It’s Just a Ride – Life, Death, and Tradition.

Traditions

What do you expect from yourself, your life, your future? How will you make that happen? Unmet expectations can be terribly painful and trying; exceeded ones joyous. Yesterday wrapped up 3 days of stellar riding in great weather with quality people. It’s official, Happy Hills SLO Training Camp (formerly known as Camp Peter Brown) is a local tradition. Expectations exceeded.

I love some of the traditions from cultures far away – celebrating the lives of lost love ones not by dressing in black and feeling bad for ourselves (necessary mourning notwithstanding – funerals and death need not be just about the pain of those still alive)... But by throwing parties in their honor thanking them for all they brought to our lives. The party can incorporate their favorite things – like a camping, dancing and drinking party for old Ed Abby in the desert southwest.

However, for the most part I am not big on traditions, not in my culture anyway. Fueling capitalism by buying gifts that people don’t need (or even want) to show you “care” on the anniversary of a religious figure’s birthday… for example. The more expensive the gift, the more you care? I’d rather show my friends and family they matter all year round through shared experiences, rather than exchanged pittances. I’d rather make them a meal, take them on a bike ride, backpacking, or to the dog park! I’d rather make them laugh. I like fun time with loved ones as much as the next guy. I am accustomed to the dysfunctional family gathering as it seems much more “normal” than a group of primates of shared inherited genetic molecules all getting along merrily. But I usually go for a long solo bike ride that morning. The roads are deliciously empty.

One of the ways to “build community” is to start a tradition and I am so proud to have begun one here in little SLO town. Communities and happiness have little to do with money. The GNP, GDP, consumer confidence and retail success are on the line this month, what ever will happen? Well, if measured by smiles and miles, the SLO Training Camp was a huge success. No dollars needed. With our newly rekindled SLO Criterium getting flack from short sighted and misguided downtown decision makers, next year maybe we can alert the local media and the downtown association to highlight some coverage – run a story, take some pictures as Happy Hills rolls out of town, surely to return. That way, the residents can see how a healthy, active lifestyle can be promoted in our town. The community can rally around cyclists and not let the closure of the a couple blocks of downtown streets for 1 day… be a reason to complain. Heaven forbid people have to park farther than right in front of a store, or maybe even walk, ride, or bus to downtown one day. We should dictate our own civic lives in the ideal gathering place, the city center. 100 riders, all together, looks impressive.

Happy Hills

Sure, there were folks who thought it was too fast, too slow, too hilly, not hilly enough, too short, too long – but that speaks much more to the big diverse peleton of 45-65 riders we had rolling happily (grumpily?) around the county than it does to dissatisfaction. I’d rather be all inclusive than too selective about who attends. I’d rather make fast people slow down in early December than give them a place to show off. Show me something in a race. Show me how you can help a teammate win, sacrifice. I think opportunities to split and rejoin the group by ability level keeps all happy. Fast folks go right and climb that steep biatch, if you’re taking it easy, follow them to the left and we’ll see you in an hour or two. I loved looking over my shoulder from the front and seeing the tail of the group cresting a quarter mile back as we reach top speed. I like giving relatively new riders a chance to ride with some of the best racers in the country in a large group, practicing their skills, gaining strength and endurance – all while seeing what a beautiful gem this Central Coast is. I like to see people making friends. I’d guess everyone, without exception, had some sore legs and happy hearts.

I cherish effort, the pace lifting, the pack growing quiet, concentrating, breathing, wondering how much farther to the top. How about the view from the top, worth it? The energy is literally palpable when a mob of happy, healthy, bundled hairless chimpanzees (been reading too much Jared Diamond lately – so convincing) roll around together hunched over two wheeled efficiencies transporting themselves while ensuring their own (and their planet’s) longevity. They could be riding to work, riding the kids to school, or riding to pick up something from the store. But they might just be riding because they love it. The wind is in their face and they feel alive, aware, awake.

