A few weeks ago, my old friend Peter called from San Francisco to tell me he was coming to Colorado for what sounded like a very complicated expedition.
The idea was to take the train from his front door in California to Glenwood Springs. From there, he would depart on a 10-day mountain-bike tour with panniers carrying everything he would need to cover the long distances between towns on a mostly off-road route. He would do a loop from Glenwood to Aspen, through Leadville, Copper Mountain and Steamboat Springs and then back to Glenwood. He estimated the total distance was somewhere around 600 miles.
A former pro downhill mountain-bike racer, Pete grew up in Marin County, Calif., at the foot of Mount Tamalpais. Even though the exact birthplace of mountain biking always will be up for debate, Pete will tell you there were plenty of folks riding on fat tires around Marin when Pete was still just a kid in the 1970s. A small, tightknit community revolved around those early days of mountain biking on Mount Tam, complete with rituals that included everything from weekly Thursday night rides to an especially long, grueling group ride that is still a tradition every Thanksgiving.
Part of being close with Pete is spending a lot of time on a mountain bike. Even though he is a superior rider, he always has had such a profound love and passion for the sport that he enjoys going out with friends no matter their skill.
When I was painfully slow, he would say it was good for me to spin in my small ring to prevent muscle cramps and to pace myself for when the ride did get hard (which it always did). When I told him I was having a hard time cornering on steep switchbacks, he sat down and drew me a diagram to explain how I should counterbalance the turn by putting weight on my opposite leg. (I just recently began to really grasp this concept, 10 years later.)
And he did his best to stifle a laugh when I would come down some steep, technical section of a trail sideways because I would be riding my brakes so hard that my bike tire was practically in the front. He would just sort of stand there and grimace and say, “Wow, you really do have amazing balance.”
One summer, Pete decided to try his hand as a pro. Without a sponsor, he was a “privateer,” which, for anyone who knows anything about racing downhill, is a huge handicap before you’re even out of the gate. Without a crew of mechanics standing by with spare parts, he was constantly dealing with broken this and blown-out that, which made it hard for him to stand a chance against the sponsored riders who were given every advantage imaginable.
He did OK, finessing the courses well enough to accomplish some pretty impressive results under the circumstances, but he never made it big-time. It was always tough to be around him during those summer seasons because his focus was so acute that his personal relationships suffered – as is often the case with extremely talented people.
The competition thing didn’t break Pete’s spirit for mountain biking. In some ways, it enhanced it, making him appreciate the simple pleasure of those Thursday night rides.
When Pete called me a few weeks ago and told me about his cockamamie plans to ride his bike hundreds of miles and camp along the way with all his gear, I said, “Wouldn’t it be easier if you just flew into Denver and rented a car?”
I should have known better.
I should have known it meant a lot to Pete to travel this great distance using only a bike and public transportation because, in addition to being a hard-core cyclist, it was his way of making a statement during what is probably the most serious energy crisis in our lifetime. The train worked out great – coach seats were only $100, the trip took 26 hours and he met a lot of interesting people along the way.
There was also the setting of a goal, which is nothing more than taking an idea, making it a reality, and giving in to the ways in which the outcome is different from what you might have imagined. Then there’s the journey – and of course the completion of the journey.
Pete said when he came down Rabbit Ears Pass after a particularly challenging, 100-mile-plus day in adverse weather, he was so happy to finally be descending that he screamed and yelled and cried. When he rolled up to our house with his scruffy, weathered face in rain gear, pants cinched around his ankles with yellow straps, the smile on his face said it all.
Instead of asking him about the trip, I said what I knew he really needed to hear: “Can I get you a beer?”
Freelance columnist Alison Berkley can be reached at alison@berkleymedia.com.
