Gate #60 – Part 3

I climbed the famed “Goat Trail” to a high plateau.  I knew they must be coming soon.

Suddenly a red helicopter dove down in front of me.  Fortunately, I was in a place where I could get off the course.  I pulled over and looked back.  There was violence and speed.  The first trophy truck blew by me.  I knew the train would be coming.

I wait for the dust to clear enough to see and look back to make sure another truck is not behind in the dust.  If there was and he could not see me….well…

I press on.  Another helicopter.  This time I’m in a narrow section with berms on both sides.  I can’t just get off the course.  There are rocks and cactus and bushes along the sides…I spy an opening and slow down.  I turn the bars toward the berm and gas it.  I pop up out of the course rut and between two bushes.  Exactly two seconds later the screaming dragon goes by at about 70 miles an hour.  Two seconds….

This process is repeated for the next three hours.  It’s sketchy.  If this was my first race I’d be freaked out.

I raced to the little town of Ojos Negros where for the last 25 miles the bikes and the four-wheel vehicles would split.  I would not have to deal with race trucks passing me anymore – or their dust.  

I see my chase team for the last time.  The sun is going down.  I’m relieved to be riding “alone” now.  I rise up into these last hills.  I am in pain.  Standing – bad shoulder, traps, and hands hurt.  Sitting – butt hurts.

Up and down.  I unleash the Big and Nasty over and over to conquer each steep climb.

13 miles to go.  I get to the top of yet another steep descent.  Rain ruts form over time on the steep slopes.  I pause at the top to scan which line to take – left, right, or center.  I see tracks on the right.  I go right. A deep rain rut appears just to the left of my wheels.  It’s about 8″ wide and 16″ deep making it down the hill.  The surface my wheels are on starts pitching toward the rut.  “Ut oh, ut oh, UT OH!”  I feel my wheels sliding toward the rut as I descend down the hill.  I know it’s going to happen.

My front wheel drops 16″ into the rut and the whole bike stops.  My boots are straight up overhead, hands on the bars still.  As I am flying I think about how far I had come and how close I am.  “Not now!” 

I hit the ground flat, my backpack cushioning my back.  It knocked the wind out of me.  I assess the damage – and I’m OK!  I stand and gather myself.  The bike’s headlight beam cuts into the dust.  I muscle the bike up and out of the rut.  

13 miles to go.  I get on and ride down this hill to the next steep ascent.

Near the finish, the four-wheeled vehicles join again with the bikes for the last 3 miles.  This is where I started 15 1/2 hours ago.  The dust is ridiculously thick.  I can’t see – some places not for ten feet.  In places, I am literally duck paddling.

Finally, I turn a corner and see the timed finish.  Four guys there waving checkered flags and checking wristbands.  I pull into the lights and shut my engine down.  I have to take a couple of minutes before I ride back into town to the ceremonial finish. 

I had done it.

60.  

Gate #60 – part 2

I bobbed through the boulders and whoops.  Very steep hill climbs were near and my self-talk was that I would eat them for breakfast.  6:45 am and you’re on a dirtbike in Baja California Mexico unleashing 50 horsepower on a silty rutted hill strewn with boulders…what could be better?

I talked in my helmet.  Partially because I needed a voice for support and entertainment, and partially because I had a voice recorder the guys put in my helmet.  I started calling my bikes engine the “Big and Nasty”. 

“Imma unload the big and nasty on this hill!”

I rode in “Eco-Sport” mode.  I wanted to go fast but I knew it was a long race and I had to be there at the end.  I got passed and was in third again.  I didn’t worry about it.  He was almost done with his turn.  I had to go the distance.  If I beat a team, as I did in April in the San Felipe 250, finishing second solo against two teams, it would be a big surprise.  We’ll see.  I’m riding my race.

I had been seeing this Ironman (solo) Rider every 50 miles at the gas pits.  He’d have his helmet off taking a break.  I’d get gas and pass him, only to have him pass me some miles later.  Then the next gas pit I’d see him again.  He was riding faster than me but seemed to be having issues with is endurance.

The course flattened out along the coast.  It was wide open along barbed wire fences that farmers put up to mark their fields (though how anyone grows anything here in this parched land…).  I see the Ironman’s dust in the distance ahead of me.  I decide to hunt him down and show him what a 60 year old Ironman can do.  I get closer.

There was an alternate line on the right.  The course was almost dead flat.  I open it up to about 75 mph to make my move on him.  I was almost side by side with him – that’s when I saw a farmer had plowed a trench about 2 foot deep with a berm of dirt on the other side about 2 1/2 foot tall.  Instinctively I lock both brakes but I know I will not have time to stop.

