Another month, another gray, chilly morning. February differs from January just how, exactly? Oh, yeah — it’s shorter.
No Yanks atop the podium at the frozen crit the Dutch called ‘cross worlds, though homegirl Katie Compton got the bronze in the women’s race. The men’s race looked like a Belgian team time trial. Memo to UCI: If there’s no mud on your skinsuit and shoes at the finish line, it is not cyclo-cross.
Thirty-six and windy here in Bibleburg, yet my man Dr. Schenkenstein is already out and about, logging miles. At some point he’s bound to turn up on my stoop, wearing everything he owns and calling me a pussy because I like to ease gradually into my Sundays, like a fat man getting into a hot bath. God doesn’t even get up until noon, so I try not to incur His wrath by starting a ride any earlier than 10 a.m. With everything that’s going on in the world I figure He needs all the sleep He can get.
I understand there’s some lesser sporting event taking place today in Tampa. Alas, lacking cable or satellite we will be denied the dubious pleasure of play, commercial, play, commercial, play, commercial. Talk about your ad infinitum. We get ABC, CBS, PBS and suddenly a couple other off-brand digital channels after scoring a flat-panel TV for a joint solstice present. No NBC. And anyway, it’s wrong to watch TV in daylight hours, unless cyclo-cross — real cyclo-cross, with mud, weather and lots of running — is on.
Mad Blog Media 
Gray, chilly morning? Perhaps what you were seeing this morning was the leftover haze from last night’s indescretions… at my house, a precious mile or two south of yours, it was a sunny and decently warm (it IS wintertime) morning. While not actually riding with O’Schenkster, I was with him in spirit as a group of friends and I did our singlespeed pilgrimage 18 miles up Rampart Range Road, only to lose all that elevation in a dizzying and delightfully challenging (read: so technical it still scares the shit out of me, even though I’m quite familiar with the trail) descent through a few little-known trails, Waldo Canyon, Williams Canyon, and finally out through Manitou.
Yes, I’m gloating. I can’t help it. Today was a gorgeous day. The forest surrounding us will be on fire come our snow-less springtime, but given a 24-hour-only outlook on life, today was a wonderful February day.
Tonatiuh must smile upon you. When I got up at 7:30, anticipating an 8-ish wake-up call from Dr. Schenkenstein, the sun god was wearing a gray hoodie and so I set about consuming news and calories.
Come noon I broke out a ‘cross bike and piddled around for an hour and a half, chewing on a stiff north breeze for a spell and then enjoying a fine tailwind back to Chez Dog.
A woman from Ascent Cycling rode me down on the bike path north of Fillmore and we agreed that tailwinds were preferable to those in one’s teeth. Then she kicked in the afterburners and receded at speed into the distance.
I could say in my defense that I was on a ‘cross bike and she was on a nifty road machine, but I could’ve been on a Vincent Black Shadow and it wouldn’t have made any difference, other than making me look a good deal cooler.
Yer showing your age, Patrick. And mine. That Black Shadow was one of my stepdad’s lust-after motorcycles. I think he could only afford Harleys and Indians, though.
The description, below, of the Black Shadow at speed reminds me of my college buddy’s Kawasaki 500 triple. I did nearly check out on that thing one day. Decided to stay with my more Clark Kent version of a motorcycle: my Honda 450. The Ducati was way past my price range.
From Wikipedia
In his essay taken from Cycleworld Magazine called “Song of the Sausage Creature” Hunter S. Thompson does speak with some affection for the motorbike whilst comparing it to the Ducati 900, describing a bike that was definitely not for the faint hearted or shallow poseur:
The Ducati 900 is so finely engineered and balanced and torqued that you can do 90 mph in fifth through a 35-mph zone and get away with it. The bike is not just fast — it is extremely quick and responsive, and it will do amazing things…. It is a little like riding the original Vincent Black Shadow, which would outrun an F-86 jet fighter on the takeoff runway, but at the end, the F-86 would go airborne and the Vincent would not, and there was no point in trying to turn it. WHAMO! The Sausage Creature strikes again.
There is a fundamental difference, however, between the old Vincents and the new breed of superbikes. If you rode the Black Shadow at top speed for any length of time, you would almost certainly die. That is why there are not many life members of the Vincent Black Shadow Society. The Vincent was like a bullet that went straight; the Ducati is like the magic bullet that went sideways and hit JFK and the Governor of Texas at the same time.