Authors Note: Sorry so long, but those that know me know that I can turn anything into a long and twisted tale. Bear with me, I hope its worth the trip. I wanted to title this piece, "Losing My Virginity With Hollywood Miller in The Piney Hills", but my editors thought differently (1^st amendment - wtf is that?). Enjoy!!

 

About a month or so back, I was in Precision Bikes and Mark Miller was talking about doing an off road duathlon on October 14^th in Ruston. I was really intrigued. He said that he and Kyle Love had done it some years back and had a blast. That little thought didn’t take long to activate some suicidal tendency in my brain and I decided I wanted to try it. There was one major drawback, I didn’t have a mountain bike. Mark said that I could borrow one, because that is what he was going to do. He was going to use his mechanic Ross’s bike (an Epic full suspension).

 

I decided that it would be best if I bought a bike. I told them I wanted a cheap hardtail (no rear suspension). I explained about my old BMX days in the late 70's and early 80's (HA!!). Mark and Ross told me I was crazy to attempt the course we were going to race on a hardtail and I would be miserable. Thank God I listened to them. Some two weeks later my full suspension Specialized Epic arrived. Well, with my life taking on a bunch of wild twists and turns, I was unable to ride my bike at all.

 

So, on Friday October 13^th - yes, Friday the 13^th, Mark and I piled all of our gear into my truck and headed north into the piney woods. We arrived at Lincoln Park just north of Ruston Louisiana at about 4 pm in the afternoon, just enough time to do one loop of the course. In the parking area we met up with Chris. He is a fireman from Mt. Vernon, Texas and an avid offroad racer. He asked if he could ride along with us, as he had never seen the trail either. The only person who had been on the trail was Mark and that was almost 10 years ago. The whole way up, Miller told me horror stories about the course. About switchbacks where the other riders tires were right at your ears (OK above my head - cause I’m short), and about a giant hill you go down - "Tomac Hill", named after John Tomac the famous mountain bike pro.

 

Well, off we went, Mark in the lead, myself in the middle and Chris following. I don’t think I was prepared for what I was about to experience. Yes, I had jumped ramps, done frame stands, endo bounces, and injured myself innumerable times as a retarded teenager on a BMX. But, at 36 years old and riding a BMX on steroids - times they were a changing!!!

 

First of all, there must be a root for every square foot of trail. At about mile one I wanted to kiss both Mark and Ross for persuading my hardheaded cheap butt to buy a full suspension bike. I also quickly understood the importance of the "granny" gear (the smallest cog on the front chainrings). I almost poohed my pants when I saw mile marker number 1. I was winded, my eyes were strained, my mind was aching (stolen from AC/DC), and when I looked at my watch I realized we could have walked the trail faster. Truth be known, the mess we were riding on couldn’t be walked, not even by a mountain goat. There were areas where you would go straight down, bouncing over roots and barely making your handlebars fit between trees and then you would flatten out only to find that there was the narrowest bridge you had ever seen right in front of you. If you were lucky enough to make it over the bridge you were greeted with an incline of epic proportions covered in washed out roots and snaking through trees that you could barely fit through. I wondered many times if God/Nature know the perfect measurements for handlebars, as my barends debarked many a small tree on that trail. The so called bridges, were also possibly built by smurfs. They were nothing more than a few 2x4's thrown together. By mile 5 I had an inkling of what mountain biking is like. In a phrase, it’s road biking on acid.

 

Somewhere around mile 3 I was on my way up one of the "rooty" hills when my front tire left the ground and stayed there as I continued to pedal. And pedal I did, up the hill, then down the hill back towards Chris. His eyes widened as I headed downhill towards him riding a wheelie. My stunt however ended as I hit a tree and slid down it. I am not sure how, neither is Chris, but I managed to lodge the tree in my armpit (like a horseshoe) and slide down it. There was a mole I had been meaning to remove in my pit. It is now removed - thanks Lincoln Park. Well, after Chris stopped laughing, I remounted my trusty goat and continued on. About a mile later, crash number 2 occured. I rode up on Mark on a switchback and he was almost stopped - so I slowed and slowed and slowed to a stop, and as any "clipped in" biker can tell you, DON’T STOP on a hill while you are clipped in. Problem is, I was on a (guess what???) - "rooty hill". More skin left my body as I rolled around in the dirt and tree roots.

