Colorado Springs

I set myself up for the ultimate irony at the Sand Creek race in Colorado Springs a week ago, but first let me tell you about the course.  Most of it was smooth, hard packed, wide singletrack.  It was smooth enough that I joked with Ryan about how I should have saved some weight by bringing the rigid fork from my single speed.  

Then, as if to mock me, the trail led us into the first rock garden.  This one I could ride, but there were some sections I couldn’t.   A lot of the next mile consisted of rock gardens that I could ride during my warm up, but never under hypoxic race conditions.  To make a long story short, the course did not play to my strengths.  Put another way, my strengths do not play to finesse riding.  

My inability to descend gingerly notwithstanding, I had two aspirations for this race. The first was to not finish last, which was [relatively] easy.  I finished in front of 11 riders, and there were another 20 or so that didn’t finish at all.  By the way, when 90 racers are trying to get up the same trail and so are riding wheel to wheel, if one of the guys in the front dabs his foot everyone behind him gets stopped too.   So, to the guy behind me that yelled when I decided it was faster to run than wait for a literal traffic jam, if you’re reading this: Don’t be myopic, look up, look around, and quit staring at my hub. There’s a race going on.  

My other aspiration was to pee in a cup, or get tested for drugs.  I failed in that regard, or at least I hope so.

When I crossed the finish line I had only one thing on my mind, and it wasn’t to find out what place I’d finished or if I’d been randomly selected for drug testing.  No, I was thinking of getting to Coors Field and watching Ichiro Suzuki, the galaxy’s most gifted, graceful and gracious ballplayer, slap another base hit that doesn’t make it out of the infield.  

So Ryan and I loaded our bikes into the truck, and thanks to a 45 minute rain delay, we made it in time for the second inning.  It wasn’t until later that night, after the Mariners had blown two golden opportunities and thus the game, as I was finally drifting off to sleep, that I realized that I’d forgotten to check if I’d been randomly selected for drug testing.  

Missing a drug test is as bad as failing a drug test in the eyes of the USADA.  The irony of hoping to be selected, getting selected, and then skipping out on the test would be too much to bear.  So, to the USADA, if you’re reading this, and if I was selected: I’m sorry, but Ichiro is leading the American League in batting, and I hadn’t seen him play for five years. I’m begging for a little leniency here.  I’ll pee in that cup any time you ask.  I promise all you’ll find is some flax seed, chocolate milk, and if I’m desperate, maybe a bit of Mountain Dew.