PEAK MTB RIDE REPORT (VERSION 2) – 14.07.13 A VERY PERSONAL PERSPECTIVE It would appear that I popped into ‘my comfort zone’ last week. At the time I had no knowledge of this, I guess my sub-conscious got bored of playing pong and went for a mooch about. Now, ‘my comfort zone’ is full of all kinds of stuff. It’s well ordered (this would come as no surprise to those of you who know me), clean, tidy, calm. Nice, it’s a nice place – I like it a lot. It’s comfortable. One of the rooms in ‘my comfort zone’ (lots of rooms, categorised, obviously – with an index) is called ‘Cycling’. It, like all the rooms in there, has very nice bespoke designed (modernist influenced, Bauhaus specifically) built in cupboards and includes a ‘bikes’ cupboard, a ‘kit’ cupboard’, a ‘stuff I bought but didn’t really need but haven’t let go yet’ cupboard. I like to pop in, rummage, look, y’know, cupboard stuff. It has a cupboard called ‘my kind of cycling’. My subconscious popped in there. He messed it up bit. ‘My kind of cycling’ has things like – Alpine roads in Autumn, early Summer evening road rides, hilly road Spring sportives with coffee and cake, 1 hour sprint road laps – in it. They’re in drawers in the cupboard. One of the drawers has ‘Form’ on it – its full of turns of phrase, the rules, its my ‘Velominati’ draw. I love that drawer. Some choice quotes from that drawer and specifically from the venerated Frank Strack – the ‘Keeper of the Rules’ – “La Volupte – a fleeting moment of perfect harmony and clarity found aboard a bicycle”, “Grimpeur – one who goes well uphill, normally with the grace of an angel”, “Sur la plaque – moving onto the big ring” and ‘il posizione – the position on the bike where a rider can hammer on the pedals to go faster with less effort”. My subconscious clearly does not like that drawer, actually he thinks its sh#te obviously. He seemingly is also of the opinion that there is a drawer in that cupboard in that room in ‘my comfort zone’ that is missing – it is in effect, not in my comfort zone. My subconscious, at about 5.30pm last Wednesday decided to do something about this. It was a very little thing but one with a very big consequence. Innocuously enough it was all put into motion by this tiny, innocent, butter wouldn’t melt in my mouth word - ‘yes’. I typed this word ‘yes’ when responding to an email. I’d volunteered for something, I hadn’t realised this previously but clearly I had ‘cause my name was on the list, in the email. It would seem that I’d volunteered to go mountain biking in the Peak District and when my fingers (nothing (consciously) to do with me I might add) typed the ‘yes’ word my subconscious me simultaneously shouted YES!!!! and immediately after rapidly built a very messy room called ‘not in my comfort zone’. ‘Yes’ made me got to that room. The little bas#ard! And so a chain of unconsciously conscious events was set in motion. If I was going to have to go to ‘not in my comfort zone’ then I would quickly need to pop into the room in ‘my comfort zone’ called ‘buying stuff’ to help me manage the consequences. It’s a big room that, lots of drawers, kind of defies all sorts of relativities. It’s a lovely room, I love that room. I spend quite a bit of time in there. I popped in, I added a drawer, maybe two. Whilst I was back in ‘my comfort zone’ I made sure I also popped into ‘blissful ignorance’, had a quick rummage around ‘denial’ and finally stopped for a sit down in ‘getting stuff ready and putting it in piles’. I then had to leave ‘my comfort zone’. Sunday morning, up, awake and breakfasting at 6.30 am!!!!!! Yep, definitely not in ‘my comfort zone’ there. Loaded up the mountain bike, hmmm, picked up my ride buddy – who incidentally was sooo in his ‘comfort zone’ that he was having an extension built on to it – with wings and a massive spiral stair and a tower, with a balcony! Mind you, he’d also definitely popped into ‘buying stuff’ as well as ‘VERY EXCITED’ which clearly were very popular rooms down at his place. We met up with two more folks – one was easily at least involved in the planning application of my mates extension and quite possibly the detail design as well – I’m thinking ‘VERY EXCITED’ will probably have its own floor in the new build and at least a couple of keys to get in. We cracked on to the Peaks. I quickly sneaked into ‘Miles Davis’, ‘outwardly calm and philosophical’ and ‘futile grasping at straws’ which offered temporary respite but not really for very long. We ‘rocked up’!? at Heatherdene car park. I started to build the first