I would be a passenger when I hit it – I knew I was in trouble.  I slowed to about half the speed when I went in.  I thought I’d be thrown over the bars and rag doll out there.  I brace as hard as my arms and legs could – and hit the other side of the trench with great impact.  Shocks when through my shoulders – including the bad one.  Before I knew it I was on the other side of the berm stopped.  It was the “crash without crashing”.  It hurt as if I did crash.  

The Ironman’s dust line drew out into the distance without him knowing what had just happened 50 feet to his right.  I breathed through it, and restarted my bike.

The day before I was really worried that I had used up reserves of energy I’d need when I preran the 50 miles when my body wanted to rest.  I got three pieces of great advice that I keep repeating in my head.

My wife Marie said “Do your best”.

My son Tanner said “Ride smooth, keep going.”

My friend Jason Waldek, who is a rider himself, said “If this is your last solo motorcycle race, enjoy every minute of it.”

Pretty good advice for living – Do your best, go smooth, keep going, and enjoy the ride.

I emerged from the hills of Urapan on Route 1 – the Pacific side of Baja.  I saw my west side chase truck – Randy and Dean, and my video friend Jesse.  I woof down some calories and I’m off.  My competition just ahead of me.

I wound around the graded road switchbacks from Santo Tomas to the coast.  I round a turn and there it is – the gleaming Pacific Ocean right in front of me.  I race south.  Race fans scattered the course here.  I enter the little coastal town of Eridira.  If this was in the states the lots would cost millions.

I find the wash inland and see my chase again.  More calories.  Go.  At mile 125 there’s a steep hill climb that is really rough and boulder strewn.  Technical.  Big and Nasty goes to work.  Glad that is past me.

The miles are long miles it seems.  Various body parts take turns protesting the loudest.  I acknowledge the signals and keep going.

I hit the pavement for an 8 mile trip up the highway.  The first day of prerunning it was 110 degrees and the afternoon pavement made it seem like 125.  It was the hottest I have ever ridden in.  But this race day was cooler – thankfully.

I get to a place called the “Crossover Road”.  It’s a dirt road that connects the west side and Highway 1 near Colonet with Highway 3 in Valle Trinidad.  The course would follow the road for a while (easy) and then dive into the hills and some of the most technical challenging terrain of the course. 

Body is not happy.  Mind tries to convince body that were good.  Bring it.

More hills, more silty ruts, more rocks.  Branches slap my arms at turns when I have to lean in.  Some are cactus but most thorns have been knocked off by other race traffic – but not all.  I have KT tape under my jersey from my elbow to my wrist for this reason.

I get cross-rutted and go down on a rock on my bad shoulder.  Hurt.  Lucky.  If I had lurched another inch forward when I hit the ground my shoulder would have been in much worse shape against the rock.

Finally and mercifully, I emerge at Highway 3.  I turn north for a few miles and see my chase holding a big yellow sign “614x”.  I pull in and eat more calories.  I have 120 miles to go.  It’s late afternoon.  The sun is lower.

I see the Ironman rider I had been chasing all race.  He was sitting in a chair.  I knew that look.  He tapped out.  He would not finish.

Soon I would enter another chapter of the race.  Helicopters would come down and buzz me.  Bop, bop, bop, bop.  The most acute danger on the course was coming from behind….

 

 

 

Gate #60

On September 14 I raced the third race of six that I had planned this year.  It’s a very big race year for me, but I thought I should do it while I am relatively healthy and able.

This race was the Baja 400 in Mexico.  I entered on a motorcycle in the 60 and over class.  That’s the oldest class they have bracketed out and is typically used by ex-pro racers – guys with a lot of experience and smarts.  If they weren’t smart, their career would have been over a long time ago.

There was a team of four riders, a team of five riders, and me.  I was solo.  I wanted to solo it and become the oldest to ever do so.  If I had four guys on my team I could go 100 miles and give the bike to the next guy.  That’s easy.  But I don’t race to make it easy.  

I preran the whole course.  205 miles on Tuesday.  Brutal.  I was so beat at the end of the day.  Armando was my chase truck driver and I had my film crew of Ted and Jesse with me as we are trying to make “Into the Dust 5”.  We were at a taco stand in Valle Trinidad, a dusty little town 2 1/5 hours from our hotel in Ensenada.  I was very uncomfortable just sitting up in the van’s passenger seat.  If we went back to Ensenada tonight we’d have to come back here in the morning to pick up the pre-running where I left off.

Armanda suggested we stay in this little town that night to save five hours of driving.  I jumped at the idea.  No toiletries, no change of clothes….but I needed to sleep.

My knees aren’t great and I had a nagging shoulder injury that hurts some when I ride.  You might think that if I was this uncomfortable and beat after 205 miles, how could I race the 432 miles on race day (Saturday)?  I always wonder the same thing.   But I have experience and I know that on race day you can out things together that you couldn’t on a regular day.  Don’t think about that.  Just get some rest right now.

