Confusciously

Woopsie, haha, hi folks, I forgot that I have “Moderate comments” set!
Thank you for your well wishes! I’m all healed up, like a champ! It’s amazing how much faster a fit person heals than the “average” bum-around, possible smoker does.

The guy who sewed me up said, “Stay off the bike for 6 weeks!” Sorry doc! Can’t do that, I have races to train for! I started back up with gusto 5 days after the accident, and I feel that the bloodflow contributed to my quick recovery.

Today I headed out for my ride as any other day. Maybe a bit of a late start, but it was beautiful as ever in Los Angeles.

I started with an interval of Warming Up. Weaving through a bit of usual traffic, I roll up behind a van, being sure to stay several car lengths back to accommodate for the slow-and-go rhythm of the speed bumps. Except, one particular speed bump, the van didn’t start moving again with the rhythm I’d expected! He slowed, and SLOWED! By the time I realized he wasn’t moving I was getting close and with a curb to the right I attempted to veer around him to the left while slamming the brakes when NOOOOOOO!! He turns left too! Slam, right into the side of his van.

Then started my Freaking Out interval. With blood pouring down my face and the van driver calling 911 I figure I’d calmly call my partner in crime Ginger for support. Apparently screaming, “Oh! Ah! I don’t know! My eye! My eye, Ginger! I’m bleeding! It’s open! Can you come? No, what street, I don’t know! I don’t know! I don’t, ahhhhh!!!!” does not a calm call make.

Shortly after I did an Explain-Calmly-to-Paramedics interval. “I’m calm! I’m fine! I’m just bleeding! I need a surgeon!” They didn’t think I was calm either. “You’re trembling, ma’am.” But I thought I was calm. Funny the ol’ perception thing.

An Ambulance interval later, I was wheeled into Cedars-Sinai.

The paramedics and docs kept telling me I was lucky to only require stitches near my eye, that everything was in-tact.

I am lucky. I am very lucky. I am lucky to have the life I do, to train like I can with the coach I have, to work with the people I work with, to have a great team of doctors and paramedics assist me.

And all I got was this bruise on my cheek and a few stiches in my eye.

I promised I would write about all my racing experiences, the good and the bad. Last week I just couldn’t do it, I was too grumpy about a miserable race in San Marcos. But! I have since found the light. Rather, my own meadow of green grass.

Let it be known, I cried at San Marcos. Didn’t even wait till I got back to my car before starting. Walked directly to my parent’s side and cried. They are so fabulous, they always come watch my San Diego races! That’s right, at nearly 30 years old I still run to the parentals. But hey, I’m thankful that they are a safe place to go. Not everyone has that. I baited my parents with, “You still love me, right?” knowing that this is a loaded question that would return to me what I needed to hear. “Of course I love you!” my mom exclaimed. “I don’t care if you’re LAST!” The conversation in my head while racing was pathetic - “Why do I do this? Maybe i’m really no good. I’m too old to start.” Remembering something the amazing Dotsie Bausch told me, I knew the wave of post-race hormones was making me more emotional, and so decided to come out of the conversation in my head to chat with some friends. Ah, always works.

Last week I picked myself up, and I’m moving on. Training proceeded as planned.

Then! I raced Ontario this weekend. I came in third! Of course I feel with a little race juggling I could have placed better - even won! - but alas a race plays out exactly as it does and we end up exactly where we are. I just remember to learn from every detail. I even went on to race with the boys which is super fun and finished with the pack. Woo!

Before the women’s race I gained clarity in my mind for why i’ve had the poor race results I’ve had. I met a couple really nice girls, both who walked up to me separately and said, “This is my second race! I just hope to finish!” One girl even said, ” I remember you from Bakersfield! You’re strong!” Me?? Strong?? My god I love you. I’m that easy. But I was able to say, back to her, “Just stick with it! Don’t give up! Don’t ever give up! You will get better!”

See, my dream, my big What-I’m-Up-To-in-life dream is to be a public speaker, a mentor, an author, a success coach.
When I was wallowing in the “I suck” of last week’s perceived failure, I really see it for what it is - just another stepping stone on my journey. I’m getting better at flats, I could benefit from hill training, but right now I feel absolutely grateful and in love with where I am.

It’s one thing to know what I want to do, which is inspire people to be their best, and it’s a whole other thing to experience it since just the week before I thought I was the lowest of the low. How does the bottom rung inspire?? It ain’t about position, baby, it’s about heart.

You see, I finally get that my grass is amazingly green right here. I just needed to have a picnic on it to notice it.

Okay, this post is long overdue. I finally cracked out of being cynical and resigned.

But first, a quote:

“A ship ought not to be held by one anchor, nor life by a single hope.”
– Epictetus, Philosopher

So last year I set out to win this year’s State Road Race Championship. Hey, dreams are great to have, and I am all for creating the future in a visionary way rather than being relegated to the old ways of the past. But wait, did I say this year’s Road Race Championship? Because obviously I meant “one of the next few year’s championships”.

Ten hours of Law and Order reruns and numerous shots of tequila later, I am feeling much better. Then the fabulous quote above comes to me in my inbox! I see how silly it is to make results mean that I suck. I mean, really, just a year and a half ago I was riding a cruiser on the beach path terrified of people, speed, and traffic. And why do I let one single race be the determinate of Who I Am, for surely I’ve got more than that in me, it’s just a matter of sculpting it. And sometimes it just feels good to wallow in bummerness.

