The day I quit mountain biking

( After the four-year hiatus: Me on the White Rim trail in April 2003)

Today I made it another 90 minutes on the trainer. My Netflix DVD ended so I started it over from the beginning. I really need to get back outside soon. But since I can't quite do that yet, I thought I'd share the story of my first and nearly last time on a mountain bike.

I still remember the date - April 7, 1999. When I think of that time, I remember myself as a giggly little girl ... but in reality, I was a junior in college. Back then, I had a boyfriend who - not unlike the one I have now - was better than me at pretty much everything. But unlike the boyfriend I have now, he was either unable or unwilling to reach into that vast reserve of knowledge and teach me the ways of the great outdoors. Whenever we went snowboarding together, I would spend an entire afternoon dragging my bruised knees down whatever black-diamond slope he abandoned me on. When we went backpacking, he would laugh as I juggled my gear - a full-sized pillow and a $10 sleeping bag strapped to the outside of my bookbag - and then bury me on the hike up. Then, one day, he suggested we go mountain biking ... in Moab.

"Sounds great," I said. And in my mind, I was thinking, how hard can this be? After all, I had a 10-speed as a child. I definitely knew how to ride a bike - or at least I believed that adage about never forgetting how. He took me to Poison Spider bike shop. "What would you like to rent?" they asked me.

"Uh, a bike?"

"Mountain or road?"

"Um ... for slickrock?"

"Rigid or suspension?"

"Uh ... huh?"

I think think in local bike shop speak that's code for "Give this girl the cheapest bike and the nicest helmet we have." They gave me a hardtail with a squeaky little suspension fork. We strapped it to the top of my boyfriend's car with bungee cords, then hauled it up to the Slickrock Trail.

"They have two loops," he said. "One of them is painfully easy, and the other is pretty fun."

"Fun," I said. (I mean, what would you say given those choices? However, I should have known from several snowboarding experiences that to him, "fun" was code for "you're not going to get out of this without permanent scarring.")

It's been long enough now that I don't remember much about how the ride started out. There was a little tentative pedaling, a lot of walking, and an uneasy distance between me and my boyfriend. I spent so much time fixated on white dashes scrawled across the slickrock that I began to lose track of him. And as I looked back, I realized that I could be anywhere on this vast plateau hovering over the Colorado River and he was carrying all of the water. I had to keep up.

I began to pedal harder, catching glimpses of his silhouette coasting effortlessly across a moonscape of red rock beneath the harsh April sun. I had a fair amount of elevation on him, but that perspective was lost on me at the time. I wobbled a bit and mashed at the pedals, feeling a surge of freedom and power. It was beautiful and fleeting, and it absolutely shattered the second I crested the edge of what can only be remembered as a sheer, sun-scalded cliff. My front wheel was the last to relish in that freedom and power as it sailed into deep blue sky before slamming into the side of the cliff. There was enough empty space below for the bike to turn a complete 360. If I had any grace or skill at all, I could have flipped a full head-over-heels turn and landed on my wheels. But instead, I set the twirling bike free and landed on my face in a pile of hot sand. By sheer grace, my legs must have hit the slickrock first because they ended up bloody and torn, but I didn't snap my neck.

I remember laying motionless in the sand - stunned. All I could think about was how my face felt like it was on fire - and with my eyes shut I almost convinced myself it was only sunburn. But as I rolled over and got my first look at my legs, dripping crimson from slickrock rash that would make even the most hardened roadie cringe, I thought, "My 10-speed never did this."

I staggered to my feet and collected the bike - no worse for the wear, although I admittedly didn't really bother to check. The boyfriend was nowhere in sight. I commenced limping along those white lines until I was convinced nothing was broken. Then I walked normally for a while, leaving a lightly sprinkled trail of blood in the sand. I think a couple more miles passed before I found him. He was sitting in the shade, sipping the water that he had waited so patiently to share with me.

"What happened to you?" he asked.

"Crash," I said.

"You feel OK to keep riding?" he asked.

"If it's OK with you, I'll probably just walk to the trailhead," I said.

"Hum," he said. "I think it's still about five or six more miles."

(Indifferent nod from me)

"You sure you don't want to try riding again?"

This argument went on for about a mile before he convinced me to at least try to sit on the saddle one more time. Then it was tentative pedaling ... a lot more walking ... pedal ... groan.

And when I wheeled the bike back into Poison Spider, legs still covered in dried blood that had only been half-heartedly scrubbed with a Subway napkin, the bike shop guy asked me, "So how was it?"

"Great," I said. And in my mind, I was thinking, "Thank God I'll never have to do that again."

Haunted

It's just my luck that the minute one Iditarod race wrapped up, another one started. This year's dogsled race is actually pretty compelling, with your favorite redneck and mine, Lance Mackey, tearing up everyone's expectations. The backlash from this is that every day I have to scroll through dozens of pictures like the one above (by Al Grillo, Associated Press) on the AP wire - sometimes lingering on them well past the point of productivity - and the images have started to show up in my dreams.

I have a strange dichotomy following me through my post-Susitna life, the one in which I'm not riding my bike at all and yet spending more time thinking about riding my bike through increasingly more difficult and more mind-bending situations. Now I can't even imagine how I'll survive another year if I don't ride the 350 Iditarod trail race to McGrath in 2008. The strange dichotomy of this is that I can't imagine how I'll survive if I do. Why must it haunt me so?

