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THE RACING CHRONICLES: Hipps, Vikings and Scripts; or More Bucolic Buncombe from the Bottom of the Bitterness Barrel.
Forget Regret
1. The Racing Chronicles rarely touch on racing being what races almost always result in someone finishing first and the rest not; and more to the point the Self has rarely been anyone but part of the not. Having never found much succor in the trying hard equals victory pabulum that goes down like day old cream of wheat, the Chronicles prefer to skip blithely away and concentrate on the foolishness. It is far better, it seems, to find self aggrandizement in the belittling of others than to come straight up against inadequacy. But, the Chronicles are at least minimally dedicated to the glory of Labor-with least being determined as a function of when the swag finally arrives. And so it goes that a couple paragraphs will be about races. Of course having not been there the facts are almost certainly just made up as the Self might have to write about racing but most assuredly is not going to waste any time fact finding. We make our own reality.
The Hippstar won the Early Bird Criterium held somewhere around San Francisco. He won in disgraceful fashion by sitting on two Health Net American Pretendo Professionals until the end of the race when he sprinted. Labor's Ryan Laird was second. The bike Hipp is riding is a Leopard and can be purchased at Leopardcycles.com. The Self does not endorse products-mostly because no one will pay for it. While from time to time free stuff comes into the office it is always, as you no doubt already deduced, with the proviso that the Self not offer an endorsement; you don't find Tyler being asked to claim that Geritol cured his tired blood. But, Hipp and Vampire have won a bunch of races on Leopards. Almost all carbon fiber bikes are made in three factories. The owners of Leopard Cycles come from the land of technology and they craftily determined that if they sold the same bikes as others direct from their business in Northern California they could sell at a lot lower price. This is much like cheating to bike industry magnets used to offering bikes that are not in stock but that would cost a lot more if they had them to sell. Anyway, you can call Leopard and talk to Mark and satisfy yourself. For three years Easton has kindly provided Labor with parts, wheels and tube sets . They work and don't break. They are on Hipp's bicycle. You should buy Easton products. This will end the shameless promotion segment. 2. Labor's very own Viking, Karl Bodine, won both 2006 Editions of the CBR Race Series at Dominquez Hills. He won the" Ride it Like You Stole It" race in rather pedestrian manner by sprinting. On Sunday he was much braver. It went something more of less like this: There was a break of some and Viking was in it. Wike bridged along with some others and then there were eight or nine or ten but they included Stricky, Turbo, L'Ron, Wike, and Pat Carroll. The rest were there by luck. Eventually Turbo attacks and after he gets somewhere Wike, the hero of this piece, darn near pulls a hernia and gets close enough that Viking can counter. Eventually Viking catches Turbo and beats him straight up, with no remorse. Wike wins the sprint. It is reported that MKA smiled even if only for a brief second. In the forty plus, John Walsh (he with the titanium joints) rode away from an All Star field and won. The Tinman was thankful it didn't rain. It is reported that MKA was happy, "if only for a while." Regrettably, the Snot Hill Road Race in Frostbite, Ohio was cancelled due to snow. The Self was so looking forward to racing; and here the schedule won't permit a weekend off until say June. Darn. II. Sometimes
I've Believed as Many Alice in Wonderland
The Tango Maureen 1 In 1936 Stanley Baldwin's Conservative Party was being found out for being less than forthcoming regarding the status of the British and German air forces. Before going to face the pasty opposition he remarked that in his experience the English people responded quite well to the "heartfelt apology." He went to the floor; apologized for the situation; assured the members that Britain would never have an air force inferior to the Germans; and, of course, went right back to doing the same things. The Self gets quite a chuckle whenever an athlete, who had steadfastly denied drug use both before and after getting caught with his arm in the Dracula Preserves, offers up the traditional scripted apology: "I let myself down. But, more importantly I let down my fans and the sport. I just hope people learn from my mistake and most importantly the children." The self's jocosity derives not from the apology. No, that is just standard public relations contrition; besides which the come clean is replete with the plaintive weasel-"I was having personal problems and I hope you can understand." No indeed there is scant humor in such travails; but, nor is there tragedy and while the Self has plenty of his own shame there is scant evidence that casting more of it on some other wretch gets anything but very short term relief. The smiles come from reading the follow up letters from the ponderously pompous pontificating puerile Puritans who just can't let an apology go by without adding their winsome eulogies to souls lost to temptation. No act of contrition is complete until they write to VeloFluff and offer their considered judgments complete with homily: "It is sad that this young man has learned the hard way that taking shortcuts is no way to happiness." "If there is anything good to come of this tragedy it is that other young athletes won't make similar mistakes." "As a father, coach, life long competitor and successful business man I have always stressed the importance of doing things the right way." Now, Chronicle readers are the most astute and it hardly needs mentioning that these letter writers are merely seeking relief from their own discomforting inadequacies by projecting their most distasteful judgments of themselves onto some young athlete who has presented himself as a mental punching bag. The take here is that an apology is to be accepted with a simple "thank you." The opportunity offered by a young athlete's understandably awkward act does not require a torrent of old scripts equating errors in chemical judgment with the decline of western civilization. It just isn't so. And oh my do we here at headquarters feel sorry for the poor kid who in parroting decades of folderol wrote to the effect that "I just hope the example of Adam's fall from grace will prevent some other young man from making a similar tragic mistake like smoking marijuana." It is pretty clear why the college entrance examinations no longer have questions designed to test for the ability to recognize analogies. If someone's education has somehow caused him to equate blood boosting with eating four bags of Doritos then Reefer Madness is to drug education as George Bush is to a real war veteran. Which is all to say that it is one thing for an adult to be consumed with the need to live in Wonderland; it is an entirely more serious matter to resign a kid to living at Fox News. 2. This