But with NRC race winners and national champions riding along side weekend warriors through steep, challenging terrain – what can be gained? Experience has no substitute. What can be more beautiful than a cancer survivor riding beyond himself, knowing more than anyone else what it felt like to work hard, to face death, to live and to ride again? And while local doctors crack femurs descending sandy steep twisting mountains (Doc and Mrs. Collins were in GREAT spirits - morphine? He’ll be on the trainer soon, back to work in few weeks, and out on the ride by February) – who is to say what matters most in life? To each their own.

And lastly since no one read the description of the camp or route details (previous blog post below), next year’s invite will be short and sweet. It will look something like this…Comments and suggestions about this and future camps, more than welcome. Can’t wait to see ya at the 5^th annual.

Come ride for 3 days, Dec 5-7 – 2008 in Happy Hills San Luis Obispo. Bring warm clothes.

Day 1 – Leaving at 12 noon - 3-5 hour ride. UP the grade to Creston. All stay together. “B” Group – easy route back to SLO via O’Donovan and rollers on 58. “A” Group - via La Panza and 58.

Day 2 BIG DAY – Leaving at 8:30am, - 5-6 hours. Up the Coast to Cayucos. All stay together. Entire group climbs epic Hwy 46. “A” riders regroup at the top and are off to Peachy Canyon, Paso, Templeton, Atascadero and down the Grade. “B” riders regroup at top, and come down Old Creek, back the Coast home.

Day 3 – Leaving at 8:30am. Huasna Townsite out via Orcutt, back via 227. “A” group returns via Printz and La Teena, chasing back to “B” group on 227. Ride ends at Uptown Café.

SLO Happy Hills Winter Training Camp

Just a reminder, the SLO "Happy Hills" Training camp has received a great response as is ready to roll out in about a week! The weather should be perfect. The hills have gotten hillier as riders have lobbied for more options, but ride plans will accommodate all. Don't be afraid. But bring enough food for long days in the saddle. One water stop will be had per day.

All new routes planned, new roads, new climbs, epic tales to be told. See below. Part of the revamped plan will allow some riders to "stretch their legs" while the rest of the group rolls on at a slow winter pace. If you are not from the Central Coast area, you'll be amazed at the riding here! World Class, reminds me of where I grew up riding, Sonoma County, endless options, quite roads, varied terrain and great weather.

Roadies!

Mark your calendars, get your hotel reservations or book a spot on the floor somewhere...The FOURTH ANNUAL SLO Training Camp is BACK! Severe rain cancels, anything less we ride. Wind does not change route plan. :)

Come one come all! The more the merrier, I always say.

Three days of long, slow endurance miles on the beautiful back roads of the sunny Central Coast at winter pace. Most riders are very experienced so even "slow" miles for them will seem fast for others. The group is always big and your bike handling skills must be high. This is not a race. There are chances to cut the ride short if you need to. I'll be taking $5 donations on Friday and Saturday so we can have SAG support all day Saturday, but always be prepared to fix your own flats and find your way back to the group or home.

All rides will begin at Uptown Espresso (HMMM, Coffee - 1065 Higuera St., SLO-town 93401 ) and leave on time, not 10 minutes late. There is a bathroom at the coffee shop, and one across the street at Higuera St. Cafe or down a block at Peets, but try and do your "stuff" before you get there. Pee stops will be had on the ride.

Friday 1pm - Head south for some rolling terrain, SLOWLY Up tough climb of Perfumo, REGROUP at END OF SHORT DIRT ROAD atop See, then down See Canyon, south to Pismo Beach, OPTIONAL WADSWORTH CLIMB lead by Dirk Copeland, CHASING BACK TO THE GROUP DOWN Price Canyon and REGROUPING at the top of Ormonde , Printz to Arroyo Grande, water stop at AG Park, then out toward HUASNA and back to SLO on 227. 4.5 hours - 70 miles.

