Seizing Opportunities

January is always hit or miss. It can roar or whimper, pee or squall. The roads can be wet or icy, sandy, sloppy, or bone dry and stained white with salt. Or all of them in a single ride. As they were today.

While Wing Nut is banging out 50 mile rides in the hills of western Mass, Dubstoevsky is pecking away at crumbs and possibilities. 11 miles here. 40 miles there. 18 miles today in the absolute gloaming. Seizing every opportunity, foolhardy though some might be. 

January 19, 2017

Tuesday is a perfect example. Fully-suited up and ready to pedal, I noticed the a pattern of droplets on the pavement. The imminence of rain. I asked myself "What would Wing Nut do?" 

The answer was obvious - set out and hope for the best - so that's what I did. The best proved to be ice pellets instead of rain. At least I was not wet or uncomfortable. The pellets hit my outer layer and bounced off. They stung my face like little biting ants. Though the roads were completely soaked by the time I got back, for most of the ride they were just in the "dampening" stage. I got lucky, perhaps I conjured the beneficence of WingNutKarma.

Today it was overcast and ashy when I left after 3:00 and it got steadily darker as I went on. By the end of the ride, all the cars' headlights were on and I was grateful for my strobic-blinking headlamp and the schizophrenic blinking red taillight. I got back at 4:50. It's still January, for fuck's sake. Stupidly dark. Both Tuesday's and today's rides were in the "foolhardy" category. 

Also in the "hard man of the peloton" category. 

Ah well. After today, I've got 6 rides in 2017, 117 miles over full-on winter roads. 

Every January ride is a pint paid for by a stranger. 

Clear and Cold

Holden Reservoir
January 14, 2016

Saturday, January 14, 2017 was the 50th anniversary of the Human Be-In. I rode. 29 degrees, overcast crept in by the afternoon, a wan gray overlay fifty years after that cornerstone cultural event. That was the beginning and the end of what was possible. 

All these years later, a refugee from the Soviet Union, a hard man of the proletariat, a skull-thumped survivor at large in America, the bicycle is my pedestal and soapbox. I claw my way forward, eating up the hills of Woo County, grinding out dogged winter miles, telling myself that the Rasputitsa is nothing, is a lark's pedal, a puff of bluster in a long train of savagery.   

Monday, January 16. I bow to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., prophet and peacemaker, visionary, martyr for justice. OM AH HUM. 

The day is bright, sharp, clear, above freezing. Perfect. Don all the garb necessary for a comfortable ramble. And a fine ramble it is, 40 miles across the free New England landscape. Is Massachusetts the best state in the union? Some would argue. But I would not. 

This is where we ride

Emulating Balzac

Onward. 

First ride on the year, first ride on the Crux since the D2R2 (I didn't even test ride it after getting in back with a new derailleur last August). First training ride for the Rasputitsa, 112 days from today.

William St, New Years Day 2017

Hall St, New Years Day 2017

They say that if Balzac finished writing a novel before lunch, he would, immediately after lunch, start his next one. 

So it goes for Dubstoevsky. No time for slacking, for taking it easy. Serious training, arduous training, relentless training getting underway. The bike, for a while, becomes a secondary focus. After three years of determined cycling, the body, while sinewy and strong in the muscle gruppetto, has lost significant strength and muscle elsewhere. Everywhere else. 

That sad state to be addressed. Core training. A strengthening regimen designed and overseen by DS Mawgs, the Huron fitness guru who has taken a personal interest in Dubstoevsky's resurrection. Barbell step-ups. The Kettlebell Swing. Rowing machines. Weighted sleds. Truck tires. 

It's the first day of the new year. Time to start the next novel.

Woo City Style, January 1, 2017

January 1, 2017

Bancroft TowerJanuary 1, 2017

It's a Wrap

The vanishing year

2016. Done. Finished. Weirdness. Success and disappointment. The abandoned Tour de Heifer. The D2R2 mechanical on East RD. Team Shad reduced to two stalwarts, Wing Nut and Dubstoevsky. But the Rasputitsa, if not a triumph, definitely a success. A strong showing for the team. 

Dubstoevsky? An injury-free season. A personal best mileage count. Strong outings at the Rasputitsa and at the D2R2, until the mechanical. 

Stats 2016

118 rides
3,116.1 miles
165,679 feet elevation gain
233 hours 51 minutes pedaling

Those stats indicate a worthy effort, as one would expect of the team leader. Not even a contract year, just another year of dogged perseverance, of joyous embrace the rounding wheel, of conviction.

Crows on Cedar St
December 27, 2016

Bancroft Tower 12.27.16