October 1, 2006 Trash Talk from Scott By: Naomi Bloom |
A bundle of the content in this month's column comes to you courtesy of Scott Martin. A denizen of Santa Cruz County, Scott is often spotted winning (or at least placing) on and off the road for The Bicycle Trip's racing team. Scott's somewhat cynical observations of the biking life appear weekly in Road Bike Rider. Back in the day, he used to write a tad less facetiously for Bicycling magazine. His humor, although somewhat skewed to the macho mega-miler wannabe, never fails to tickle someone who's just the opposite -- me. Sometimes I even see myself in his little vignettes. For instance, Scott has astutely observed that "there's nothing like a strategically placed comment to throw your. . .riding partners off." Like: "Only three miles to the top." Response: "I thought this was the top!" Accompanied by a drastic reduction in speed.
Scott featured that sort of "trash talk" in a column entitled "Mentally Challenged." " . . .to paraphrase Yogi Berra," he wrote, "50% of cycling is 90% mental." I couldn't agree more. I just wish my mental state wouldn't delude me so often. I distinctly recall once ascending the steepest section of Arastradero Road (what my old riding buddy Leo Moll calls a "puppy hill"), when a voice behind me pipes up: "Naomi, don't stop now!" Hey, just because I'm slow doesn't mean I'm stopping! That doesn't happen until my pace sinks below 3 mph. Then I don't exactly stop; I just fall over. Another way to psych out a riding partner, Scott claims, is the old "it's all downhill" ploy. How many times have we all heard, "It's all downhill from here"? Sure it is, except for the uphills. Been ridin' much?A few weeks later, I discovered a partial solution to the delusion. Where else? In another Scott Martin column. It started with the perennial question, "Been ridin' much?""As any true cyclist knows, the correct answer -- whether you logged 2 or 200 miles last week -- is: 'Nah, I haven't been riding much at all.' Remember to preface your response by rolling your eyes and grimacing." Of course, no one will believe you. I, myself, am telling the truth, with no eye-rolling or grimacing to detract from my honesty. I'm slower than ever and my mileage has gone south. And the reason is that I'm not riding nearly as much as I used to. But everyone still expects me to be charging ahead and zipping up hills. Yet "we're all such good liars," Scott insists. If that's indeed the case, there must be ways to ferret out the truth. Of course, Scott has outlined a few telltale markers for us:
Scott's Dos and Don'tsYet another SM column endeavored to instruct us ignoramuses about on-bike etiquette. Or, how to lose friends and never have anyone else to ride with:
I've experienced this lesson on two memorable occasions. The first was sometime in the 1980s, when I introduced a triathlete friend to the Cinderella Classic. She'd never drafted before and wasn't really aware that she was doing it. I felt a slight bump. She dumped. Fortunately, she rode away with just a few scratches on her knee. The second time was a few years ago on a century in Sonoma County. I was on the back of the tandem. Some yahoo was pulling away from his buddies and just had to turn around and offer them some snarky remark. SLAM! He hit us full force. And down he went to the loud guffaws of his supposedly dropped pack. C'mon, fella. If you can't seen a tandem in front of you, you should know you sure as hell can't knock it down! Thanks, Scott, for bringing memories like these to the top of my brain. It's part of what makes an old fart who gets fat in winter keep pedaling. And I sure hope that yahoo in Sonoma wasn't you! |
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