Saturday 8:30am (come at 8:00 for coffee) - BIG Day, Going North. Hilly terrain, but slow climbs. Alternative starting point at Santa Margarita/Hwy 101/58 Park and Ride lot at 9:40. Up Cuesta Grade - slow neutral climb, after Margarita PnR regroup, out Park Hill Road, SLOW climb there also. BLACK MOUNTAIN will be the toughest climb of the week (month? year?), to the highest paved road in the County. Everyone should plan on doing it. Option one - KOM - all the way to the tower at the top for "leg stretchers," 10 mins wait and descend. Stragglers should turn around if group is descending. Option two, slowly up to the top of the saddle and don't make Left turn. Enjoy the view. Descend with caution back to Pozo Rd, LEFT TURN and regroup for water/food at the POZO fire station. Back Pozo Road to 58, down grade. 6 hours - 85 miles, it will feel like 100.

Sunday 8:30am (come at 8:00 for coffee) - Headed South on 227, just like the 2006 Tour de California departure route; 227 to Corbett Canyon. After that out to Lopez Lake restrooms/water stop, (some riders wanting a flat easy day will turn around here for about a 40 mile ride) otherwise it's HILLS around the lake to French Camp (short dirt section) and onto Lopez Canyon, OPTIONAL LEFT TURN on UPPER LOPEZ for EXTRA CLIMBING, otherwise RIGHT TURN on UPPER LOPEZ, steep climb then descend to High Mt. Road, LEFT Turn to head out High Mt. to the end of pavement. Chasers will catch up on High Mt. road. From there it is flat (finally!) and down hill for 25 miles back to SLO on Orcutt Road. 5 Hours - 70 miles.

ABSOLUTELY NO HWY 1 TRAFFIC on this year's camp. "Up the Coast" may come back by popular demand in 2008.

Any questions, let me know, otherwise get ready. Ride.

Peter Brown

805.440.4968 (slopedro@gmail.com)

PARTY???? Oh yes and Saturday at 5pm-10pm, I will cook my famous Turkey/Veggie Chili, Couscous, Rice, and Bread feast at my condo (2250 king ct. #89, 93401) - Park in the King Ct. Cul-de-Sac and walk on up to my unit, it is the last one on the Left side before the 2nd driveway- don't enter any driveways, you'll be lost forever, the unit is on the street. Complete with music, fire pit, the beer and wine , sodas/water, salads, appetizers and desserts that you bring, and tall tales of the day's heroes and goats.

Flight of the Conchords - Business Time

It's business time baby... nough said

Bad Rusty! That was a $600 carbon wheel!

But great to see the tail still waggin! Goooooodddd DAWG~

Road Trippin w. the Leipheimers

As a car less (and careless actually) 25 year old kid, I would do the group rides out of Dave's Bike Sport in Santa Rosa on Wednesday mornings because to train with Peters, Sayers, Levi, Odessa, Nancy Vallance, Roemer, Divine, Hagenlocher, Julian Dean (love the way he delivers Hushovd), Roberto Gaggioli and the occasional Julich, was about as much fun as was possible on the bike. I also would forage around to look for rides to the races. Sayers and Levi were always, shall we say, a bit uptight on the rides, they basically liked to go hard and would chew you out if you didn't pull through as hard and long as they did. "Sorry Mike," I throw out sarcastically, "we all can't be big pro Mercury studs like you." We'd do the Tuesday night twilight's and tell stories of horror and glory on our long endurance days. Those were the days.


So Nancy and Odessa, neither very shy, get to voting on who has the nicest ass and legs (separate vote) and I begin to overhear. Any guesses, tallies on who was the top vote getter were? Have you seen John Peter's legs? I am getting away from myself here, but if you ever get a chance to overhear cycling chixs talk about guy's bodies... take it, pure entertainment.

Turns out Levi and Odessa are driving down to Visalia that weekend and have room in the Nissan.

