Breathing Through Your Ears
Suffering is part of Cycling the way alcohol is part of liver failure: they are obviously connected but it’s too much fun to stop and think about why you do it. Grace finds us through La Volupté, but her touch is rare and we generally are far better acquainted with her husband, The Man with the Hammer. That guy is a bit of an asshole.
We typically don’t want to let anyone we’re riding with know how much we’re suffering, but I do admit to indulging in a Virenque or Voekler-style Five-Face to further bewilder the passing traffic while I’m killing it up the local leg breaker or crushing the 53×11 while overtaking the cars along the various boulevards in town.
But any time I’m riding with someone, I go to great lengths to ensure I hide my suffering in totality. I’ll start chatting to the rider next to me whenever I hurt. Or when I don’t hurt but I know they’re hurting. You know the drill. Bernard Hinault used to attack whenever he felt really like shit because if he was off the front, no one could see how much he was suffering. That’s a really good way to go about it, so long as your name starts with “Bernard” and ends with “Hinault”.
There is an expression in Cycling, “Breathing through your ears”. It’s meaning is twofold; on one hand it means you’re feeling desperate to open up any orifice in your body to allow more oxygen into the organism, on account of the wholesale suffering that you’re experiencing. On the other hand, it means you’re also not breathing through your mouth, for fear of betraying your Suffer Monkey Score to those you’re riding with.
Both interpretations are equally valid; take your pick. Vive la Vie Velominatus.
I like to recite Charge of the Light-brigade on 15% climbs to annoy other riders.
Ahhh…now I know why you were striking up conversation with me during the Falling Leaves Cogal…
I fractured my nose four times. The first two happened during high school. It was after the third fracture, while wrestling collegiately, that I required surgery to fix my deviated septum. Such a horrible procedure. I’ll spare you the details. After mending, I was able to breathe freely through my nose. Unfortunately, a season later, I suffered my fourth fracture and deviated the septum. I was not keen to undergo surgery a second time only to break it again. Lucky, I did not suffer a fifth fracture (knock wood). Today, I struggle to move enough air through my nose during long/hard efforts and must resort to open mouth breathing. Now, I do a wicked Voekler imitation.
And my, how one-upmanship can escalate it all! Hurts so good, don’t it?
@Sparty
Me too, regarding the deviated septum and mouth breathing, mine is from Aussie Rules football though.
Whole lot of ” whale sharking ” going on when I’m under the pump sadly.
What elective surgery could I sell a kidney to finance that would allow me to actually breathe through my ears?
(My liver wouldn’t pass inspection and I need every last functioning cubic millimeter of it.)
Breathing through the ears is acceptable. Pedalling with them isn’t, though…
Other than Rules #5 and #9 which deal with suffering more or less without saying do we have a Rule on the perfect amount of suffering that is to be experienced whilst taking part in a: solo ride; group ride; race?
I only picked up on two words from that article, and they were ‘Bernard’ and ‘Hinault’. Read Fotheringham’s book on him over Christmas, and more than ever I just want to be him.
I’m going to have to start attacking off the front whenever I’m in the red. That’s a great plan.
@the Engine
Rule #10.
I’ve heard tell of people breathing through their eyes and also come across that as a terms for a balls out effort but as far as I know only fish breath through their ears. Sort of.
@RobSandy
Kinda – but I think that “only” sets a benchmark for performance improvement. What I’m driving at is there a way of calibrating suffering? Suffering I feel is not the same as “effort” or “performance”.
@the Engine
If you’re asking the question, you’re not going hard enough.
@the Engine
How about:
Stage 1 – Pain
Stage 2 – Throwing Up
Stage 3 – Unconsciousness
Stage 4 – Best avoided
@the Engine
Rule #TBD:
@RobSandy
Damn! I need this book! Adding to the list!
Fucking GREAT article, Frahnk! Totally brings me back to 1988 when my 16 year old self (ahh to be there again) was in my first race and on the first climb I noticed a few of the racers trying to chat it up and smiling while I was dying. At that time I could not figure out how the hell they were doing it. Slowly, over that year, I learned what they were up to and it is something that I have taken forward with me to all aspect of my life, not just cycling. I actually won an award in a pretty awful and tough Army school b/c I just kept on smiling and trying to be cheerful with the guys while we were getting the shit kicked out of us. THAT was a lesson I learned on the gradients of New England in my youth on my Cannondale.
