I walk away from social gatherings with an acute sense of accomplishment whenever I haven’t offended anyone and when my friends all stayed awake. I view myself as a bottle of wine that keeps getting better with age, but I’m slowly coming to grips with the notion that I am actually a bottle that may be corked. The great irony of life is that as we become more comfortable with who we are, we become more annoying to be around.
Fortunately, I enjoy being alone. I haven’t always felt that way, but my natural charm means I have had to cultivate a taste for it. That isn’t to say I don’t like being around others – quite the opposite – but being alone allows me the opportunity to reconnect with who I am. This is especially true when riding my bicycle. Riding alone, there is nothing to do but focus on the sensations of the ride: the wind in my face, the smells in the air, the sound of my tires as we hum along together, rider and bicycle.
Doing a long ride alone is an exercise of discipline. The little voices in your head may start quietly, but they build to crescendo inside your skull after a few hours of solitary suffering. The doors and patios on the cafés at the roadside start looking larger and more welcoming with every kilometer that passes under your tires. A point comes, on these long rides, at which Rule #5 becomes a matter of continuing on with the task; a determination to finish what you have begun.
We learn fundamental things about ourselves when we are alone in the Pain Cave, after we’ve dropped the flashlight and watched helplessly as it rolled off the shelf and into the void. Questions come knocking, and they won’t go away until you’ve dealt with them. This is when we grow, when we build confidence in the face of doubt.
We are lucky to find ourselves at crossroads where every direction leads to more suffering, where the direction we choose is irrelevant. The choice is simply to suffer or to go home. In a world where we have made a science of luxury, we Cyclists choose to suffer.
Vive la Vie Velominatus.
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@wiscot a week off can do wonders, depends on your training load, I average 250km a week and probably take 3 separate weeks off per anum.
@DCR
where in NM are you? My parents are in Santa Fe; will be there for Xmas.
@wiscot
Rouler has a great article on Dan Martin. He takes a month off the bike and thinks other pros could stand to get off their bikes more.
I found it perplexing riding out here in Hawaii where one can ride year round. I bet everyone needs to lay off and build up. And if you have hit your goals for the year, absolutely a few week to a month is a good thing, as long as it's not a pumpkin pie a day routine. Obviously, I'm not saying loose too much fitness, do another sport, like hunting and killing moose with a knife, wearing moccasins and not too much else. I'm talking old school here!
What the fuck is this monstrosity? A kilometer of a different colour?
@wiscot
In September I completed my last major event of the season. Because of end-of-the-quarter volume at work, I was compelled to then take two weeks off from riding. The break did wonders for my motivation, as well as give my body time to recover from all the pains and niggles I had ignores during the pressure of the season. But I did make sure to watch the food intake as well.
...ignored...
@KW Are we going to start talking about wood again???
@The Pressure
We woodn't dare, wood we?
@The Pressure
A completely functional wooden Campagnolo derailleur.
I ride alone 90% of the time. The rest of the time I ride with other people on bicycles, some of whom are true cyclists. I prefer the 90% time. I am alone with my thoughts. I determine how hard or how easily I will push myself. I like to test my limits, but at the same time I sometimes like to ride just to ride my bike. It is easy to miss out on sometimes amazing things, or the simple raw beauty of nature if I put my head down and merely hammer on the pedals. Part of the beauty of riding a bike is that you are in the world, not viewing from it a window as happens when in a car, but you also have to deliberately decide to sometimes slow down.
I ride through the winter to the extent possible, but I ride for enjoyment. I have no big rides or events to prepare for. My calendar of events ended in October. There won't be enough daylight hours until March or thereabout, so my riding is mostly confined to weekends. Its enough to keep me from losing too much fitness. The time away from the bike just serves to make me more appreciative of the time that is coming and the return to the rituals of Spring, Summer and Fall that include lots of hours spent focused on being a cyclist.