proper room in ‘not in my comfort zone’ it was called ‘buggering about’. I put the sign on the door, flat packed one of the wardrobes from ‘my comfort zone’ (from ‘stuff you might need one day’) and put the first drawer in. I labelled the drawer ‘fettling’. It filled up really, really quickly. God mountain biking involves a lot of faff. My shocks were pressure checked and pumped, thank goodness I’ve only got a hard tail, we’d still probably be there if I’d gone the ‘full susser’ route. So were everyone else’s. Seats were adjusted for this and that, back packs donned, hydration packs donned, chain guards checked, this adjusted that modulated, this tweaked, that tuned. Yadayadayada. ‘Buggering about’ might be in a bit of trouble I was thinking – I quickly dashed back to ‘stuff you might need one day’ to see if there was anything immediately to hand but I ran out of time. We were off, dudes?!??!! I think we were going to get ‘stoked’? ‘Syntax’ was quickly popped on the next flat pack cupboard door. I kept it open for later. It was sunny, we were on a road, ok, this is good. We were then off the road. Where we were actually was at the bottom of a maybe 250 metre straight ascent at something like 15% gradient. It was about 4ft wide, heavily rutted. It had a forest on one side and a dry stone wall on the other. In the past the dry stone wall must have been about 30ft high ‘cause all but the remaining 4 vertical feel of it had been liberally and very randomly scattered along the path I was about to ride up. I think it was called something like ‘devils nipple’ or ‘satans flange’ or ‘awesome dude’, I started to build ‘this is why they invented roads’ in ‘not in my comfort zone’. It was to be a big, big build. So, up we go then. Y’know it’s fine until it isn’t. It isn’t is when you have to put a foot down on a climb like that. Once it’s down will it go back up (compounded by spd’s – note to self)? Will it my ar#e! 15 minutes into the ride and it was a walk. I pushed on. Literally. There was a flat ish bit near a gate, near the top. I got back on and ‘pushed through’ – in every way! Ok, the proper top. Some respite – grass, a few berms. Nice. I bunney hopped I think. Very radical. Already getting air. Dude. A short down hill stretch and then - Arrrgghhh – ‘witches crotch’, ‘salty armpit’ or something similar – not unlike ‘satans flange’ apart from shi#ter. ‘this is why they invented roads’ was getting a lot of traffic, I should have packed more flat packs. It was filling up and filling up very quickly. There was most likely going to be some spillage. I looked longingly back at ‘my comfort zone’ and then I just lost it in the fog that had began to fill the inside of my head. First proper fall off on ‘the armpit’. I believe the correct phrase is ‘it’s quite technical’. The incorrect phrase is ‘this is bolIo#@s’. I segwayed through ‘understatement’ whilst trying not to look like a tit. I looked like a tit. Another nice drop and to be very fair some jaw dropping views across to Kinder, Hope and all points in between. We descended to a corner of a wood and to the top of something called ‘THE BEAST’. I mean, come on, why would you do that? I might as well have put a big sign above my helmet flashing out ‘THE KNOB’. I had a crack at it obviously – I had to use up the last few remnants of ‘outwardly calm and philosophical’. I used them up. I used them up when I left my most favourite part of my elbow on a big, pointy, rock hard rock. Now to me ‘THE BEAST’ looks like it was once a river bed overlying typical limestone features. Being in the Peaks would indicate that this had been close to the start of this river’s journey and hence it was very steep, sharply meandering with some big drop offs made into bigger drop offs through undercutting. Loose deposits were everywhere. It had cut deep and where it wasn’t embanked it was flanked by rock, or forest or both. THE FACT THAT EVEN THE RIVER HAD DECIDED TO GIVE IT A MISS SENT A PRETTY CLEAR MESSAGE TO ME! Apparently only I heard it though. Bugger. Even my mountainy mates grabbed the handles and started to shut the door to ‘VERY EXCITED’ when they saw it. All apart from our very intrepid leader who absolutely nailed it. He flew down it – very literally in some stretches – and, drawing from the appropriate lexicography – ‘he was aweosme’! He was awesome. I was not awesome. I was fearsome, which is quite a long way from awesome. Fearsome has a drawer next to ‘hurty’ and ‘told you’ in ‘not in my comfort zone’. Not a great drawer. I filled it up, stuff was