MILTON
"it is better to rule in hell than serve in heaven" john milton, "paradise lost"
i usually wake up before my alarm on race days.
in the quiet of pre-dawn, i begin my rituals. toast with peanut butter, bad coffee and a few loose bowel movements. i don my race gear in silence. if i am successful, i will get the car loaded up, and be on the road without waking my 3 year old or her mother. i am always struck by the similarity between waking up at dawn for a race or a training excursion to lake wilcox and doing the same thing for pre-dawn prayers. morning is a solitary time. a clean time.
once on the road, my mind usually opens up. occassionally i feel something like joy as i realize that, for the next several hours, i will be in a special space that only comes a few times a year. sometimes i feel the regret that a soldier must feel when he leaves his warm bed and family for the battle field. other times, i feel a bit stale and bland. on a good day, i feel like a hero as i leave my regular life behind me.
today i am feeling bland. the grey, windy sky and incessant rain are not helping. the i-pod is not cooperating either. tunes in the car can make or break your race day. uncanny how sometimes the ipod seems to resonate with my soul. but today, my soul is a bit empty. today, there is no flow. every tune seems objectionable. van halen, zz top, philip glass, camaron de la isla. no good. slayer comes on, too loud. too aggressive. my head hurts but i try to embrace it, hoping its violence will stoke my racing fires. my daughter calls and i i feel more regret for leaving home in my stealthy pre-dawn cloud of bike parts, racing gear and loose poos.
speaking of which, today is IBS day. i have NEVER had to go so much before a race. what the hell did i eat? i pull over at a road stop in a state of semi-urgency, and, to my horror, starbuck's does not open for another 15 minutes. i can't hold on, so i acquiesce and roll into timmie's and christen their toilet. when i rise i notice that the word "satan" has been kindly engraved into the seat. how interesting. how infernal.
once outside, i put the car in reverse and a face suddenly appears asking me for a jump start for his car. this is my chance to get some good karma before the race, i think and my friend thanks me for making his day. i drive on. it rains on. i wonder what the hell i am doing and why...
finally i exit the highway in milton and find a starbucks and my body quivers with delight, as do my dopamine receptors. i quaff a double espresso and pause to be mindful of the sensation. a certain kind of irritable, glad alertness courses through my veins. i have to go again, but the men's room is being used so i do the unheard of and use the women's room. i wonder what kind of ticket i could get for doing that. i think of the shame it would bring on my family. how would i explain this to my daughter?
entering kelso park, i pass some young elites loading their fancy, deep dish wheel laden bikes off trucks on their way into the park. they look very slick, skinny and self-assured. my instinctive narcissistic will to dominate kicks in. the problem is, what to do with that will when there are just some people you don't stand a hope in hell of dominating???
now i am worried my buzz will wear off before it is time to race. good thing that power gels have caffeine in them these days.
agoraphobia. i realize i have it. while some may feed off the energy of a crowded race site, the best i can hope for is to insulate myself enough in my own head that i don't lose too much nervous energy to the crowd. it has taken years for me to realize this about myself. i have been like this since primary school. the presence of many others peaks a kind of insecurity in me. i never really feel like i belong as one of the crowd. i feel like an obvious steppenwolf, a sore thumb. i become self-conscious in an uncomfortable way. all of this can get in the way of performing at my best. i guess i am in good company. while dave scott would feed off the energy of others on race day, mark allen would avoid casual contact, because he realized that even the most casual encounter could rob him of precious energy. maybe his reasons were similar to mine, i don't know. but i do know, that, as much as i like racing, the other racers, as a group (not as individuals) make me uneasy.
funny how we can spend so much energy reading the weather, examining radar images, hoping it won't rain on the bike and the when it does, when it streams down in a deluge and the hard drops bounce off your helmet, obstruct your vision, and make your skin cold, you just deal with it. i am a bit cowardly about maintaining my aero position in the wet conditions, so i spend much more time sitting up than i would like...
running in the forest during a downpour becomes almost fun. i think about how i have come to love cross biking and trail running, mud is fun. the hills are not. but it is all part of the voluntary suffering. i examine the faces of other runners as they pass by, at the front of the race. some awkward strides, some painful looking faces, and i think to myself what a strange activity this all is. then i start to hit a rythym and, for the first time today, i feel like i am in a flow. my legs turn fast. i am enjoying the pain; sitting on it like it was a fancy, leather chair.
before i know it, everything is over and it is time to pack up and go home. i was just getting into it and now it is over. that is a sprint for you. i have been coming to kelso for a quarter century...to swim, mountain-bike, picnic. it is a beautiful park with its lake, hills, and forest. today was a harsh, cold, canadian kind of experience that had me thinking about milton, the poet, about anti-heroes, and the poem paradise lost. i can't really explain why in rational terms. but life and triathlon by extension are not always rational. nor do they need to be.
