With two weeks to go until the end, it had gotten hard to get out the door. Time felt short, responsibilities loomed like thunder clouds and enthusiasm had been replaced by a bit of resentment and a lot of second guessing: WTF was I doing? Was it worth it? Why?

When you’re 57, it’s not unreasonable to be asked why you want to spend a large portion of your free time on a bike (mostly alone). As I think I’ve mentioned before, I don’t have a good answer for this beyond, “most days it makes me feel good.” But, when it’s hard to get out the door, then the “whys?” just become so many little flies swarming around your mental well being. At least, that’s the way it is for me.

Nonetheless, on Saturday, I was in Lincoln, in the dark and a driving rainstorm, getting ready to roll out for the Garmin Gravel World Championships. That’s kind of a large misnomer, it’s not really a “World Championship.” In my case, it was a 78-mile spin on the arrow-straight gravel roads that slice through this part of Middle America’s agricultural sweet spot. I chose the race because it was supposed to be fast. The soaking rain changed that.

In the first two miles, the gravel was more like peanut butter: thick, sticky and an effort just to make the rear wheel spin. Not ten minutes into what would prove to be a five plus hour adventure, I was seriously thinking of just turning around going home. “Why do this? For what?”

I kept riding. Kept thinking of my mantra: present, patient and committed.

A few years ago, in this space, I confessed that my “crazy competitor” had seemingly been retired. I’d lost the ability/need/desire to put myself well beyond the redline. More than once in races, I’d throttled back in the last mile because it just wasn’t important to me to beat the person ahead.

There’s a lot of concessions I’ve made in getting older, this is one that I’d mostly accepted. But part of my mind still longed to go there. It kicked up on some rides, some climbs, some late nights when I lay in bed thinking about the miles that would come in the morning. Like a friend that you love getting in trouble with, I thought about “crazy man” with a mix of horror and affection.

At about 38 miles, I had been struggling to hold the wheel of the group I’d ridden most of the morning with. When it was my turn to pull, I was on point and pretty strong. But the second I dropped to the rear, I flailed. It was apparent to me, so I thought, that I wasn’t going to make it to the end with this group. There was no embrace or bitterness of the reality, it was just the truth of my present. Then the road turned to mud, literally.

For three quarters of a mile, up a decent hill, every rider had to dismount, carry their bikes and hike through ankle deep goop. All around me, I could feel competitive spirits wheezing out of lycra clad bodies with all the force of a wide open CO2 cartridge. I thought of what I told my son in the middle of Covid lockdowns, “in every shitty situation, there’s a chance to turn it to your advantage.” With my shoes thick with brown sticky goo, I marched up that hill with purpose, I was in it til the end and this was the day I’d get my crazy back. The group that I was sure would leave me behind, were now in my rearview mirror.

20 miles from home, I hit the gas. Sure, for an ancient being like myself, everything is relative but I definitely started passing people, dropping people and enthusiastically hopping on the wheels of others that, given their years, should have been much stronger than me. It felt great. I was in love with what I was doing.

Always given to bountiful fantasy, I haven’t watched a professional bike race without imagining myself in the situation. How would I respond to attacks? When would I choose to go? Could I ride anyone off my wheel?

At about 6 miles to go, I finally reeled in a group I’d been chasing for about 15 minutes (you can see forever in Nebraska). When I settled in last in line, I was surprised at how they seemed to be sleepwalking to the finish and was quickly made uncomfortable by it. I didn’t want to finish on a soft pedal. And so, when the road tilted up at a fairly gentle angle for a long way ahead, I opened up the throttle passed the group and had that animal feeling of the whole lot of them jumping on to the back of my effort. For a good half mile, I just kept my head down and thought of driving through the pedals as efficiently as I could. Wanting to see the damage I had caused, I turned to find the whole group hard on me. I’d dropped no one, but I had added significant bodies to the following crowd.

The spectre of humiliation played in my frontal lobe. The possibility of getting crushed in the next few minutes, thrown on the scrap heap of those that tried and died was quite palpable. Those fuckers back there looked strong AND young. Clearly, I’d gone to soon.

Crazy Man had a different take on things. Just when all seemed lost, he doubled down. I found another gear. I didn’t give up, I went harder. Really hard and instead of blowing up, strength just seemed to be boiling through me. My trusty body rose to the challenge gave me the best moment of my cycling life. The next time I turned around, everyone was gone. I was alone. And for a beautiful few seconds, I had an idea of what Wout Van Aert gets to experience on a regular basis. This old man was stronger than that sprightly group, by a long shot.

I crossed the line in 46^th place out of 500 something. In the 50-59 age group, I came in 9^th. There’s plenty of room to improve there but I felt good with the result.

Why do I do it? Because I love it. And while there are plenty of attempts to describe love, sometimes it’s better for this guy to just experience and not worry so much about explaining it.