to this machine that brings me so much joy. Maybe I'll get more out of my biking experience; and my bike will get more out of me.
Or maybe I won't. If I do learn all these new things about my bike, and begin caring for all of my bike's needs, would I have experienced my flat in my last tri? Or would we have experienced the kindness of this Round Pint of Guiness in the minivan? Probably not.
Maybe I'll continue to ignore and dismiss my bike's needs. That way I'll still have something to write about.
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