I thought about the logistics as I was riding on my bike trainer today - 90 minutes working up to top resistance, a new post-injury record. I really wish I had the guts to ask more questions of the people who really understand the race. After the Susitna 100 ended, I spent about three hours sitting in a sweltering cabin and waiting for Geoff to find the energy to stand up. Also waiting in the cabin to find that energy was John Stamstad, who shared a table with us during the entire hazy recovery period. Stamstad ran the Susitna 100 on foot, but back in the '90s he was one of the pioneers of Iditabike ... as well as just about every other endurance mountain bike event that existed at the time. I mean, he's the John Stamstad. I had about a million and a half questions to ask him. But instead, I just spent a couple of hours sitting five feet from him, staring into sluggish space and saying nothing. He comes across as the type of guy who does not want to be bothered, and I do not like to be the one who does the bothering. At one point, Geoff asked him if he was going to do any rides while he was in Alaska.

"No," he said, "I don't race bikes anymore."

And in those five words came a million and a half more questions. But all we ever heard was those five words. It's good I found my way into editing, because I'd make a terrible reporter.

I guess the Iditarod Invitational is one of those experiences you really just have to figure out for yourself. I learned this during my first Susitna 100 ... nothing I read before the race helped me much during it. But still, I'd like to know ... what does -40 really feel like when you have no where else to go?

.....

Also - in the interest of being a good reporter - I should disclose that "Up in Alaska" did not win a Bloggie. So much time lapsed between voting and now that I nearly forgot all about it, but Fat Cyclist's latest post reminded me. He didn't win either, and that is truly a travesty. Up in Alaska, on the other hand, doesn't really deserve to win "Best Sports Blog." I'm sorry, it doesn't. It's only a bicycle blog because its sole writer is obsessed with bicycling, and it's a marginal bicycle blog at that - tainted with a lot of Alaska lifestyle, mundane stream-of-consciousness, wilderness daydreaming and other activities that have nothing to do with sports. Not that I wouldn't have loved to win ... and thanks to everyone who voted, regardless of who you voted for. Maybe next year. :-)

Summer dreams

Daylight Savings Time always gets me dreaming about spring. Why did it have to come so early this year? We logged another 9-10 inches of snowfall today to add on to our 50 inches in March alone and 200 so far this season. That stuff stacks up and always seems to take its sweet time melting. So spring is nowhere near my horizon. Might as well dream about summer.

I think I have my 2007 endurance race season planned out. It’s a meager one for sure ... probably another trilogy this year, with a few long independent rides and maybe a mountain running race or two thrown in. The Susitna 100 has come and gone, so here are the other two:

24 Hours of Light (June 23-24?):
I know close to nothing about this race. I don’t even know exactly when it is. But I do know that it’s around the solstice and it’s in Whitehorse, Yukon, which is a small jump across the pond from Juneau. The only description the Web site gives is “No lights allowed (or required) ... Ride sweet singletrack and rolling terrain all night long with the glow of the sun as your guide.” It sounds like the 24 Hours of Kincaid with Canadians. Let the good times roll!

I wish I had a chance to ride more 24-hour mountain bike races. I live for the challenge of self-supported wilderness events, but the setup of a 24 gives me a place to shine. They’re perfect for me ... I’m not fast, but I can ride long stretches of time without stopping. Middle-of-the-night sleepiness is not a problem for me. Technical trail is only a problem if I’m unfamiliar with it and dogged by my typical lack of confidence. But give me 16 identical laps, and I’m bouncing off ledges with the best of them. In short, I actually love solo riding the hamster runs. But only one of them is within my reach this year.

So my other race is:

The Fireweed 400 (July 6-7):
I know. They’re so close together. That’s how it goes. I’ll probably ride this race one way or another. If Geoff gets into the Mount Marathon race, we'll turn it into a mini vacation and fly out together. I’ll ride the full 400 if I can find a willing (and therefore crazy) support crew. A friend in Anchorage is trying to help me recruit right now (If you’re in the Anchorage area, and you think hours of hours of puttering behind me in a rental car sounds like fun, drop me a line) If not, I’ll ride the 200 and consider an unofficial ride back.

This is a pretty serious roadie event - possibly the largest in Alaska - and I look forward to showing up at Sheep Mountain with my $600 flat-bar touring bike with its platform pedals and 27 gears, wearing running shoes and a big backpack so I can pretend that there’s not some petroleum-powered vehicle shadowing me the whole time. I do plan to train hard so I can ride it seriously - you know, at least come in before the cutoff. I have no idea what kind of pace I can maintain on a road bike. This is what makes this race so appealing to me. It's such a new concept for me.

Everything else is tentative. The Soggy Bottom 100 is in September, but it’s a lot of effort and money for me to take a weekend off work and buy a plane ticket to Anchorage, so it’s unlikely I’ll be able ride it this year. Same goes for any race in the Lower 48. The one exception is a trip to Utah I am planning, likely during the first week of May. Every year, Fat Cyclist and his friends put together a “Ride Around the White Rim in One Day” extraveganza, but I think RAWROD 2007 is in April. I’d like to organize one of my own White Rim assaults, but don’t have a friend in the world who would be willing to do it with me. So if you live in Salt Lake/Moab/Denver ... or anywhere, really ... and are interested in meeting in Moab for a self-supported (No vehicle. Carry all water and food) single-day ride around the White Rim trail sometime between May 4 and May 9, please comment below or send me an e-mail. I am serious about organizing this. And it would be cool to ride with some of my Mountain-West-based blogger friends if you're available (Dave Nice? Chris Plesko? Dave Chenault? Anyone? Bueller?). Anyone interested can reach me at jillhomer66@hotmail.com.