In the morning I put all the same dirty clothes and gear on and set out for another 170 miles.  At the end of the day – I was beat and just wanted to lay down.  Baja is very rough.  It’s hard to explain.  The course takes me on terrain you would have great difficulty walking on.  Steep hills climbs and decents.  Silt filled ruts.  Rocks.  Deep sand.  And it goes forever – and ever.

I rested on Thursday.  On Friday we went through tech inspection, got interviewed on the podium, and waded through the throngs of race fans who showed up for a pre race festival to see all the race vehicles.  Then I had to get my gear on again.  The last thing I wanted to do the day before the race was to burn more energy.  I needed to rest.  But I had to prerun the first 30 miles and the last 20 miles of the course.  They only open it for prerunning the day before the race, and the last section was brand new in the hills, which I had heard would be a challenge.  I’d hit it in the dark on race day so I needed to see what I was getting into.

At 6 pm there was a mandatory rider meeting.  After that I went to my hotel room and tried to sleep.  It’s not easy to sleep when you have to get up at 2:45 am to get geared up and go to staging.  I didn’t sleep much.

At 2:45 the alarm went off and I dutifully got up (I was awake) and began doing what my morning preparation checklist said to do.  KT tape in 8 places, sunblock on the back of my neck, socks, padded bicyclists tights with a padded butt, bicyclists shorts with padded butt, knee braces…..

I ate the sandwich and banana I had in my room for breakfast while I got ready.  I walked out to the parking lot where my team had my bike ready. I got on and started the beast, and rolled through the city streets of Ensenada to the starting line.  The starter official put us in order.  At 4:15 they started letting bikes go. Every 60 seconds for the Pro Unlimited Class, then every 30 seconds after that. 

But this was just a ceremonial start. We were in the middle of a big city. Granted there was no traffic at this time, but you can’t go screaming through a city at race speed without grave danger.  So we gathered up and got a police escort 17 miles up into the hills where they had a timed start location. 

On my way through town my GPS wasn’t tracking.  Oh no.  I shut it down and rebooted it while I was riding.  Problem solved.  

We ascended up and away from the Pacific Ocean and city heat island and the temperature went down.  I had only a thin race jersey on and I was freezing.  As we got closer to the timed start we rode into a fog bank.  This is worst-case scenario for vision.  My goggles fogged up.  Luckily I was prepared with a white terry washcloth hanging from a wire tie on my backpack strap.  I could reach down with my left hand and grab it and wipe my goggles off.

It was 5:10 am now.  Thirty seconds before I was to get the real green flag I watched the rider in front of me take off into the darkness and fog and disappear.  My turn.  I hit the gas and let the clutch out.  432 miles to go.

There was no wind.  Dust from the guys in front of me hung in the air and stuck to my wet goggles.  I had to wipe my goggles with my trusty rag every 20 seconds.  How long before it became filthy and saturated?

I had to go slow because I could not see.  The beginning had a lot of off-camber turns where the course pitches left but turns right.  It’s these conditions that break bones and end your race if you over ride them.

Slow going.  Dust.  Fog. Dark.  50 minutes later I notice the sky is getting lighter – there is a horizon.  Slowly, mile by mile, it gets lighter.  I can start seeing in color – the colors of the desert.  Up into the hills and I breakout of the fog.  I’m riding a ridge looking down at the top of the clouds – like riding in heaven.

Back down into the fog.  At mile 40 I meet my east side chase team for the first time.  Another rider comes in screaming in pain.  He crashed in the fog and broke his shoulder and foot.

I swap my goggle rag and get going.  I pass one bike in my class – I’m in second place after starting third.  The fog is burning off from sunlight.  My cold hands are aching on the grips.  The temperature is coming up and it feels good. 

370 miles to go…

 

Keep your goals in front of you

At the beginning of this year I wrote all my goals for the year down on one index card.  I have personal goals, business goals, family goals – all of them.

I have that index card on a little stand at my desk where I see it everyday. 

When I accomplish a goal, I color it with a yellow highlighter.

Do you have goals written down?  If so you are a small group – only 3% of Americans do.  Once written however, keep the goals in front of you every day.  Re-read them.  If you do you will find yourself acting on them.

Live on purpose.

Get it!

There's nothing wrong with being wrong

“If anyone can prove and show me that I think and act in error, I will gladly change it – for I seek truth, by which no one has ever been harmed.  The one who is harmed is the one who abides in deceit and ignorance.” – Marcus Aurelius

If you are getting better then you SHOULD be changing your mind about things. 

Do you want the same ideas, beliefs, and philosophies that you had when you were 25 years old when you are 50?

Search for truth, not validation that you are right.

It’s ok to see and admit you were wrong and change your mind.