Odessa, "Awesome, come with us!" Me, "Super, what time we leaving?" Levi, "What? Why to do we have to take him?"

I get picked up on Friday, Blondie is at the wheel. I toss my bike on the rack and we're off, all the way down I-5. Beautiful country. Uneventful trip, except when we stop for gas and baldy takes over the wheel. The rest of the way we are doing 55, his hands are at 2 and 10, and Blondie is constantly on him about how he can possibly be going so damn slow, on a four lane highway, two lane road, cars stacked up behind us, no matter. 2 and 10. If you can believe it, and I know you can't, I just sat in the back and stayed quiet. A bike racer driving to a race like a grandma, slow and barely able to see over the steering wheel.

We get to the Holiday Inn at Visalia and the Saturn team whisks baldy away for his massage. So that leaves me and his hot girlfriend...

"Well, let's get a room and go for a ride," she says with a huge smile. Words I'd been wanting to hear (still want to hear) all my life.

Me, "Um er, ok, I am down to share a room, I couldn't afford one on my own anyway, not here."

We get our room, one of the last ones and we're in, shackin' up. She calls up skinny, and says, "Hey, Peter and I are in 206."
Baldy exclaims audibly through the phone, "WHAT, you're sharing a room with him????!!"

Blondie, "What's the big deal, it's just Peter... besides, what are we supposed to do, fork out over a hundred each and have rooms next door to each other? Come on, relax, we're going for a ride and we'll be back so we all can eat."

"Just" me, hmmm, flattering. Stories follow from both her and me about riding, racing, training, and sex - she brought that last one up.

Ride was fun, although I don't remember any of it. We get back, shower up (she went first), towel off, and end up in the prone position, each of us on our own concaved, well used queen beds 10 feet apart and here it comes... "Levi trains so hard, and when he gets done, all he wants to do is eat and go to sleep. He never wants to have sex. And when he does want to, it's over so fast i don't even get anything out of it." (sorry buddy - but you have bigger fish (sausage?) to fry, go get 'em in the TT and Pyrenees, just stay with Moreau, the Chicken, or Valverde - quit marking Vino, he's got nothing this year)

Me to self, "Oh my god, please, please, don't ask me to help this situation." I turned out to be a good friend, faithful, consoling... offering, "Hey, look on the bright side, he trains less in the off season. Try him then... or you should throw yourself at him early in the week, before interval Tuesdays. Besides, he's all big on getting to Europe, doing the tour, but so are lots of guys, he'll probably only race a few more years and then you can take him out to pasture, the stud." We talk some more and doze off, in our own beds, dreaming of... yes that is it, the Rocky Hills RR the next day. Nothing else.

Tailwinds and Tail waggin'

I often say "the wind is your friend, it's either making you stronger or getting you there quicker." I hope this weekend it's both.

So looking forward to the long hours with just the Pacific off to my right, the occasional riser, the weighted descent, the rig between the legs and of course, my whole world for four days in a couple of panier bags, half empty. Not a care in the world outside of getting enough tasty calories and a little bit of car dodging.

Merckx, the new menacing, cat-eating, untrained-peeing all over himself-barking-whining-lanky-barfing-running around the hood, into the street and through the park as I write this (what I am supposed to do? he doesn't come when called - and he's faster than me by several orders of magnitude) - is beginning to win my heart. He loves freedom, more than birds, more than food-which he can do without, and who can blame him? He's built to run, has the endurance of an iditarod dog and has never been off leash. So I am saying f-it, freedom first, nose to the ground my friend, go! Sniff away, chase that bird, run, run some more, but be alive. Live your life the way it was meant to be lived, the way your evolutionary biology dictates. He is no longer a basement bound hound, and he loves it.

