Categories: Defining MomentsExportLa Vie Velominatus

On Rule #5: Not Minding That It Hurts

Lawrence of V-rabia

In my favorite scene from Lawrence of Arabia, T.E. Lawrence, after lighting a colleague’s cigarette, allows the match to burn down to his fingertips before snuffing it out. Having witnessed the stunt, the dim-witted associate attempts it himself, only to blow out the match before it gets anywhere close to burning down. “That damn well hurts!”, he states, barely concealing his amazement. “Certainly it hurts,” replies Lawrence with the cool calm of a man who is at ease with The V. “Well, what’s the trick then?”

“The trick, William Potter, is not minding that it hurts.”

The trick to becoming a better Cyclist depends, they say, on one’s capacity to suffer. Riding faster is easy, after all; all you have to do is push harder on those flat things attached to your feet. But that, as many of us have discovered, is the complicated bit.

Our ability to suffer is driven by our willingness to push ourselves, to resist the signals our bodies are sending – whether those signals tell us to stop an effort, to stay inside when the mercury drops, when the rain falls, or dipping into the cellar for a session on the trainer rather than for a bottle of wine. To walk the difficult path of becoming a better cyclist requires, in a word, willpower.

Many of the obstacles along that path require us to eschew the wisdom taught to us by our elders and society. Listen to your body, they tell us, when in fact our bodies are chatty things that have only a few sensible contributions to make. Stay inside when it’s wet, or you’ll catch cold, the folk knowledge claims, while in reality those who stay indoors are more likely to catch cold and if we were to heed that advice, we would rarely throw a leg over a top tube during non-summer months. What doesn’t kill you, makes you stronger… well, I suppose they had to get one right.

In practice, weakness breeds weakness and strength breeds strength. We may not allow ourselves to take the easy path, for nothing worth travelling to lies at the end of it. If we relent to the pain during an effort, it only makes it easier to do so again next time. Allowing ourselves to stay off the bike for today’s bad weather makes it easier to do so again tomorrow. On the other hand, enduring today’s cold steels us for tomorrow’s chill.

To claim we enjoy suffering, that we enjoy the pain of an effort, or that we enjoy riding in the wet and cold is a bit misleading. While I believe there might be those who possess a perversion that does indeed allow them to enjoy pain, for most of us, we have merely discovered that the burning of our muscles today strengthens them for tomorrow. We have learned that submitting to the deluge or climbing aboard the trainer in winter helps build towards a result that won’t be realized until our planet reaches the next equinox. Rather than enjoying suffering, we enjoy what suffering does for us and have learned through practice to associate current pains with future gains.

Personally, I enjoy riding in the rain more than most, certainly when it comes as a refreshing change from riding on dry roads. I enjoy the rain splashing up from the road, or the cold air in my face. But to say I cherish riding throughout the cold and wet Winter months is certainly an overstatement. During this time of year, I have to push myself to go for a ride every single time. When I am warm inside, there is no part of me that wants to pull on cold-weather gear knowing I will be cold and uncomfortable for the duration of the ride. Instead of thinking about whether I want to ride, I simply do it; focusing on desire or comfort does little to improve the condition. Quite the opposite, in fact – a frozen toe is better left not contemplated when one lacks the means to warm it up.

The trick to becoming a better cyclist doesn’t have so much to do with our capacity to suffer. Certainly we suffer; the trick is not minding that we suffer.

frank

The founder of Velominati and curator of The Rules, Frank was born in the Dutch colonies of Minnesota. His boundless physical talents are carefully canceled out by his equally boundless enthusiasm for drinking. Coffee, beer, wine, if it’s in a container, he will enjoy it, a lot of it. He currently lives in Seattle. He loves riding in the rain and scheduling visits with the Man with the Hammer just to be reminded of the privilege it is to feel completely depleted. He holds down a technology job the description of which no-one really understands and his interests outside of Cycling and drinking are Cycling and drinking. As devoted aesthete, the only thing more important to him than riding a bike well is looking good doing it. Frank is co-author along with the other Keepers of the Cog of the popular book, The Rules, The Way of the Cycling Disciple and also writes a monthly column for the magazine, Cyclist. He is also currently working on the first follow-up to The Rules, tentatively entitled The Hardmen. Email him directly at rouleur@velominati.com.

