Dartmouth Cycling Wiki | Profiles / Second Stab At Mediocrity

A lot of you commented about spelling erros in the first entry. For one, I don't read over the post before sending it out, as that process would remove its stream-of-consciousness vibe. For two, fuck you, everyone makes errors, I'm early Phi beta kappa, i'm allowed to make spelling errors (I made a self-call, are you happy now Jen?) . For three, I don't believe in the prescriptivist school of grammar (which says that there are correct and incorrect ways to do grammar/spelling). I believe if a mistake is perpetuated by enough people, it should become the law.

First of all, before I go any further, please go to timdoud.net and check out his new post. It's a comedy of errors, and for some reason reminded me of explosive diarrhea.

Ok, are you back? I'm really trying to understand the psyche of this guy. I think what it comes down to is fear. He's afraid that he's not making the right decisions about his life, and thus needs to tell himself a lot of BS to reassure himself.

Which comes to the next topic-- self-serving bias. this is the common tendency to take credit and responsibility for successes, but blame others or external factors for failures. To a large extent, everyone is guitly of this, as it is hard to think objectively about oneself, and it is also a good coping mechanism for ups and downs of life. I think it's pretty obvious how self-serving bias applies to cycling. When we "fail" in cycling (whatever that means) you get feedback about an approach not working, but often we don't listen to it because we blame things outside our control for failure (I wasn't feeling well, I missed the break, I was having an off day,...) At the same time, when we "succeed" we often end up chasing the memories of what that success entailed. But who knows if we are even chasing the right memories? Do we not overemphasize the things that make us look good to others (smart racing, a specific training/nutrition regimen, etc...), while discounting the things that were out of our control (i.e. luck)? Like apple cider, something to mull over....

It was another nice day in the Bay Area (60 degrees, slightly cloudy), so I did another big ride before the rain moves in this weekend. I started off riding with my dad and his buddies to the coffee shop. For some reason, they take (and have been taking for the last 10+ years) the absolutely steepest route possible over the hill to get the coffee place. I don't understand. Anyways, after getting some coffee, I headed off for my ride. I decided to go to Mt Diablo, and focus on doing a very even pace up the whole thing.

For those who don't know, Mt. Diablo= the cycling equivalent of liquid sex. From the south gate, it climbs 3300 feet over 9 twisty miles. From the north gate, it climbs 3600 feet over 12 twisty miles. It is God's gift to cycling.

The whole ride ended up being 85 miles, with ~8000 feet of climbing. Anyways, back to the climb. I was pretty happy to climb the south gate (athenian school to the observatory) in exactly 1 hour, averaging 270W. It was the easiest it ever felt climbing it, and one of the fastest too. I guess the tailwind helped. Also, even pacing really is the way to go, ladies and gentlemen. I couldn't help but notice how beautiful the sky was that day. It was crazy, all striated with clouds, and at the horizon the clouds were red. Amazing. This pictures actually aren't of Mt. Diablo (my pictures of that were too big for the website), but it gives you an idea of what the scenery/roads are like.

Oh yeah, when I got to 4 miles to the summit, the road had been newly repaved. This was really exciting, but unfortunately I pied myself badly out of the excitment. woops. I hope nobody skids out on the puddle.

so now, I'm back home, lying in bed (in cyclist terms, I'm "recovering"). I'm going to take my performancing enhancing drugs (EPO, IGF-1, extract from the urine of a diuretic pony, etc...) (in cyclist terms, I'm being "pro"), then some opiates (in cyclist terms, I'm being "belgian") , and fall asleep. Sweet.

rock out, matt

One more thing-- a preview of the next installment-- I will take about the neurobiology of drug use. You'll understand, if you read the next installment. To all the people who emailed me asking to be off this list-- I told you, I don't care. I'm a big deal, you have to read what I write, and enjoy reading what I write.