I have a really hard time saying “no.” Whether it’s walking my friends’ dog when I’m already overbooked, taking on additional projects at work, or dinner plans with family at inopportune moments, I tend want to make others happy, so I just say “yes.” It’s an easy answer to give, often harder to deliver. Occasionally, an ill-conceived “yes” can even turn into a painful, bloody experience.
I realized I should have said “no” to racing the March 13, 2010 Grant’s Tomb Criterium when I merged from the George Washington Bridge to the Henry Hudson Parkway and my car was jolted sideways by haymaker-esque blast of wind, just as a bow wave from a van in the next lane washed across my windshield, making it momentarily impossible to see through. Fortunately, I managed to keep the car on course, surviving the rest of the drive to the racecourse.
Then, I compounded the error of leaving my house by getting dressed (while the car stood swaying like a wind chime), getting out of the car, registering for the race, and starting a warm up, such as it was. It was during my warm up that I really should have said “no.”
I was rolling around on a viaduct that carries River Side Drive when sunglasses, expensive ones that I’d worn nearly every time I rode my bike since 2005, lifted off from my helmet like a parachute exploding out the back of a drag racer. Accelerating like a baseball headed for home, they took off bound for the Hudson River.
I watched them go, feeling momentarily sad over the loss of a key piece of equipment. I shouldn’t have allowed myself the momentary distraction – while I was saying goodbye to the glasses the wind was driving me straight into a curb, all those fancy bladed spokes on my race wheel were transformed into svelte-but-efficient sails, pushing me toward the downwind mark.
It was a tall curb, so I didn’t have far to go when I fell over onto the sidewalk, but it was enough to tear the brand new knee warmer I was wearing and the flesh beneath. Before I even stood up, I realized that the bloody wound make me that guy on the start line – the one who had crashed before the race. Nice work, slick.
So much for doing something impressive at what was supposed to be a big season debut for my new team, Champion System Racing. Some debut.
Like I said, I should have realized by this time that this was a good time to start saying “no.” But I was already dressed, so thoughts of hunkering down in the car didn’t even occur to me. I’d driven nearly the entire length of the Hudson River Valley to race in this event, and damn it, I was going to race.
Besides my own stubborn bone, team management had called Grant’s a mandatory race, and I was determined to show that I was a team player. So I went to the line with the other racers foolhardy enough to show up in the awful weather. Of course, despite the conditions, I was the still only person with blood dripping down my leg.
I put in an honest effort for a couple laps, once the race finally started, then water started coming in under the collar of my racing cape, instantly soaking everything that wasn’t already saturated and causing me to lose any motivation I’d been able to muster. The effort I was putting out suddenly began to decline.
Then, a monstrous blast of headwind, larger than any other we’d yet experienced, ended the peloton’s carefully-choreographed dance; cyclists careened in 19 different directions, resembling a fleet of sailboats tacking across the wind. With that, something finally clicked. I was back in the car, shivering and stripping off wet Spandex while the leader still had half a race to suffer in the rain. Sucker.
Oh wait; I’m the sucker who needs to expand my vocabulary.
Thanks to Michael Koschara for the photos.