Next The Seduction of Symbols »

Previous « Rule #5: Racing Hoogerland-Style

View Comments

scaler911 says:

Dec 6 2011 at 8:38 am

did one of "us" do this?:
http://www.xtranormal.com/watch/12674956/cycling-explained
RedRanger says:

Dec 6 2011 at 8:44 am

@scaler911
Saw that the other day. Had me rolling.
ChrisO says:

Dec 6 2011 at 9:07 am

Followed a link to this chap, Tommy Godwin, today... now that must have hurt.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tommy_Godwin_%28cyclist_born_1912%29

75,000 MILES in one year - that's 200 miles a day. Having broken the old record he kept going and beat it by an extra 13,000 miles, then kept going until he reached 100,000 miles, by which time WW2 was in full swing so he stopped and joined the air force.

Amazing. A record still standing since 1939 and considered too dangerous to even attempt.
mcsqueak says:

Dec 6 2011 at 9:15 am

@mblume

Wow, you had the chance to meet Jure? Very cool story.

Yes, his passing was indeed a loss for cycling. But if you are training as much as he did (6-8 hours/day) on the open roads, the likelihood of eventually being in a crash is probably pretty high, just like for people to drive for a living. From the sound of his personality, he was probably alright with that risk.
Souleur says:

Dec 6 2011 at 9:47 am

@ frank

Our current culture trends heavily towards the belief that willpower is limited to genetics, that once our reserves run dry, we are at the mercy of our animal. But those who believe that the will is self-renewing, that strength drives us to become stronger, those are the ones who have the capacity to become great Cyclists.

golden
what article is that? i missed it, and need to go back to read the archives
Minion says:

Dec 6 2011 at 1:00 pm

@Steampunk
Agree. Most of my posts are squeezed out at work, furtively typing to make sure no - one realizes I'm not actually doing, you know, work. I'm all for attention to detail and accuracy but these are comments on an internet website after all. I spend all day with media content, and some of the howlers that end up being press releases, which get published verbatim in hundreds of articles, you'd have grounds to complain there.

BTW, we love Big Ring Riding.
frank says:

Dec 6 2011 at 1:34 pm

@Kiwicyclist

Frank, your article has given me an excuse to post this link to a recent article on consumate hardman Juric Robic which some of you may have seen.
Suffering is all in the mind apparently: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/05/sports/playmagazine/05robicpm.html?pagewanted=all
As a sidebar Marcus and I had the pleasure of meeting G'rilla in the flesh on his recent visit to Melbourne over the weekend after he joined us on our regular Saturday ride along bayside Melbourne. It was quite a thrill and we look forward to hosting other Velominati should they come through Melbourne with a bike in tow.
Lawrie of Arabia is one of my all time favourite movies. Omar Sharif loping up to the well in the desert - Lawrence yelling 'no prisoners, no prisoners' - pivotal scenes, magnificent cinematography and a must-see for anyone who enjoys epic movies.

Fantastic you all got to ride - sounds like a great ride, one I hope to join you on some day.

@ChrisO

Since we're digressing, my favourite part is the scene in the Negev desert where the camera just stays on the sun inching slowly up over the dunes until it fills the screen.
It has an even greater resonance for me in my current location of course. I really do think of that scene frequently when I'm out cycling and see the sun coming up across the sand. For most of the year I know I've got another 3, maximum 4 hours, before it becomes intolerable and that's with a steady supply of water.

I've never wanted a thing to do with a desert, but now I do. Thanks for that visual. Amazing.
frank says:

Dec 6 2011 at 1:39 pm

@Blah

Typos are fine. A typo is a slip of the finger rather than clearly not getting it right. There/their/they're confusion isn't a typo. The problem, for mine, if there is a problem (and that's for the community to decide), is poor grammar, spelling, etc. And that's not typos.

Totally disagree. Opposite, in fact; typos are careless while grammar and spelling errors can be simple ignorance. Take, for example, the Keepers Tour debate. First off, I simply didn't know the rules around that, and second, according to the discussion it's a gray area at best.

On the other hand, I think the Articles should be held to a much higher standard than the posts, though it is still careless to make errors.
scaler911 says:

Dec 6 2011 at 1:52 pm

@frank

@Blah

Typos are fine. A typo is a slip of the finger rather than clearly not getting it right. There/their/they're confusion isn't a typo. The problem, for mine, if there is a problem (and that's for the community to decide), is poor grammar, spelling, etc. And that's not typos.

Totally disagree. Opposite, in fact; typos are careless while grammar and spelling errors can be simple ignorance. Take, for example, the Keepers Tour debate. First off, I simply didn't know the rules around that, and second, according to the discussion it's a gray area at best.
On the other hand, I think the Articles should be held to a much higher standard than the posts, though it is still careless to make errors.

Or beer............
scaler911 says:

Dec 6 2011 at 1:54 pm

@scaler911

And, If you're really good at carelessness (like not being able to tell a dude from a chick), you get a +1 badge to wear around here. See, everybody wins!