El Bastardo Real

Filoli, I will see you your wine blog and raise you this:

El Bastardo Real!

For over Four years now I've been trying to ride this one particular feature at Palmer Park. And you have always defeated me. Other obstacles have come and gone, but not you, no. You've always been the one insurmountable climb. (and horrifying descent when I ride clockwise.) Some where in your grainy Colorado granite is a titanic will to crush all those who come against you! Time after time I have fallen, tipped, or been stopped with such force as to do mild OTB's and partial endo's, stopped only by the fact that your so damn steep that if I stick my arm strait out I can arrest my forward momentum without completely landing on my face. Or the even more horrifying and climatic act of only making it part way up, then going over backwards. Yard sale! I can count one one hand the number of people I've seen climb you. And its always been ugly, unclean riding. Riders, good riders, pitting their will against the combined forces of geology, inertia and gravity, and more oft than not, losing in the most spectacular fashion. Much blood has been shed to the old, vengeful gods that built your Colorado, sandpaper like Geology, and used it for your foundation.

But today was different. I woke early. 3:30 to be exact. I didn't want to be awake, but I felt compelled. I got up, made tea, had granola, read the news online, and when the S.O. and child awoke, I grabbed my stuff and headed out the door. I went to Ravens Nest for Chai and a burrito. It was 14 damn degrees. There was half an inch of snow on everything. I was freezing my ding-ding off. By the time I rode from downtown to Palmer and made it to you, I was already pushing 25 miles. I was cold and tired but things were clicking. I cleaned your little brother of an obstacle just down the hill like it was a speed bump. I charged you feeling good, things were going my way. And you denied me! I made it only part way, lost momentum and had to unclip to put down my foot. I cursed your cold unyielding heart assuming that today would be just another repeat of previous rides. Three tries, then, the walk of shame.

A second time, this time ending most horrifically, in the going over backwards, turtle like fashion, that had there been onlookers, would surely have produced many a laugh. I lie at the base, under the bike, checking to see what, if any clothes I've torn, or what skin. Because of the cold I'm well protected, no blood is shed this time, and my pants have lived to see another day. Others have not been so fortunate.

The third attempt, my cardinal rule last, is half hearted. But strangely, inexplicably, I find myself at the top looking over my right shoulder, atop my bike to see something I have previously seen only through the eyes of defeat. The cold bottom of the narrow slab of dirt that is the approach. I call my wife.

I know that in Geologic time, the 5 minutes I spent attempting you today is not even the merest twinkling of a moment. However for me, that moment is timeless. And no matter how minute that moment might be to you, somewhere it will remain, in the tiniest deepest crag of your stony memory, it will remain there, long after I am gone, for that is your nature, just as you existed long before me.



Today, I made you my bitch.