Pain

Cycling makes you crave different things at different times. I’m not talking about that urgent need for a pasty half way round the ride, or the feeling of wanting a beer as you play out ion a dusty summer track, but the inbuilt need to go and experience something that it can provide.

Often this need is something like a long flowing singletrack downhill; something that makes you smile and gives you a buzz and the wind in your face as you hammer a trail that’s not too technical, but is baked out and dazzling you with green and white. Sometimes it’s just feeling two wheels rolling under you, maybe popping a little curb, or clearing that small jump or step-up that you know you can make on a day where you’re dialled in a bit; the whoosh and burr of tyres on the road.

On other days you want something a bit harder to explain. All that fills your mind is the idea of grinding up a long hill. For me it’s often the type of hill that winds up at a steady rate, maybe on a fairly wide track, opening the view up below as I sweat and focus behind the bars. The sort of hill that makes you recede into yourself and fills your mind with something that isn’t real life as you close off everything outside the area your arms make in front of you and the thoughts behind your sunglasses. I want to be driving the bike on upwards in a steady rhythm and entirely dominated by it you for the time I’m climbing. Some day’s it’s just like I crave the pain of the ride, and it has to be said that those rides are often the best ones.

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