Douchey By Association

You’re only as cool as the biggest douche on your team.  I ride for a shop team, BioWheels-Reece/Campbell Racing.  If one of my teammates were to run a stoplight, I run a stoplight.  If one the riders on the team litters a GU wrapper, it may as well have been me.  However, perception is reality.  Truth is you’re not only a douche to the rest of us who are in the know about bike racing teams and group rides.  Outside our little two-wheeled Kumbayah singing Cincinnati circle you’re not on a team or the weekly group ride, you’re a part of a larger group known as those bike riders.

This past week a local team got thrown under the virtual Facebook bus.  I’d name them, but at this point it’d be rubbing salt in the already oozing road rash.  A veteran rider pointed out he saw the team run a red light in busy traffic.  A day or two earlier, a team member was seen littering a wrapper.  Ba bam!  They were called out on Facebook by their team name, the equivalent of an atomic public chamois wedgie.  Right now they are wishing they had eaten Spanish steaks via a syringe. 

Needless to say, they won’t be making “the list” anytime soon.  It’s too bad.  There are a lot of great people on that team, friends of mine, well educated people, true advocates of the sport and the city.  However, it wasn’t so-and-so who littered or ran the red light.  To those that witnessed the events, it was the team.

Then again, as the veteran rider pointed out, it wasn’t only the team.  Motorists and city residents don’t associate certain color combinations of spandex as team uniforms.  That’s inside information.  Yesterday I was talking to a neighbor of a friend while in my kit that says BioWheels in 19 different places.  We were chatting about local bike shops.  They didn’t even realize that I was wearing a BioWheels team uniform and my friend was wearing Smitty’s kit, two area shops only miles away.  Regular people only see people on bikes.  When they see someone litter or run a red light, they see you, a bike rider.

On Having Made "The List"

The Road Crew: one man working, 15 others watching.

We were going nearly 25mph at the time, and I was on the rivet in the middle of the fall-back lane of the paceline trying to snarf down a Clif Bar.  Ahead lie the last relatively uninterrupted 20 or so miles of the regular Sunday racer ride, Cincinnati’s Hyde Park Ride.  Even with the hammer down, it was still nearly an hour or so home and I felt like I was struggling, on the cusp of letting a gap go or missing tagging onto the rear of the rotating paceline with the fastest guys in the city.  “Hold up!  Joe’s got a flat!  Hold up!”  Wha?  Wha huh?  Sure enough, I looked down and my rear end was a tish mushy, slow leak. 

“Igussadoo evaflat,” I mumbled out between heavy breaths with my mouth full of chocolately goodness.  Well at least it wasn’t my legs this time.  One of the most veteran riders in Cincinnati was on my wheel, spotted it and waived the flag.  Miraculously yet thankfully, the whole ride pulled over to the shoulder.  “Quick change Joe,” he said.  Sweet, I thought.

Either everyone needed a break, or maybe, possibly,  finally, I made “The List” as the Two John’sPodcast half jokingly calls it.  That warm faint feeling of coming to a dead stop after riding at 25mph rushed through my head as I tossed the last quarter of my Clif Bar on the wooden post of the roadside barrier and dug out my tube.  It wasn’t the quickest tube change in the world, but respectable.  I threw my leg over before the last guy finished a natural break, so all was good.

As I thumbed the bead of the tire off the rim, I was grateful.  On this same ride, nearly a year ago I got tailed off on a climb.  Flat backed and head down I tried to claw back on before a stop sign but ended up dropped, a good hour and a half from home.  Solo and lost, I literally had to navigate like a sailor to get home.  I kept heading south to the Ohio River, then followed it west back to town.  Judging from the stickieness of my tube, it’s been a long time since I flatted.  Here, as I tugged to peel the old tube from the inside of my tire, were all the Hyde Park Ride veterans and their teammates chatting patiently.  I tossed the spent tube to the guy next to me to roll up, stuffed the new tube in, double checked the bead and shhhhhhhtt!  I hit it with CO2.