I have since had some great rides with good people, switched coaches, and raced the Manhattan Grand Prix successfully. A few more for me this season, including this weekend’s San Marcos race.

See you at the races!

Like a giddy schoolgirl, I rode with the GREAT Greg Lemond! Me! A mere mortal!

A big THANK YOU to Jeff for letting me know about this, and for inviting me to come. “Do you want to ride with Greg LeMond tomorrow morning?” Um, YEAH!!!

I arrived early to get setup (that race prep comes in handy), when Greg and his wife roll into the parking lot. Greg bounds out of the car like an enthusiastic kid himself. I’m struck by his genuine, playful smile and animated crisp blue eyes. He shakes my hand firmly and says, “Oh, you’re too skinny.” *gasp!* Me? What? But I thought cyclists….

Then he adds with a laugh, “You’re going to beat me up those hills! I’m too heavy now!” Oh, haha, I get it, but also notice the ripped buffness of his legs. I’m surprised, actually, by the musculature. I may look like a climber, but my leg muscles tell me a different story.

As we all gather and get ready to ride – about 8 boys and me – Jeff and I get to chat with his wife a bit. She is very sweet, and concerned in an almost motherly way. “Greg, you need to be back…. Greg, you should get going….”, while Greg is animatedly talking about his Assos jacket, how great the quality is, See look at this fabric. She sighs, turns to us and says, “Greg got a brain scan done a few days ago and the doctor turned to me and said, ‘You must be the temporal lobe of the relationship, because he has almost no activity in his temporal lobe.’ The temporal lobe has to do with order and organization. He has the worst ADD.” As Greg continued to chatter away about shoes, riding, his son, I understood what she meant.

Jeff is such a saint, always trying to help me to feel better about my racing and get me to understand that it’s a process, that it can take years and don’t give up or be sad. He said to Greg, “Tell her how long it took you to get good at racing.”

To which Greg answered, “I won my first 11 races! I thought there was something wrong because it was too easy! So I applied to race with the juniors, because back then juniors was 15-17.” Haha, woops! That story is a little different than mine, but it was really cute and much appreciated that he tried.

We roll out and head north on PCH. One moment we’re waiting for Greg (he’s on a loaner bike from Helen’s and keeps adjusting the saddle), then next moment he’s laughing at us and zooming by. He is lightning fast and nimble as I have never seen before. I’m amazed by how speedy and graceful he is on his bike, how smooth his spin is. We climb Latigo Canyon. The first part of the climb is a bit more steep than the average and I think to myself, If I can just make it up here smoothly I’ll be good. Greg is behind me and I’m trying to be Cool, the I-may-be-the-only-girl-but-I-can-ride Cool. “Geez this part is steeper than I remember! Stick with it Cynthia!” I say to myself. Then Greg the trickster shoots out next to me and says, “What’s going on? What’s wrong? Feeling a little heavy?” his eyes crinkled in a mischievious grin. It takes me a second to register that he’d been holding my saddle!

I get dropped on the climb, but luckily we regrouped at the top. Here I am, on top of Latigo, with the great Greg LeMond! He continues chatting about his shoes, how on one Giro d’Italia he had to slice the toebox open of his shoes and duct tape them together because they were too tight. “They should customize shoes better,” he says. I can see how he was such the innovator of his time, daring to break rules and try new things like aerobars and heartrate monitors.

“Yeah, I’m planning to drop about 20lbs to get to 180,” he mused on another tangent. “I’m taking my son to Europe to ride and boy I’m going to make him hurt.” His eyes softened to a faraway gaze as he imagined the kill.

Descending with Greg was good fun. As I did my best impression of a racer descending like a hawk (concentrate, Cynthia, use good form, balance, relax, good job), Greg futzed with the buckles on his shoes and whipped around corners like nothin’. It was good practice following his lines.

We rode with him back to his hotel (this was the week he was in town for the Landis hearing), and he tried to converse with me. Unfortunately I was too busy trying to find enough oxygen to keep up with him so the conversation was very one-sided, and eventually he just said, “Uh, here, let me get in front and pull you.”

There I was, drafting off the great Greg LeMond, pretending to be The Great Cynthia Lou. Heh, it was a lot of fun.

Before it disappears from SoCalCycling.com, I must post this photo:

That’s me, in the blue, looking like I’m drowning! Thank you SoCalCycling for posting a Women’s race, and a Cat-4 race at that! Let me know who I have to pay over there…

“Victory goes to the player who makes the next-to-last mistake.”
– Savielly Tartakower, chess master

“Only those who dare to fail greatly can achieve greatly” Robert F. Kennedy

“Failures are expected by losers, ignored by winners.”
– Joe Gibbs, Football Coach

Me, trying to look cool, but really, just dorking out. And apparently, trying to get a better workout by leaving my seat bag on my bike. Doh!

Two fast chicks! That’s my partner in crime Ginger to my left. She won the race that day, so proud of her!

Again, dorking out. Usually I’m just so thrilled to be out and racing I turn into that annoying, overly enthusiastic chick. Good thing the image is too small here, but I’m actually smiling in this photo. Smiling! Who smiles when they race??