i usually wake up before my alarm on race days.
in the quiet of pre-dawn, i begin my rituals. toast with peanut butter, bad coffee and a few loose bowel movements. i don my race gear in silence. if i am successful, i will get the car loaded up, and be on the road without waking my 3 year old or her mother. i am always struck by the similarity between waking up at dawn for a race or a training excursion to lake wilcox and doing the same thing for pre-dawn prayers. morning is a solitary time. a clean time.
once on the road, my mind usually opens up. occassionally i feel something like joy as i realize that, for the next several hours, i will be in a special space that only comes a few times a year. sometimes i feel the regret that a soldier must feel when he leaves his warm bed and family for the battle field. other times, i feel a bit stale and bland. on a good day, i feel like a hero as i leave my regular life behind me.
today i am feeling bland. the grey, windy sky and incessant rain are not helping. the i-pod is not cooperating either. tunes in the car can make or break your race day. uncanny how sometimes the ipod seems to resonate with my soul. but today, my soul is a bit empty. today, there is no flow. every tune seems objectionable. van halen, zz top, philip glass, camaron de la isla. no good. slayer comes on, too loud. too aggressive. my head hurts but i try to embrace it, hoping its violence will stoke my racing fires. my daughter calls and i i feel more regret for leaving home in my stealthy pre-dawn cloud of bike parts, racing gear and loose poos.
speaking of which, today is IBS day. i have NEVER had to go so much before a race. what the hell did i eat? i pull over at a road stop in a state of semi-urgency, and, to my horror, starbuck's does not open for another 15 minutes. i can't hold on, so i acquiesce and roll into timmie's and christen their toilet. when i rise i notice that the word "satan" has been kindly engraved into the seat. how interesting. how infernal.
once outside, i put the car in reverse and a face suddenly appears asking me for a jump start for his car. this is my chance to get some good karma before the race, i think and my friend thanks me for making his day. i drive on. it rains on. i wonder what the hell i am doing and why...
finally i exit the highway in milton and find a starbucks and my body quivers with delight, as do my dopamine receptors. i quaff a double espresso and pause to be mindful of the sensation. a certain kind of irritable, glad alertness courses through my veins. i have to go again, but the men's room is being used so i do the unheard of and use the women's room. i wonder what kind of ticket i could get for doing that. i think of the shame it would bring on my family. how would i explain this to my daughter?
entering kelso park, i pass some young elites loading their fancy, deep dish wheel laden bikes off trucks on their way into the park. they look very slick, skinny and self-assured. my instinctive narcissistic will to dominate kicks in. the problem is, what to do with that will when there are just some people you don't stand a hope in hell of dominating???
now i am worried my buzz will wear off before it is time to race. good thing that power gels have caffeine in them these days.
agoraphobia. i realize i have it. while some may feed off the energy of a crowded race site, the best i can hope for is to insulate myself enough in my own head that i don't lose too much nervous energy to the crowd. it has taken years for me to realize this about myself. i have been like this since primary school. the presence of many others peaks a kind of insecurity in me. i never really feel like i belong as one of the crowd. i feel like an obvious steppenwolf, a sore thumb. i become self-conscious in an uncomfortable way. all of this can get in the way of performing at my best. i guess i am in good company. while dave scott would feed off the energy of others on race day, mark allen would avoid casual contact, because he realized that even the most casual encounter could rob him of precious energy. maybe his reasons were similar to mine, i don't know. but i do know, that, as much as i like racing, the other racers, as a group (not as individuals) make me uneasy.
funny how we can spend so much energy reading the weather, examining radar images, hoping it won't rain on the bike and the when it does, when it streams down in a deluge and the hard drops bounce off your helmet, obstruct your vision, and make your skin cold, you just deal with it. i am a bit cowardly about maintaining my aero position in the wet conditions, so i spend much more time sitting up than i would like...
running in the forest during a downpour becomes almost fun. i think about how i have come to love cross biking and trail running, mud is fun. the hills are not. but it is all part of the voluntary suffering. i examine the faces of other runners as they pass by, at the front of the race. some awkward strides, some painful looking faces, and i think to myself what a strange activity this all is. then i start to hit a rythym and, for the first time today, i feel like i am in a flow. my legs turn fast. i am enjoying the pain; sitting on it like it was a fancy, leather chair.
before i know it, everything is over and it is time to pack up and go home. i was just getting into it and now it is over. that is a sprint for you. i have been coming to kelso for a quarter century...to swim, mountain-bike, picnic. it is a beautiful park with its lake, hills, and forest. today was a harsh, cold, canadian kind of experience that had me thinking about milton, the poet, about anti-heroes, and the poem paradise lost. i can't really explain why in rational terms. but life and triathlon by extension are not always rational. nor do they need to be.
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