WOW. My dear, faithful readership, wherever you are--I appreciate you. Really. My life is divided into parts...kind of like how your brain is divided into hemispheres and lobes. I pretty faithfully neglect 89% of my lobes. Bathrobes?
Anyway I think we have all figured out that I am probably never going to really tell you what happened those last few days/weeks/month? of Bike the US for MS. And perhaps that is for the best. After all, if I revealed all of the Lizard mystery to you guys...what's to make you come back here?! Isn't there a saying... something like, "nobody wants a peach with a bite missing." Yeah! That's real.
Wait...that is from memoirs of a geisha. Um--let's move on, I guess.
So Here is a quick life update. For me, probably, as much as any of you who read this.
Graduate from college: check. Experience existential life crisis: check. Funnel all possible energies into one activity that may or may not lead to a sustainable lifestyle: check. Become an adult: LOLZ NO.
I have also recently (somewhat sadly) switched teams. (...ok that sounded like a hilarious euphemism, but it was not meant to. let's all be mature about this.)
Yep! I am now a member of the illustrious Rosebandits racing team...but I will never forget the team that took me when I could barely keep from running into the barricades at races and earnestly wondered whether or not underpants were to be worn with one's chamois. I will love team kenda forever with all of my lizard heart, and I strongly encourage everyone else to do the same.
It is sort of a funny story, the way I got in contact with the Rosebandits...it was a dark and stormy night.
HA, no, it was actually the middle of the day. And it was sunny out--blisteringly so! It was Florida State Road Race Champs...my motivation was a bit lacking. To be fair, I had been "in season" since the beginning of May, and at that point, we were about to flip the calendar on October. I debated racing espoirs on the Saturday but couldn't justify spending the money on a hotel just to be thoroughly crushed the day before the race I was actually gunning for. Also, one isn't really competing for money at State Champs...more like bragging rights, and if you come out on top, a sweet jersey mimicking the design of the Floridian state flag. My bank account was already sobbing from the thorough bleeding I'd put it through the last few months: plane tickets, speeding tickets (dang old texas), lady gaga tickets!
Naw, though, I didn't go see lady gaga. But...i did want to keep that parallel structure going. (I have a degree in english...)
I decided, in my wisdom, that the best, most viable option was to leave from my sister Emily's place in Tampa in the middle of the night. Literally, the middle of the night. I think it was like....2:30 AM. Because sleep is for the weak and soulless.
"Siri," I said, "how do I get to Clermont?"
"Sorry," Siri told me, "but I don't understand 'how do I get a cream soda'? Would you like me to search the web for 'how do I get a cream soda'?"
"GOD, SIRI, HOW YOU FAIL ME." I stuffed my phone into a cupholder and resigned myself to blind, twilight sign-following.
In retrospect, the drive was thoroughly enjoyable. I had nearly a thousand milligrams of sugar-free amp marching through my bloodstream, wreaking all manner of havoc on my adrenal glands and vital organs. I WAS ALIVE. I WAS ALIVE AND IT WAS 3 AM AND WOOOOOOOOOOO.
This euphoric hyperbole was not to last, though. No thanks to Siri, I rolled up on the race course just after 4:00 AM. I was in quite a different mood, indeed. My giddy caffeine giggles had been replaced by the soft, woeful sounds of bereavement and suffering. "Why Liz," I asked myself, "why would you do this....WHY WOULD YOU DO THIS."
But I had no answer for myself, and I rarely ever do.
I found the race course without difficulty; this was my second year attending and I was pretty familiar with the course. Even so, I drove it in a sleep-deprived haze, muttering to myself about potholes and corners and degrees of incline of hills.
My strategy was simple: do nothing, until I had to do something. I have proven to myself repeatedly that hills are probably not my forte. I mean, we were still in florida, so maybe it's more appropriate to just call them humps. But...apples and oranges. You know. words.
By now it was almost five. I was delirious, and in terrible need of snacks. I went to a gas station about three miles down the road, and purchased three sugar free red bulls, an obscenely large tub of water, some almonds, and a clif bar. The clif bar was because I am health conscious. I then returned to the race course to locate a place to nap.
In my mind, the idea of just stopping somewhere and sleeping in a minivan seemed at least moderately normal. I mean, why not? Minivans are huge! It is like a traveling hotel room, sans minibar! But in practice, it is less perfect than it seems. I mean, it is actually pretty close to perfect; My only real concern was, like...axe murderers. I locked all of the doors and hid under a blanket. Fears assuaged.
Sleep eluded me for several minutes--probably due to the clinical levels of caffeine i had consumed. But, it's anyone's guess! I listened to a rooster crowing idly nearby and soon drifted off.
I jumped awake again at about 8:00 AM, feeling as though someone had stolen all of my blood and replaced it with a mixture of sand and tissue paper. It was the feeling of utter death. Imagine being slapped repeatedly with a plank of wood and then doused in seltzer water. It's like that.
At this point, I seriously doubted my ability to produce very many watts, and wondered whether it was worth the entry fee to race. But I am the Lizard, and I have some sense of dignity to uphold, so wimping out isn't really a viable option.
I rose from my minvan cave and slapped on some bibs. I checked the time: thirty minutes out. "IS THIS REAL LIFE," I cried. It was.
I withdrew the clif bar from my snack cache and ate it. I then dumped all the red bull into my bottles. How did I convince myself red bull was a good mid-race hydrator--clinical insanity? All of my inhibitions and common sense-making had turned off somewhere around 4:30.
I signed up and paid the very lovely registration people (who I was becoming rather familiar with), and rolled over to the start/finish. I asked an official for the time: ten minutes out. Oh dear god. Why.
The field was a healthy thirty-or-so ladies, a mixture of all categories. I sometimes prefer it that way, but I do believe it can be discouraging to newer riders when they are forced to "race" people three categories higher than them. But...it also helps identify sandbaggers. There are pros and cons.
ANYWAY. The race began, as all races do, and I felt shockingly normal. I deemed it some sort of miracle and continued pedaling.
I attacked somewhere in the first or second lap (i can't really remember which), just to see what people would do in response, and I got a bit of a gap going. i was quickly joined by Rosebandits' Laura Parsons, who went by me going about 32 mph up a little dip just before the first turn. Moderately stunned, I clambered onto her wheel and made a mental note that this was probably her race to lose.
I can't remember whether that was the move that stuck or if we were sucked back in again--but the important thing is, it eventually came down to a breakaway of four: LP, myself, another lady whose name i forget (i am terrible), and one of the cat 3-4 ladies who had basically already won her race.
It came down to the sprint, and laura crushed everyone decisively. I just barely beat the woman who came in third place. It was like...a thumbnail between 2nd and 3rd. SWEET LORD.
ANYWAY. The moral of this story is, after the race, I told Laura, "hey that was sweet you totes crushed me" or something like that, and she was like, "oh yeah you should check out the rosebandits!" and i was like "yeah dawg!" except that i never said that. but you get the idea.
And so, one thorough rambly block of words later, you have the point of the story. I don't know, I felt like you guys deserved some words out of me.
ANYWAY (part deux), I have resolved to write in here at least twice a week. I mean, I'm going to be riding 6 days a week. So, by the laws of nature, at least 2 out of those 6 days will have to include some sort of hilarious crises, right? It has to happen! I don't think i'll lock myself into two specific days, but that might change along the lines if i become lazy.
I am beyond excited to keep going with training, do training camps, meet new people, commence the crushery, etc etc etc. I hope you'll all read this for my lizard thoughts, ridiculous opinions, race reports, pictures, and maybe a video every now and again.
UNTIL NEXT TIME.
Your faithful Lizard
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