 

Well about a ½ mile later, I guess to make me feel good, Mark had a pretty damn hard crash. His front tire caught a root, twisted the bars out of his hands and he flew forward and landed on a root. Chances of landing on a root or a rock when you fall on this course are about as good as getting laid in Vegas with a fist full of hundreds. His hip took the brunt of the fall, but the 14 time Ironman shrugged it off and continued. What a stud!!!

 

Not to let him outdo me, on the next set of switchbacks, I encountered a sandy area on a turn and my back end (my tire - not my a$$), got away from me and down I went again. I kept hearing Howard Cosell’s words echo in my ear "down goes Frazier", "down goes Frazier". It was at this point that Chris was beginning to realize that he was riding with two of the masters of the mountain biking world.

To put things into perspective. I have ridden thousands of miles on road bikes and time trial bikes with only three crashes. In the first 5 miles of my mountain biking career, I had tied that mark. I wasn’t about to give up. Besides, no matter what, I still had either 5 miles forwards or backwards to ride out to my vehicle anyway. I was stuck.

 

A few miles ahead, Mark stopped his bike in a clearing to check out his handlebars. He looked ahead and told us, that’s Tomac hill. I didn’t notice anything different. Looked like the pine trees I had been clipping for 7 miles or so. However, when we walked closer, I realized what he had been talking about. Those rednecks have it all wrong. It shouldn’t be called Tomac hill, but Tomac cliff. It is a shear 2.5 story drop to the forest floor below, where you encounter another bridge built by the smurfs only to rise a few feet later into a jump. When you land from your jump you are greeted some 10 feet later with a berm and a 90 degree turn into the forest. My words don’t do justice to the dread that a normal person would feel at their first inspection of this suicide section of trail. It was then that I realized why mountain bikers smoke dope.

 

I watched Chris, then Mark fly down the hill. I couldn’t be outdone, so I dropped in as well. All of Sir Isaac Newtons Laws started to go through my head. Things like objects that are in motion tend to stay in motion until it is acted on by some outside force, skip the 2^nd law, and then the one that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. Well, for as fast I was falling down that hill, I was proportionately screaming like a little girl. Somehow I managed to hit the center of the bridge and then the jump. I must have temporarily lost my mind and reverted to my old BMX days, as I did a crossup in the air, landed on the berm and leaned out into the forest. There is only one theory that I can think of that saved me and its not Sir Isaac Newton's. It is one that I read on a bumper sticker - heaven don’t want me and hell is afraid I’ll take over.

 

With Tomac behind us, we rode uneventfully until about mile 9.5 when we encountered a little hill. I didn’t know that mountain biking had hor’s categourie (beyond category) hills, especially in the redneck alps of Ruston. However, we encountered the only such hill. After attempting to ride this thing in our granny gears several times, we decided to walk up it. O. K., scale the damn thing carrying our bikes. Sir Edmund would have been proud of my cherpaesque technique.

 

One hour and twenty three minutes had passed on the sundial by the time we made it back to the start/finish line. That comes out to an average speed of 7.2464 miles per hour ( just for you Ben and Dodd). I figured that on paper, I could probably run the course faster.

 

After inspecting my wounds, I told Mark that I was going to replace my Precision Bike stickers on my frame with "ejection seat qualified" stickers. What scared me the most was that I was going to try to race that same course the next day. In essence, I was going to attack the beast that attacked me today. I knew the outcome, but smiled nonetheless. I am used to getting pounded. At 5'6" tall and quite the smarta$$, needless to say I have been on the losing end of many a battle with those that didn’t find my whit entertaining. However, I’m still smiling with most of my teeth still in my head!! Persistence beats pretty any day.

So, at 9 a.m. the next morning Mark, Chris, and myself found ourselves awaiting the start of the Piney Hills Offroad Duathlon. The USAT National Championships. Yep, I felt like quite the champion - my second time on a mountain bike and this my first ever trail run. Boy, did I belong or what? I felt like a member of Hezbollah at a bar mitzvah.