falling down the back – now it was ‘fearsome’ and ‘messy’. ‘Anxiety’ popped his head round the corner, flat pack in hand, but I told him to do one. We all made it to the bottom. Y’know I actually can’t remember what we did then. I think we did a great big arrow straight climb, a bit like ‘satans flange’ – it was longer, steeper, less technical and I think I was first up. I was first up because all the way up I was having an increasingly heated exchange with myself for a: having a subconscious, b: having an unruly self-conscious, c: being able to type yes. I got up fuelled on bloody anger at me as well as an increasingly challenging indexing problem with the ‘this is why they invented roads’ drawer. We rested at a particularly poorly sited gate, ‘fuelled’ and then did the set off on a steep, cobbly, rutted, uphill path thing with 50% of us consequently proceeding to walk the 20 yards to the top following ill timed foot down moments. Id opened a new room - ‘agitated’ had trumped ‘anxiety’ and nestled in nicely next to another new room – ‘increasingly f#@ked off’. This seems an opportune moment to re-iterate that this is my ‘not in my comfort zone’ rant. Honestly, to me, everyone else was having a blast and whilst occasionally ‘not in my (their) comfort zone’ may have popped up in momentary lapses of will they typically were on it, stoked, rapped, in the zone, getting air, being radical – all that. And having a nice time. My bike broke next. Apparently my shocks needed more pumping (??!!) and whilst travelling down ‘potato ally’??? or the stream that followed it my front mech had a moment, with something harder than it was, and kind of fell off. This was preceded by my potatoes having a moment with something harder than they were, fortunately they didn’t fall off. I slumped from 30 to 10 gears firmly stuck in the mid range. I quickly popped into ‘buying stuff’ but ran out when I saw the prices. I even fettled and dabbled and flanged. I made it down the next overtly ‘technical’ bit, pulled into a bike shop and had an epiphany. There, staring me straight in the eye was ‘perfect excuse’! Firmly back in ‘my comfort zone’ I withdrew the contents of the whole room – adding the stuff from ‘I’ve been out for ages’ and ‘I should get home really’ just to seal the deal. I high-tailed it as fast as my mid-range and hurty potatoes would let me back to the car, got in, drove home and gave ‘my comfort zone’ a massive cuddle. That is not a euphemism by the way but I did have to be mindful of the spuds. So, what can I take from this day then? Key message – beware your subconscious. Keep it occupied. Lists, give it loads and loads of lists – and habits, definitely habits. Do not give it any down time and if you do and you see ‘not in my comfort zone’ try and think long and hard before you pop across for a look around. It’s worth it on occasion but go in with the full knowledge that your veg might get bruised. Whilst I was in ‘not in my comfort zone’ I don’t recall experiencing a lot of “La Volupte”. Certainly there were opportunities for ‘Grimpeurs’ but to be fair I think I was more ‘gurner’ than ‘Grimpeur’. Did I manage to get ‘sur la plaque’ no. the only big ring I got near had nothing to do with my bike and its sole moment of engagement coincided with the potato incident so best not to go there. And what of ‘il posizione’ – er, no. If there is a phrase called ‘il pipedream’ then I definitely went there but what hammering there was focused on the construction of additional drawers ‘not in my comfort zone’ rather than any added velocity gained via pedals. It’s good to go to ‘not in my comfort zone’ and it’s good to do that when it coincides with ‘in my (their) comfort zone’ for the people you are with. It was a cracking route, a beautiful day and I’m glad (I’m not glad) I did it and gave it my best (which was rubbish) shot. It was another day spent in the fine company of VCF and I learnt a lot, I think I even improved a bit – although given the base line starting point there’s not an awful lot of bragging rights in there. My ride mates had a wicked time and everyone committed to some really difficult stuff. I committed to getting back into ‘my comfort zone’, which is where I am now. It’s well ordered (this would come as no surprise to those of you who know me), clean, tidy, calm. Nice, it’s a nice place – I like it a lot. It’s comfortable. My potatoes are better now by the way. See you on Wednesday at 7
Posted on: Tue, 16 Jul 2013 11:03:08 +0000
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