One could say that cycling teaches us how to best live the unfortunate moments of our life when we are not able to be cycling.
But did you have to post another Mapei kit, FFS???
(and since my Mum always said don’t complain unless you have a solution, I offer you LeMan instead; a man who always seemed to be able to smile through the pain)
@the Engine
Maybe a hammer rating. I had a 4 hammer ride last Friday…
Just simple math folks.
required effort / pain endurable for the duration = max suffering, + 1 oz of V
So if you complete the ride without meeting the Man with the Hammer, it will be just barely.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LKhkvSRQZYo
(Why would someone run 26 miles after bicycles have been invented? props either way to the ladies.)
@Major VVald
Is riding hard in the dark suffering where Zwift is not suffering? Descending wet hills in the dark and sleet is clearly suffering but one is not breathing through one’s ears.
@Teocalli
We do need a Rule about the necessity of throwing up on the line. After the line means you weren’t riding hard enough. Before the line is a misjudgement of effort.
@Sparty
Good lord. Having wrestled as a kid, I know how hard the sport is. Maybe harder and more thankless than cycling? Largely ignored as a sport (at least in the U.S.), hours of hard training, endless weight watching, and no easy wins. Ugh.
Having spent most of my life in and around lacrosse, I LOVE that it’s a sport where you refuse to show pain to your opponents. A broken leg is a “lower body injury” to be dealt with in the training room, not on the field in front of the challenger.
I also play and love soccer, but the diving and faking of injuries at the highest levels is pure bullshit.
@the Engine
Time of day/night is irrelevant to the suffering. Good point on the descending in adverse conditions, but of course we have a rule for pedaling while descending so you can – and should – put forth max V on the downhills as well. Use your brakes as resistance if you are spinning out and feel the need to reduce speed but keep up the pressure on the gears.
In no cases can trainer sessions be construed as suffering in any shape or form.
Yeah, that’s what they used to tell us, never show you’re hurting in a race, this is the jungle and you don’t want to be an easy prey… Conversely if you ever feel this is your day and you’re cruising in the front group, it’s time to use your comedy skills -if you have any- and play the half-dead. You don’t want the others to sit on your wheel everytime there’s a gap to bridge and you don’t want them to gang up on you (they naturally will if you give them a reason to… It’s only human)
Cycling is about destroying your opposition when you’re head and shoulders above the rest but if you are part of “the rest”, you can still do pretty well: race hard when you have to, save your energy whenever you can and try and bluff your way to the win. Sometimes it works.
“Breathing through your ears” is a nice expression, very evocative, in the French language we have pédaler avec les oreilles -“pedaling with the ears”: you know when the road’s been going uphill for a while now and you’re at the back the group, hanging by the skin of your teeth, “à bloc”, desperately moving your head right and left everytime you push the pedals… not in a position to bluff anymore, not in a position to do anything anymore except pushing right and left -transient survival mode. Then suddenly you realize you aren’t that far from the hilltop, the road isn’t as steep now, you think that somehow you almost made it, you’re going to pull it through… Sadly, you find that when the road isn’t as steep, that’s usually when the decisions are made in a race -the big guns are going for it, until then they were only going steady -they hadn’t noticed you were still in the group anyway.
All that pain, all in vain.
@Major VVald
http://www.velominati.com/guest-article/indoors-at-the-v-and-dime/
See Frahnk’s intro and read our dear friend JiPM’s (where has he gone???) article.
@the Engine
Somewhat akin to Colin Chapman’s principle for designing an F1 car. I remember him once saying that the ideal car was built just strong enough so that it would collapse as it crossed the finish line.
All this talk about chatting away when at maximal effort appears to be either at odds with the principles of 5 levels of effort or show Zen like control of something or other.
The 5 levels being:
1. Asleep
2. Can converse normally without breaking up sentences.
3. Speaks in simple sentences, one at a time.
4. Spits out short phrases or single words.
5. Speak? Are you f*&ing joking!?
@Ron
It might not be a huge pro sport here in the US, but at the high school (and some colleges) level, wrestling is still huge – at least here in the midwest.
@Major VVald
There are numerous holes to pick out in that bunch but to keep it short and sweet; the number five is not a bullet point.
@the Engine
Throwing up before the line is perfectly acceptable as long as you don’t slow down during the act.
It could be argued that it would be proper etiquette to remove oneself to the back of the bunch to avoid collateral damage but the mention of a line suggests racing rather than training.
