Holy cow! While feeling discouraged about my fitness level, biking skills (or rather, lack thereof), and things in general, I was surfing the internet and came across an old (1999!) article I had written that was apparently still on the
Team Estrogen website. After reading it, I have to consider maybe I should take my own advice...
My 1999
Team Estrogen article in its entirety is below:
How To Win At Losing - by C.N. Spotz
Okay, I'll admit it - losing graciously is not one of my strong points,
and this year's Knobscorcher was no exception; I childishly sobbed
myself to sleep quietly in my cabin following the race. However, later
that week, as I sat home nursing my wounded arm and feeling sorry for
myself, I started to wonder whether there wasn't something positive I
could extract from the experience - some sort of, shall we say, silver
lining to losing's ugly cloud. So I began to reflect back, way back,
trying to put things into perspective.
I'm not what most of you would consider a "real" mountain biker - I
stumbled upon the sport quite by accident. For the first thirty or so
years of my life, I was a horsewoman body and soul, who lived and
breathed training, showing and caring for my horses. Then four years
ago, the only life I had known came to a screeching halt when the horse
to whom I had devoted the previous five years broke her leg. I lost
her, and the failed surgical attempts to save her drained my finances
enough to ensure no more horses for me. In my devastation, I turned to
my then boyfriend (now husband), Steve, who had occasionally trail
ridden with me - him on his mountain bike and me on horseback. I
remember being fascinated that a bike could be ridden that way. Having
grown up with ponies, I had never experienced the thrill of bike riding
as a child, and always assumed that they were just ridden on the
sidewalk. But with the horse life now behind me, Steve convinced me to
try a new sport.
So we went shopping, and at the tender age of 33, I bought my first
bike - a shiny gray, fully rigid mountain bike. I was like a
six-year-old on Christmas morning - my very own bicycle!!! Luckily, I
had Steve to pick out a bike to fit me, as I didn't know how to ride a
bike to even test one - no small feat, as I'm only 5'1", and tiny bikes
are just now beginning to show up in bike shops locally here. Anyway, I
won't bore you with the details of a grown woman learning how to ride.
Suffice it to say that eventually, with a lot of patient coaching, I
finally figured out shifting, braking and pedaling enough to ride around
the neighborhood. After a few weeks of trying out my newfound skills
on the pavement, I ventured off-road and fell in love. I fell a lot,
got dirty and bruised, got poison ivy, hated my bike, loved my bike, but
continued to ride. As the weeks turned into months, I bought more
bikes, discovered suspension, and continued to ride nearly every day.
I still never seemed to develop into a "real" mountain biker. I have
always been terrified of almost everything on the trail. I tend to
walk nearly as much as I ride - over logs, through ditches, switchbacks -
anything that looks scary. I know other folks see me out there, still
afraid to death of falling after four years on bikes, and think "what a
dope", but still I'm drawn to the trail. I used to wonder why I love to
ride so much, when I'm so afraid.
A couple of years into my riding, I decided to try my hand at racing.
Not a very successful venture for someone with such a high fear
factor. I raced many times, placing usually within about two to three
spotz from last, but still trying and still finishing the races.
I began to get discouraged, so I stopped riding with other people, as
I hated always being the last one in the group that everyone else had
to wait for. I rode alone nearly every day, with only my dog, Zoe, as
company - she never minded waiting while I walked the obstacles that
still spooked me. Even the solitude couldn't keep me off the bike,
though. What was it about this sport that drew me so?
Fast forward a year. I decided to start racing again after a brief
hiatus. This time, it was a little easier. I actually won a race, and
started placing closer to the middle of the pack. I still walked a lot
of obstacles, but I did it faster now! I also still rode alone most of
the time, but began to try more new trails, with my ever faithful dog as
my companion.
I decided to stop letting racing be such a serious drudgery, so I
bought a bunch of leopard pattern clothes from Shebeest, and picked up a
new Titus full suspension frame which I had painted leopardskin to
match my clothes. I adopted the race name C.N. Spotz, and decided to
just have fun. Things actually began to work out, as Shebeest was
excited about my leopard scheme, and agreed to provide partial
sponsorship for me. The confidence they put in me carried over to my
riding, as I began to turn out better and better performances, even
winning a 12 hour race as a solo rider.
This brings us to this spring. I had decided to try my hand at a big
NORBA race, so I registered for the Knobscorcher at Tsali, North
Carolina. I had been riding pretty consistently at home, and even
attempting some log crossings that I previously was afraid to even walk.
Unfortunately, the week prior to the big race, I miscalculated one of
those log stacks, and fell, tearing several tendons in my right arm and
hand, not to mention the gigantic wound the accident left on my psyche.
Foolishly, I decided to attend the race and compete anyway, which would
have probably been okay, but in my anxiety about the size of the race, I
prerode the entire 18 mile course plus an additional 7 miles the day
before, thus exhausting my energy reserves - not to mention the fact
that I fell once again during the preride, re-injuring my same right
arm, hand and fingers.
Needless to say, I had about the worst race I have ever ridden,
falling behind on the very first climb, a 1.3 mile trauma, with my right
hand going numb after about 100 yards. I felt like old women with
walkers could get up the hill faster than I could. Nevertheless, I
pushed on, getting passed by everyone, including squirrels, on the
trail. I had originally set my sites on placing in the top 50% with a
time of less than two hours. Well, out of 12 finishers, I placed 9th,
but did manage to squeak past the finish line with a final time of
1:54:20. I was crushed, disappointed in myself, as I knew I could ride
better than that. I cried quietly in my cabin all that night, wishing I
could start the whole weekend over, but knowing that there was nothing I
could do now, so I wallowed in my regrets.
Several days later, I was sitting at home, cursing my wrist which
still hurt some four weeks after the initial injury, when I realized
that moping about, being depressed and criticizing myself about a poor
race finish was such a waste of time. What had I become? Didn't I fall
in love with just riding my bike? When did the competition overwhelm
the sheer joy of cruising down the trail? How did the finish line
become more beautiful than a deer quietly enjoying a spring morning
drink from the stream that parallels the trail? I began to think about
what made me want to ride badly enough to go out alone on the trails
every day, and realized that it wasn't racing. It was the freedom to
just ride. It was daffodils blooming along the trail edge, the
switchback that I was finally able to ride without dabbing, the cool
splash of water on my legs when I rode across the creek, the hill that I
actually made it all the way to the top of this time. That's what made
me ride, not a race that any one of a million riders could win on any
given day.
Does this mean that I'm hanging up my racing silks? Of course not.
It just means that I've decided to keep it all in perspective. I still
love to race; I still love to win. But more importantly, I still love
to ride and since I still can, I guess that means that maybe I really
didn't lose this time after all.
As published (1999) in Fat Trax, the newsletter of the N.C. Fats Mountain Bike Club.
Copyright �1999 Tammy Kaufman. All Rights Reserved.
