You know about the Archetypes of the BTG. Today, I ran across perhaps the strangest BTG ever.
So, I'm on the trail today trying to get in a ride home, just an easy zone 1 / zone 2 ride. I've finally gotten fresh enough that my legs feel good. My "freshness" curve on cycling peaks is a mere -10 or so. That means I'm nearly rested after four days of doing very little!
I came up over the big bridge coming into Bethesda, just spinning up it and coasting down. I clicked it up a gear or two to keep an easy spin and passed a couple people, including a troll-like, unshaven chap in a maillot jaune who was wobbling along on a Brompton, little folding bike. And wobbling he was - holding the handlebars and swinging them left to right as if he were trying to scythe down a wheat field. Naturally, his wheels were swinging right to left and he was weaving in an enormous sine wave, back and forth. I treated him like an errant roller blader, and just moved left and spun on by.
Lo and behold, this triggered a standing sprint! Dammit! I must have missed the townline sign! Surely, I had trifled with the Captain of the Peloton and would be made to pay! The terrible, the little, the round unshaven (not bearded, unshaven, with a 3-4 day growth) man dusted me! He timed his magnificent sprint perfectly, coming around near one of the park benches, getting well past me, then drifting a hundred or so yards up to the stopsign to take the Sprint Points.
My Archnemesis: The Ride of the Man Who Crushed My Very Soul, Ripped my Legs Off, Dropped me, Outsprinted Me, Took My Mother Out for a Fish Dinner and Never Called, and Basically Tore My Head Off and Crapped Down My Throat on the CCT:
So he slowed down a bit for the stopsign, and treacherous, fat blown-legged loser guy in a race jersey that I am, (a disgusting poser - as Brampton's friends at the D&D Gathering tonight who have heard the story 30 times by now could tell you) I spun by him, again at a constant 220 watts, 16 or 17 MPH, scraping with everything I had, digging deep to, um, keep it more or less in recovery/zone 2.
I kept tooling up the next segment of the Crescent, up to the parkway, absolutely buried halfway through zone 2, clearly in a spot of bother, Paul. I was broken, punished, blown out, deprived of all my reserves. About halfway up, some triathlete down in his aero bars came shooting by, well, relatively shooting by, maybe doing about 20.
And who passes me just after that, but the Velo God himself on the scything Brampton!
There was nothing I could do. Having been attacked, and attacked again by the round hirsute man on the tiny bike, I cracked. I backed it off from 220 watts and 16 or 17 MPH (pegged needle, total red zone area for me) down to about 220 watts, and 16 or 17 MPH. But was that enough?
NO! Emphatically NO! Brampton knew he had me, and went for the stage, and the whole General Classification. He could break my spirit here, ensure I wouldn't pose a threat for the rest of the pursuit, and hammered the 50 yards up to the parkway and straight across, in a standing sprint of brutal pace and acceleration (not to mention a dizzying right-to-left oscillation). There was nothing I could do to keep up, not in the forward direction, not in the right-to-left direction.
So I just kept spinning, tried to stay within myself, and limit the damage.
Suddenly, Brampton pulled up and slowed just across the parkway. He pulled off to the side, gagging and shaking, and waved me past, with a derisory gesture of the left hand that told the whole story - he could crush me any time, anywhere, on any bike of my choosing, and there was nothing I could do about it.
As I passed about 1.5 seconds later, Brampton opted to take The Place of Honor next to the trail. I think he may have been throwing up. I am positive his vomitus was not the result of working hard, but was instead a warning, a sign of Brampton's dominance and dominion over the Capital Crescent Trail, a marker telling all of us lesser riders, especially fat posers in race jerseys they probably didn't earn, that Brampton PWNS!! the Trail, and the rest of us just can't keep up. He didn't toss his cookies... no. He was simply marking the trail the way the King of the Lions craps all over the veldt to let everybody know that he won't be trifled with, except he was doing it with half-chewed pastrami-on-dark-rye and mostly melted Cheezy Poofs.