@wiscot
Yep. Wrestling remains a keystone sport where I live. I coached it for 17 years. My Alma Mater won four national championships in the past five years.
@Buck Rogers
I was just reading through that and came across these wise words from Chris Boardman that I’d posted back then. If this can’t be construed as suffering then I might as well give up.
It should be appended to Rule #10.
@chris
Saw a guy barf before the start line. Carb-off loading we called it.
@Teocalli
In the days before F1 engines were supposed to be robust enough to last for multiple races I was told by a former Jaguar F1 man (a while back obviously) that there would be trouble if an engine didn’t grenade itself two laps beyond the total of a race weekend as this would mean that it was either a) Too heavy and therefore slow or b) The driver hadn’t been on the limit and was therefore going to be sacked.
@chris
Except that throwing up before the line will almost inevitably slow you down a bit as (of course) will shitting yourself. In training this may be acceptable but in racing it speaks of poor judgement (or one’s chef not washing his hands thoroughly).
Sparty & wiscot – I meant ignored mainly by the mainstream sports fans and media. It was big at the HS level where I grew up and yes, definitely some seriously devoted athletes and families involved.
@Ron
Agreed.Wrestling often gets a bum rap. Ace wrestler Bruce Baumgartner was an Indiana State Uni grad (like me) and his legend lived on there long after he was gone. Of course, what did ISU do with it’s awesome wrestling program? Dropped it. Kurt Thomas was on their incredible gymnastics team. Dropped that. Kept their football team of course which hasn’t had a winning season in decades. “Priorities” I guess.
His palmares are listed here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_Baumgartner
@wiscot
A section on our newly mapped all-road course is named Dusty Road.
@EBruner
The VMH tells me that I annoy riders going uphill because I’m too chatty. I’m not so sure, nobody has ever said anything back so how am I to know?
@Buck Rogers
YES! Just proves how iconic … and beautiful … it is!
@Teocalli
I think the sayings are “bleeding through the eyes” and “breathing through the ears”…
@chuckp
I say “enough!” with the Mapei talk for a while. Let’s change it up and talk about another iconic squadra that simply doesn’t get the attention they deserve: Saeco.
These boys had it all: Cipo, Gilberto Simoni, Cunego, the red train , Killer DiLuca, brilliant red kit, espresso machines, and rolling on bad ass C-Dale CAAD’s. Hell, I think they has 4 or 5 Giro wins over a decade.
….and how can we forget the jail kit!
A beautiful trick would be to hold silent until a fellow rider tried the “conversation” trick. Then, during a long winded response, you slowly up the watts and finish with an open ended question…
Then wait to see if they respond, just try to hold the wheel, or leave enough silence that you can hear the elastic snap. Oh, that would be evil and just fucking glorious.
@fignons barber
You had me at Cipo. I used to have a Saeco but now have a Gaggia. And the new Katusha kit is very reminiscent of the Saeco red kit.
@Major VVald
Disagree. Remember, in a race the goal is not to make yourself suffer -it is to inflict suffering on everyone else. That quite about licking your opponents plate clean before starting on your own? Yes.
@RobSandy
You need to take that one step further, “The trick, William Potter, is not minding that it hurts” it doesn’t matter if you’re suffering as long you can accept that suffering and be prepared to suffer more than the next man. He may be fitter, faster and blessed with better genes but if he isn’t prepared to accept the suffering, he is beatable.
@Teocalli
I’ll add a stage between 1 & 2 I guess: Eyes focused w/lasers like the heat of a thousand white hot suns…
The story: My young daughter is racing a Jr’s field crit. So is 10-16 yr old boys and girls and these races get strung out pretty quick. A couple of laps in and this young man has been glued to her wheel. She’s going by and she’s complaining to me as she passes something along the lines of, “what do I do”? Next time around I shout back, “if you can talk you’re not going hard enough”! So, next time around as she’s coming up the small hill to where I’m watching the race and she has laser beam eyes focused on me as if the white hot heat of a thousand suns were to burn holes thru me. She was mad. Very. I’ll never forget that look from my little sweetheart princess. And the young man that was on her wheel? Maybe 5 seconds back.
@Oli
I looked up a medical dictionary for a definition of “bleeding through the eyes” and it said: a symptom of prolonged and regular exposure to images of 1990s Mapei cycling team kit.”
Even that B&W Cannondale kit is better looking FFS.