 

What a way to cap off a nightmare season. Mark and I had endured three Ironmans in 10 months with the Houston Marathon thrown in for good measure. Ironman Wisconsin was a mere 5 weeks in the rearview mirror and here we were about to torture our poor bodies once again. In retrospect, there is something seriously wrong with us. There has to be a 12 step program out there for us. Every book I have ever read said "NO speedwork for 6 weeks after an Ironman". I felt safe, since 7.25 mph couldn’t be perceived as speedwork. HA!!

 

Well, bang went the gun, or whir the siren....whatever!! And off we went flying into the hills. I figured I would try to keep my eyes on Brian Lejeune (one of them fas fas boys from Baton Rouge). Those delusions of grandeur were short lived. Not only because you can’t pick your eyes up off of whatever root/hill you are about to encounter, but my long/slow year of long/slow had guess what—made me long/slow! My sub 6 minute miles of a year ago were replaced by sloth like movement. I realized then, it was time to throw the nitrous bottle out the window and come to terms with the fact that I had brought a diesel to a dragstrip. It was time to relax and enjoy the carnage that was about to ensue. I slowed my pace and the breathing followed - thank you God. Then a smile popped on my face and it stayed there and is still on my face as I type these words.

 

I made it through the run and onto my bike. I was passed for the first 15 minutes or so and then I had the woods to myself for long periods of time throughout the race. It was then that I felt the Zen of what I know veteran off road people feel. I could feel the course. If you relaxed and released the death grip on the bars and opened your mind (much like I try to do on my long runs), I could feel the course as it moved beneath and in front of me. I would sway dip and move with the ground beneath me. It was surreal and quite incredible. Yes, it was my cherry high and yes I am now addicted. At about mile 5 or 6 I was to become one with the course beyond the Zen I described earlier.

 

I made a crossing on the road and picked up speed. I was getting cocky, 5 or 6 miles had passed and I hadn’t fallen once. I roared across the road, hit a jump, went into the air and the next thing I know my ribs, face, and the rest of my body were skidding along the path. My bike had abruptly stopped on a root. (See Newton’s first law from earlier). After checking out all of my deceleration trauma (various contusions, abrasions, and brushburns), I remounted and sped off down the trail - hippity hoppity!!

 

Not long after I was able to fly down Tomac hill, sans parachute, and hear the crowd applaud me as I screamed that I wanted my road bike (in the same pitch as John Wayne Bobbit on his fateful night). It was then one last attempt at the hill from hell as I scratched my way up the infamous col de ruston at 9.5 miles and then down into transition. Just once, I want to come into T2 to see empty racks of bikes. Today was definitely not the day to fulfill that fantasy.

 

Out of T2 I ran. I was on pace to break 4 hours in the marathon. Only problem, this wasn’t a marathon. About 1 mile out, my friends, the roots greeted me again. My left foot caught one and I was slammed to the ground. I figured oh well, what's new, and got up, only to have my left leg disagree with my assessment. I fell flat on my face again. Seems I had landed on a rock that smashed into my left knee and it took a bit of skin and obviously did some damage. It took me nearly a mile to get back up to speed, it was ugly and quite humbling. I looked at my watch, laughed, and continued to enjoy the day and the race. After almost 2 hours on the course, I was happy to see the finish line. Needless to say, Mark and I didn’t hang around for our medals. We had to get to our recovery drinks awaiting us outside of the alcohol free park. There is nothing like red bull and Greygoose to ease the pain of two beat up mountain bike champions.

 

On the 3.5 hour ride home, all we could do was smile and giggle like two little schoolgirls. Too bad Miller doesn’t look like Brittany Spears. In the end, I’ll admit to a few things - Yes, we are stupid. Yes, we didn’t belong racing at the national championships. No, we didn’t break any records or beat up on any of our age group competitors. But, I doubt anyone had as much fun as we did.

 

Somewhere out there in Lincoln Park I felt it. You can’t put your finger on it, but it’s there. In Ironman and other endurance competitions we expose every last nerve to ourselves and the spectators. In offroad competition your every last nerve is exposed to nature, but she beautifully returns the favor - allowing you to experience her every nook and cranny and test yourself on her terrain. That mountain bike I just bought is gonna grow dusty, but it ain’t going to be dust from the attic, its going to be fresh trail dust. As the governor of California once said, "I’ll be back!!".