Train Carrier Saints and Sinners Bruce Springsteen Over the past eight years we have written little if anything about professional racing. Sure, we have on occasion touched on the follies of American based cocoa buttered boys who play video games six hours a day, live four to a room, ride around without helmets and race around parking lots on weekends; but, the Self lives somewhat as that-other than having three bedrooms to himself, not being able to work a joystick, and on recent record having not been able to finish a race to the newly constructed drive up Starbucks right down next to the newly built Sam's Club. No, we are referring to insightful in the maelstrom stories of the European scene. We always keened to the conceit that such was the place for real authors; trained writers possessed of wit, charm, and the ability to use empathetic listening to get right down inside their subjects and bring out thoughts the racers didn't know how to express. And so it has been that each year the Self succumbed yet again to the lure of books with tantalizing titles. Like a fat man at a men's club the Self just can't let experience get in the way of the futile hope that the author is selling something besides false chance. As with the followers of Kevin Trudeau, the Self cares not that he is being played the rube. But, it is one thing to admit to reading the cycling equivalents of "A Million Little Pieces"; it is something else again to believe the script. Just because you pay for the lap dance doesn't mean you have to pass it on as having been the day you danced with the Stars. And so, it is that the Chronicles will from time to time make a pass at deconstructing the balderdash of cycling's perfumed authors. Today's entry is a stapled mix of travel folders and dubious winsome titled "Chasing Lance." The author is a journalist on his last Tour. You guessed it: he has family obligations that henceforth will have to take priority over his fanciful days at the tour buffet. It seems our guide is a runner and his Faustian deal included a month away from the wife and a pass to the infield where there is great food. This is the book Al Trautwig would write if he weren't so busy reporting on the blistered feet of a geriatric school teacher who is dedicating her Ironman finish to all the kids who got perfect attendance the past year. You just can't enough books that detail the number of small hotels, crowded roads, and early closing restaurants of rural France. Even when the author can tear away from sharing that Sports Illustrator's Rick Reilly only came on Tour for a couple days and even more demeaned the sport by renting a Mercedes, he reveals himself as being so credulous that he could write the Iraqi Federalist Papers for Oprah's Book Review World. Redolent in a clarity brought on it seems by free coffee and Proustian finger cakes the author lets slip the inside information that Lance dominated in the Alps because he was angry with the manager of CSC. It seems that Lance's ire had been drawn by Riis mentioning that Lance had been lucky to get the jersey when a CSC rider had crashed while not paying attention to something or other. Egad! After a year of planning and training the entire Tour came down to a tongue slip by the Dane known in 1996 as Mr. Sixty Percent Solution. All those days Basso and his Team had spent sleeping in snow banks, and swimming in frozen mountain lakes while eating shoelace tips had come to fraught because the manager had insulted Lance. How could it have happened? Here was Lance, just wanting to ride along and enjoy his last year inside the moving carnival and Riis had to give him a reason to get angry. Now, sure this nugget alone would make the book worth twice the price; but, there is more. Somewhere down Spain way our author gets tipped by Kris Anderson-a former pro's wife-that Lance gets it all over Jan because he always tells Jan how good he looks. In this way Lance keeps Jan happy. And so, like a good mystery it all becomes clear. The travel log was but distraction from the message which the author lets you complete. Lance gets angry and that is good. Lance compliments Jan to keep him happy and thus not angry. Anger is good; happy is bad. Lance wins. All is good. Pass the cream cakes please. Many or some like to believe that which makes for a good tale. And so it is that Oprah got taken by a con that could have been recognized by anyone who had ever thrown up after drinking a quart of gin-drunks don't have memories. And fans want to believe the silliness of "bulletin board material." But, even as a child the Self didn't think that clapping was going to bring Tinkerbelle back to life and yet, that is not the same thing as not wanting to be able to fly away. Which is all to say that anger has its purposes; but, it is of little use to athletes. You can look it up.
Last week, Wike called and advised that he was going to win Sunday at LA. There was a break of six or so hackers, slackers, and bar tape snackers. Wike jumped the sprint and held off G Spot. Viking won the Pro race with JB second. MKA was second in a race to ex Labor Stickey. It is not known whether Roger smiled. All told Labor won four rolls of bar tape. The bar plugs were extra. Ride Fast and Take Chances. Billy Stone (In the third month of the sixth year of the end of the Age of Reason.)
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