As he had apparently proved his point and put me in my place, Brampton let me go to continue limping home at ~220 watts and 18 MPH, a crushed, pathetic shell of a poser wannabe racer.
He is BRAMPTON! ALL NOW BEFORE HIM BOW!
(Lest ye be doused in vomit).
8 comments:
Glad to read that these types are not getting under your skin quite so much any more. Also I appreciate the puking.
Well, that it doesn't bug me isn't exactly true. He very nearly caused a two bike/three pedestrian crash when he sprinted by me the second time. The company sells those bikes as being suitable for fast riding, and perhaps in the right hands they are, but the way Ale Jet Jr. was riding, it was *extremely* unstable. When I passed him, when he was on the side of the trail hacking and giving me the wave-on, I dropped a few compound F-Bombs on him. What he did was really dangerous and stupid, not to mention pathetic. I was expecting him to zip up his jersey and hold his arms up in a victory gesture when he crossed the parkway, though even he probably knew that doing so on the unstable little bike would result in a crash. Racing somebody who isn't racing with you and then acting like it was a big triumph barely even rises to the level of lame. Had I been watching this from further down the trail, rather than riding in Brampton's vapor trail, it would have been really, really funny to watch.
That tale sorta kinda reminds me about the team time trial I rode on Sunday. It was the state championship and our club treated it with the esteem and respect it deserved... names were finalised for most teams less than 48 hours before the start time. For my team in particular the final line-up was confirmed at 4pm Saturday for a 12:45pm Sunday race start. So we had a bunch of saddle time together to discover the synergy of the group.
The race distance on my computer was 36.77km and the total odometer movement for the day including race kit colletion, warm up, warm down and rolling over to the refreshments tent after came in at 39.8km. No typos there, just under 2 miles of prep time.
It didn't matter though. I was the only guy in the team with shaved legs and 10 sprockets at the back. But man did they try to give me all sorts of advice in the club tent before the start. All about how to roll through and peel straight off the front (just like I did in 1986 when I won a state silver medal in the under 19 team time trial). How to echelon in the crosswind (just like I did last week in finishing around 20th from 70 starters in the criterium championship).
What they failed to mention was that 1 of them would be dropped within a kilometre of the start and for most of the final 10km I would be doing 45 second turns while the other 2 rolled over for 5 seconds each.
I've discovered another good reason to shave my legs. When you (they) barf it's probably easier to wash the chunky bits off smooth legs.
Big Mike
This reminded me that I was a sign on the Mt. Vernon trail on Sunday. It was one of those giant traffic signs they usually put by the road near a construction zone. It had two messages that alternated:
"What is your"
and
"speed on the trail."
I am wondering if it appeared there in response to your friend who wrote in to the Post?
"At least 40 Miles per hour," according to my little buddy.
At the risk of sounding like an extremely grumpy man, I am rapidly losing my patience with fools, idiots, and irrational hysterics.
I refer to those BTG's as pathletes.
I rarely read anyone's long post. I read yours with high interest and many giggles that hurt my side. Nice writing. Thanks for the cheap entertainment.
Ha Ha,
Too funny Jim. I was going to write something about yesterdays ride but it is not worthy to the comparisons of defecation and territorial markings of lions. I was riding W&OD trail (rarely ride trails because of people) and some dude decided to draft me up to Dunn Lorring Metro stop area. I can care less if you draft me but this dude attacked/sprinted past me up to the top of a hill. He did this while I was passing someone one the left and had others coming the opposite direction, very dangerous. I know he had it planned for the past 4 miles. Then after the hill I just kept doing what I was doing. He saw that I was unfazed by his actions and I was still riding strong after his heroic sprint. He slowly pulled down a side street, probably marking his territory also.
When I was riding back I saw the same guy doing it again with another bunch of people. He was surely doing his job of marking the trail. Or if he was doing intervals what a stupid place to be doing them. Thats why I ride trails mostly in winter. Only few dare to venture out when it is below 60 degrees.
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