It requires a combination of factors to intersect. You need to have already spent loads of time on a bicycle. Enough so that you have an inherent sense of this odd thing with two wheels; you can make it go quickly or slowly, you can steer it around a corner with ease, you know how the introduction of a layer of moisture between the tires and the tarmac might affect the way it does these things.
There can’t be too clear a boundary between the bicycle and your body; those lines are best when blurred a bit. Hands to bars, feet to pedals, badonkadonk to saddle – these are contact points but they extend into the body to form a cohesive unit of rider and machine.
You need to know the difference between being out of shape, overweight, under-fed or hydrated, or simply being tired; these things have different implications and you must know how to manage them. You need to have met the Man with the Hammer enough times that you can feel him standing alongside you some time before his hammer hits. You need to know which actions bring him near, and you need to know which actions may stave him off.
These are all things that must be learned through many years spent in the saddle and cannot be gleaned from a book; this is a path you must walk yourself.
It also needs to be a long day out on the bike. Long enough that you’re tired with some distance yet to go; past the halfway point in the ride, but not so close to the end that you distract yourself with thoughts of finishing. There can only be the moment, nothing more. The legs need to be heavy from hours of effort but still strong. The pressure in the chest firm as the rhythm of your breathing is contant but not overly labored. The heart has to be pumping hard but not on its limit.
You have to be on the right kind of road to support a sustained, constant effort. Not too twisty, not too undulating. Not too scenic as scenery tends to be a distraction. Perhaps it is misty, humid. The air through which you ride wraps around you like a blanket.
You don’t have to be particularly strong that day, or fast, or in particularly good shape; you just need the right amounts of the right elements. As the legs start to go round, they draw you into a kind of hypnosis. The sight of the front wheel guiding you in the bottom of your periphery adds to the effect. Slowly, your senses turn inward, like falling asleep except that with every turn of the pedals, your focus grows more intense. You see everything and you see nothing. You see the road and you see obstacles, but acknowledgement of these things is reserved for critical items only. Only those things that require attention will be given it; the rest is reserved for turning the pedals.
The blanket you wrapped yourself in gets pulled up over your head, over your ears, nearly to your eyes. Darkness is everywhere except directly in front of you, the tunnel guiding you along. You hear nothing but the whirring of your tires, perhaps the changing of gear. The Man with the Hammer wanders close; you feel him. But La Volupte has graced you as well and she distracts him to stave off his hammer for a bit longer.
His killer blow will come, but not yet.
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Nice one Frank. I don't know how you come up with something so thoughtful from a hard ride. It makes me dumb which is good or I might not be doing it. So dumb I've been see trying to literally hammer on my broken speedplay pedal with a rock when it really didn't need that kind of treatment. I lose the ability to do basic math after 30km, I am zinjanthropus man, a shaved down sasquatch on a bike, able only to shift gears or get out of the saddle, pick one.
Also, I am the only person who knows where the lead photo was taken. You were in the four hour tunnel there.
@urbanwhitetrash
Frank and I were about 50M behind you guys, talking about how horrible it would be to have to ride the 30K back to his house, uphill. How we couldn't stop and have beer and food if we absolutely had to make that trip, when G'rilla hits the gravel, and flies past your group. Then Frank, without any warning, starts stomping his pedals into submission and rides away from me. I watched for a second or two steeling myself for one last attempt at "glory" and Frank just sat, maybe 10M off your rear wheel. I was sooooo glad I wasn't going to ramp it up one more time. I probably would have ridden into the gravel as well, but on accident.
@Gianni
Haleakala!
@scaler911
Keepers Tour: 9 days of that kind of shit happening as a matter of course.
@Dr C
Kinda makes you feel like a Jedi, diving around trying to avoid his hammer. Spoiler alert: he always wins.
@Cyclops
Sounds like a soul-searcher. Awesome that you're back to being off the front where you belong. Numbers and structured training have their place, but nothing beats just riding your bike and loving it. If you love the work, half the battle is done.
@bretto's been having a fit that I'm riding with a Garmin, but the fact is, it kills the fun if I pay attention to it when I'm riding. Studying the data afterwards can be interesting and revealing, but there is nothing that will provide you more accurate feedback about what you can and can't do like the sensations coming from your body. Ignore the numbers, ride on feel. Study the numbers later to see where you can improve, work on it, and go back to riding on feel.
@ErikdR
Welcome to the fold as well. Cheers for the kind words.
@Souleur
Rest is huge; I envy you that you can manage to get as little rest that it becomes a problem - I never manage to get through a week without forced rest. But man, after a few hard days, a day or two off the bike and - BAM! - super strong the next day. Awesome.
Spinning out the 53x12, that's the same state we were in. You can do it on a short ride, but it not the same tunnel effect; that's more a zone out. The Tunnel is the kind of thing where it might even take you a day to realize what happened during that part of the ride. Its just gone, as someone else said.
@Gianni
Brain was off majorly. I didn't realize this had happened until 36 hours later or so. Brain was so off that after we got to the stop sign at the end of the road, everyone there was saying it was a good pull and I was quite honestly thinking, "What pull? What are you talking about?"
I had a fairly lengthy conversation with the man with the hammer on 10th of June during the Wiggle Dragon Ride, managing to just about keep him at arms length, thanks not to la Volupte but largely to bananas and caffeine gels.
Heights in metres.
BTW @Frank, you're going to get yourself killed riding on the wrong side of the road.
@frank
Huffing gasoline fumes straight from the pump directly after that effort might have had something to do with it...
@snowgeek
Funny. I totally forgot about that 'till just now. Not sure wether that's a good or bad sign.
@scaler911
Dopers