At 6:45 this morning, I was spanked in the biggest way possible. I was
spanked the way a [censored]-off mom who just finished her Zoloft
prescription spanks a screaming kid in the middle of Toys 'R Us. I
got spanked the same way Muhammad Ali spanked George Foreman during the
"Thrilla in Manila." I got spanked . . . well, you get the point.
This morning, I promptly arrived at the Wollman Rink parking lot in
Prospect Park at five AM. Glancing around the dark, empty parking lot,
I thought, "Am I in the right place?" Turned out I was definitely
in the right place. I had simply arrived way, way too early as most of
the other riders didn't begin appearing until six or so.
First, I went through what I decided would be my pre-race routine:
unloaded my bike from the back of the truck, strapped on my shoes, and
sat on the tailgate watching everyone else inflate tires and dress in
all of the sportiest gear--colorful jerseys, wonderful bibs, and
fast-looking carbon fiber bicycles--while I looked fantastic in my red
Champion athletic shirt.
(I'm one of those guys who refuses to invest in an authentic cycling
jersey until I know I'm fast enough to run the pace of the Category 5
group. If I did well this morning, I'd hop online immediately
thereafter and order something nice. If not, I'd stick with the
athletic shirts.)
At some point, I realized I needed to ride a few feet up the road to
register and collect my number. Since I had arrived so early, I walked
up to the Pre-Reg desk and gave them my name. In return, the nice
gentleman handed me something to sign (I may very well have signed my
immortal soul over to the devil, but at six in the morning on a
Saturday feeling anxious because it was my first race, those were the
chances I was willing to take) and a number: 407. Grabbing a few
safety pins, I headed back to the truck to go about securing my
fabulous number to the back of my shirt.
Eventually, I figured it was time to get to the line. According to the
web site where I had registered for the race, Categories 1-3 would
launch at 6:30 exactly. Category 4 a few minutes after that, and
Category 5 at 6:36.
Somehow, I found myself on the front line of the Category 5 group and
that was far from the best idea I've ever had. Why would someone
with no bicycle racing experience--meaning me--want to start at the
front of the group that controls the pace? Unfortunately, that's
simply the position in which I found myself. To complicate matters, I
noticed my seat had somehow come loose a bit. Of all the frigging days
for this to happen, I thought, wiggling my seat up and down, hoping it
would stay relatively stable for the next seventeen miles.
To make matters even worse, I had the hardest time getting my left
cleat in the pedal once the whistle blew. Earlier I had noticed that I
was the only rider without the larger cleat/pedal style (forgive my
ignorance with the terminology), a mistake I'll be sure to correct
before the next race, but for this morning, I coasted along trying
desperately to get my damn shoe attached to the pedal so I could not
just keep up, but start to catch the group of thirty or so riders who
were starting to put some distance on me.
Eventually, the cleat slipped into the pedal and I began moving forward
in earnest to catch the rest of the riders. It took a minute or so
heading uphill, but I got there, and I'm going to do my best to give
you, the reader, my first impressions of riding competitively in a
group.
The sound of roughly sixty feet spinning in unison is rather
entertaining, as is the sound of the same number of tires rapidly
spinning over blacktop. That, combined with the rush of wind, creates
something of an initially exhilarating experience (I know I'm using a
disgusting amount of adverbs here, but bear with me for as long as you
can--thanks). Left and right, riders slip ahead and slowly fall
behind. Halfway through the first lap, I was feeling good. Part of me
knew I would have a very hard time managing that pace for five laps,
but another part of me didn't really want to hear it. That part
simply wanted to pedal and race and burn away the anxieties I had prior
to the conductor blowing the whistle and starting the race, so I
increased my tempo and inched toward the front of the group which sat a
second or so behind the pace motorcycle (the organizer had instructed
we were, under no circumstances, to pass the pace motorcycle). In
making that effort to move toward the front, I was forced left outside
the peloton (I'm not going to keep writing "group of riders" or
"group of racers," so I'm just going to go ahead and use
"peloton"😉 and quickly found myself surprised by how much harder I
had to pedal with the wind directly in my face as opposed to drafting
behind another rider. I then found out something else about racing.
Once you're outside a certain line, it's not so easy to just hop
back in there.
I have so much to learn.
Regardless, I eventually found myself behind another rider and feeling
a lot better. With one lap down, we crossed the Start/Finish line and
began approaching the one big hill in the park (granted big is a
relative term) when I heard someone close to the front say,
"Break!" to which I immediately wanted to reply, "What the hell
for?"
When all the butts began rising out of the seats, so did mine. I
thought, If they're going to sprint up this hill, so will I. My legs
and my lungs, on the other hand, they had different ideas, and that was
when the peloton (there's that word again) slowly but surely left me
far behind.
As my friend said after the race, "It's a humbling experience,
isn't it?"
Humbling and embarrassing, that's easy to admit; yet at the same time
it's also motivational. Now I know where I need to be so I can ride
competitively. The riding I had been doing during the week might have
been enough in terms of miles, but by way of intensity, I've got a
long way to go.
I take some pride in the fact that I finished the race, the full five
laps (17 miles). Flipping through the screen on my new cycling
computer, I realized I had finished in just over fifty-one minutes.
When I asked the organizer the Category 5 winner's time, he checked
his clipboard and said, "Forty-five minutes." I finished six
minutes off the pace, which is incredibly pathetic, but again, I now
know where I need to be.
That was my morning. How was your Saturday morning?