Too much ego

Top Gun; Best. Film. Ever. One of the classic lines from the film is 'Son, your ego's writing cheques your body can't cash.' It took me years to understand what that actually meant, but now I know. On my bike I have definitely been letting my ego get the better of me when out and about. Too often a steady ride has ended with me going too fast with someone on my back wheel or me chasing someone down when there's really no need. All ego on my part and completely uneccesary when I need to start just putting in long, slow steady miles.

However, my ego took a massive dent last weekend. As TT Secretary for the mighty Kingston Phoenix, I came up with the idea of including the Bec Hill Climb as the last event in our Club Championships. This classic event has been on the calendar for 60 years and while various KPRC members have ridden it (and won it) in the past, it seemed like a good idea to hget a few of us over for the end of season blowout. The climb is short, only about 700 metres long and compared to hills like Whitedown and Winterfold, it's not particularly steep, but it is steep enough. The top riders are climbing it in well under 2 minutes, while mortals like me are looking around 2:30-45. I should caveat the rest of this post with the fact that I spent the preceeding day giving the Van Nic a thorough service and tune up so that it would be all good for the climb.

So I drove over with Wheezy Junior and we went for a gentle 5 mile ride to warm up before I left him at the top and went to the start. It was there I found out that my 'minute man' was in fact a 'minute boy'. A 10 year old who had also taken part in the Catford HC in the morning. My ego was twitching. Please Dear Lord, don't let him beat me. Don't let me be beaten by a 10 year old. So I clipped in and got pushed off and within  a few seconds I could hear something rubbing. That's odd, I thought. I had deliberately opened up the brake calipers for the climb to make sure that that wouldn't happen, so how are my brakes rubbing? Nay bother, just keep pedalling away, it'll be fine. Within another 50 metres my quads were literally about to explode and my heart rate was through the roof, but even though the rubbing had seemed to stop it seemed harder than ever. So a quick look down and I could see that my wheel was rubbing on the rear stay which meant only one thing, dismount. I assumed that I hadn't put the wheel in the dropout correctly so pulled it back and locked up the quick release. I had lost about 20 seconds but thought that was not the end of the world. I got going again and within 30 metres the rubbing came back! By now I was seriously hacked off and pretty confused, but this also meant I had to dismount on one of the steeper sections. I spent a lot longer trying to sort it, but with my heart rate through the roof and with adrenalin filling my bloodstream I just wasn't thinking straight at all. A spectator gave me a hand and pushed me back on my way but it happened AGAIN. It was actually very simple in that my QR skewer was not tight enough. It was ok for riding on the flat but when putting the power down to get going on a steep hill it was pulling my wheel out of line. The coup de gras came when I eventually got going for the third time when I couldn't get my bottom 3 gears. The movement of the wheel coming out of line had unbeknown to me, caused one of my outer gear cables to come unseated, truly stuffing up my shifting. If Id have had the energy I would have cried.

As you can imagine, the 10 year old had passed me, warmed down, had coke and cake and was on his way home by the time I ground my way over the line at approximately 25 rpm. Along with, it has to be said, another 4 other riders. Not bad going for a 2 minute event. And yes, I came last. Dead, stone cold, last. While I'm used to MOP, sometimes BOP in events, I've never actually come last. I almost get a mention in Cycling weekly, with this quote, '...as the riders tackle the steep ascent in times ranging from under two minutes to upwards of six.' I am the 'upwards of six.'  In fact, I think I might have the slowest ever time on this course in its 60 year history. Now if that's not an ego-denting fact, then I don't know what is.