Now I’m not going so far as to say there’s a physical list taped to someone’s stem of guys who the group will wait for in case of a flat and guys that the group will leave behind to navigate their way home by the turns of the river and the setting sun.  It’s not like that.  This ride has been going on in Cincinnati since everyone had steel bikes, down tube shifters and oogled over fine welding.  In every town, there’s a similar standing ride, hang or get dropped.  Know the route and be prepared to fend for yourself.  Bring teammates, make friends, or be left without a draft on the way home.  It’s a necessary evil of a good weekly training ride.  There can be upwards of 40 or more riders sometimes.  You can’t stop every time someone has to take a leak, adjust a rubbing brake or change a flat. 

Courtesy Stronglight

So, on rides like this, it’s not so much a pecking order as it is a level of camaraderie.  While I shrug off the term, an unwritten rule.  When the yellow jersey takes a natural break, so does everyone else.  When Spartacus calls the race neutral, it’s neutralized.  When a veteran rider says, “Hold up! Joe’s got a flat.”  The ride holds up.  Some stop, some take a natural, some snack, some noodle at 12mph up the road.  In five minutes time, the ride is back together rolling toward downtown at 27mph again.

One thing is for certain.  More than anything, somewhere between mile markers over the past 8 years of doing this ride the idle chit chat that began with relative strangers in double pacelines has turned into true friendships.  While of lesser importance, in skillfully avoiding mishaps, mindfully trading work and knowing which direction the paceline should rotate depending on wind direction, trust has been earned.  It’s certainly not the category on my racing license.  Since rap stars and gangstas have ruined the true meaning of the word, I cringe at saying respect.   But, while I may not have stripes on my sleeve from competing at cyclocross Masters Nationals and Worlds, maybe I have earned something intangible and intrinsically valuable. And, I'm truly humbled by that.

Personally, I wasn’t worried about riding home alone on Hwy 52 along the Ohio River from New Richmond to Cincinnati.  No doubt my 4 teammates would’ve waited for me.  You’re always on someone’s list.  However, maybe now I’m on a new list...The List.

Out Pippin’ The Pipper

After 40 miles of sweet chilled out rolling goodness, we crested the last riser. On the other side, Bromley Kentucky and the wooden sign that proves it. Beyond that, the usual easy 10 mile city cruise over the Ohio River and along the other shore to home. The thought was in my mind. Rolling with my favorite wingman, Tony, my wife and a guy from another team, I knew at least 3 out of 4 were thinking sprint. The guy from the other team, not familiar with our little ride, probably didn’t know about the sign. Plus, it was January and it was a chilled out just glad to be on the bikes type of ride. I decided not to sprint, not fair if there’s someone in the bunch that doesn’t know about it. Tony, usually sharing the same cyclo-ethics as I do, I guessed would do the same and just roll on through the sign. My evil wife on the other hand…

The pace stayed civil toward the climb. I led nearly up to it. On purpose of course, it would give me a position on the back to sprint from. It may be January, but it doesn’t mean you shouldn't be at least thinking like a bike racer. Tony took it to the top and pulled off. The guy from the other team, unknowing that a sprint sign loomed, took it down toward the line. I didn’t even look back under my arm to confirm that Tony wouldn’t go for it. He wouldn’t. Besides, he can outsprint me 9 out of 10 times from the front spot. 250 meters-ish. Downhill. I stayed on the hoods. 200. 150. 100. I remembered I had a Clif Bar in my pocket. 50. My wife pulls out and gives it for the sucker-pip! Dang! I launched to her wheel and around! 25! 3 wide at the front. 15-10. I threw my bike and got her by a half wheel. “Aw man,” she shouted in fun as she half heartedly banged her bars with her cute girl fist. I looked back and smiled.

Let her win? No way! I’m not an asshole. She simply wouldn’t want me to let her win and besides, I’ve seen her beat the boys all on her own, present company included. She’s a smart and strong rider and can hold her own. That’s being a good hubby. Sometimes we’ll get in cahoots and I’ll lead her out. That’s a blast. Other times, she’ll go for the line and I’ll take the wheel of anyone who follows so we at least go 1-2 or 1-3. Regardless, a pip is hardly a sprint. The pip and smile is the friendly sucker punch of cycling. From my wife, the pip says, I love you honey bunny. It puts that little sprinkle of sugar on a sour cold winter ride. However, what’s even sweeter is out pippin' the pipper.