If he gets hit, I'll hate myself. But it's a calculated risk (and I love calculated risks), and he does come back, eventually. But I figure, give some one, even a dog, too much of what they cherish, and it becomes passé. As the door is always open, running free becomes less novel. Thus, a "trained" dog emerges, one who knows what hand feeds him, and rather than looking longingly out the window - barking at what moves or passes by, he simply trots out with confidence from time to time, returning happier, and with less urine than when he left. He gets to know the neighbors, and he does so much more sincerely and avidly than any of the humans on the block.

Tailwinds

The feeling that the wind is at your back, or better yet has changed direction and whipped up, is something to relish. Things are, despite the long days and short nights, despite the stress, the workloads and the commitments, really seeming to come together. Work is flowing and facilitating, racing and relationships are getting easier, and becoming more of who I want to be seems to actually be happening. Great people are in my life, and others seem to be strolling in. Perhaps above all the "life is good" crop, I am actually living and loving all of my days and dreading few. How we spend our days, after all, is how we spend our lives.

When I want to laugh, I go see Trac-Trac
or MADam's.
And none of us know anyone who doesn't read Olaf's. But "blogs that suck time" is right... This one I barely visit, once a week, and it kills my time. I should be asleep. I am supposed to be prepping a machine not babbling to no one about nothing. So off to do that machine prep since pedro really will be pedaling here before long, for a long while, and no tailwind can blow you down the coast if your biciclette is not rolling due to improper service or care.

Oh the new dog, after I let him roam with "freedom" (he's a terrorist from where Tinker Bob sits across the driveway, all hunched and hissy, ready to strike or more likely, climb a tree. So not funny how the line between terrorist and patriot, murder and freedom fighter is so damn thin) and posted for the world to see that he wasn't coming back, possibly hit by a car, etc... I got out to work on the bike and behold, curled up in his house he lays. Very cool, substantial progress. One day, we all hope, Merckx can be like Eddy. Heck one day, I hope I can be like Eddy. And true achievement would entail becoming the human being she thinks I am.

So tales of tailwinds forthcoming, coffee shop stops, and meeting new people pedaling in my direction. Tails of cetaceans are a possibility in sight, and trails blazed by millions of other Californians just might lead me to exactly where I want to go. A place where few of them have been, a den of kitty propinquity where I can crawl on all fours with scapula rising, pelvis swaying, and crouch down before lunging forward and pouncing upon a light dose of deep thoughts and adventures taken.

Adventures awaiting.

Stop off at Home

On line journals abound. I haven't really kept a journal, at least while at home and not exploring a foriegn land, ever. But thinking in writing is healing, soothing. And I am beginning to like it.

I am stopping off this weekend, at home, briefly to feed and love the feline, put in 18 hours for the man, and to catch some good z's in my memory foam matress. I love it how my love of travel near and far helps keep home fresh, rewarding, comfy and well, like home. The racing is pure adrenaline, trying, grueling and humbling. I am just touching home really between visits to great people whom I love and admire. Showering and laundering between start lines and finish lines, between meals and mistakes, between hugs and heriones, between hours lost and wisdom gained.

And at home as on the road lately, I am meeting great people - not nearly as often as I meet idiots. But one passionate, intelligent, insightful human can make up for hundreds of their drugged out, burnt out, worn out, stretched out bretheren. Along with newbees, I am learning to appreciate and admire people long in my life for reasons that before I was too busy to see.

I once wrote, after 9 months in SE Asia mind you (without a bike), that the back roads of Sonoma County were "home." I have never felt more at home than I did in July of 1997, riding out the Russian River Valley. I got home after almost 3 days of travel across the Pacific and first thing in the morning, I put my bike together and rode out to Forestville. What a name for a town! Deserving too, if ya like redwoods and firs.

And now, for the first time, I have a new home, SLO. The trees aren't as tall or green, and the roads aren't as varied or lost. But this place feels like home. Climbing up on Bishop's peak and watching the sunset over Morro Bay and the moon rise over Reservior Canyon is a nice way to end a day, start a night. I bet you'll be with someone you like.