I just woke from the craziest dream. Really, it would be more accurate to categorize it as a bloody nightmare. It was so intense, so vivid that I felt compelled to put it on paper. If anyone out there is good at psychoanalysis, have a read and help me out with this. Please!
So the dream goes like this. The 2009 race season is winding down, with just a few events remaining. I have no intentions of doing the AZ State Team Time Trial Championship, but at the last minute, we throw together a Haus team that makes absolutely no sense. Don Williams, Scott Schraff, and myself. But the part that is absolutely ridiculous, we recruit Eric Salstrand as our fourth guy?
Now, I need to be very respectful of Don and Scott, and deservingly so. These guys are super strong bike racers, and Don holds more cycling championships and records than anyone I know. In fact, if you had a racing pedigree with 1% of Don’s accomplishments, you’d be doing extremely well. But the problem with these time trials is that they are excruciatingly painful. Generally speaking, a little under an hour of living hell. Then you throw in a guy with “pulls” are like Bill White’s Ducati crotch-rocket, and well, hell would be a much, much nicer place. If you could finish with one guy o.k. but the rules require you finish three intact.
You see, Salstrand is part man part animal. I could spend all kinds of time describing him using fancy adjectives and metaphors, but let me keep it simple... if he wore socks you’d swear you were riding with Fabian Cancellara. For God’s sake, he even looks like the guy. What also makes this team selection so comical is that there’s a bit of age difference. In fact, if you take the 3 of us and calculate the difference between each of our ages, and Eric’s, you get total of about 60 years. No big deal. Just more experience, right? Well, you're wrong.
So in this phantasm, there are all sorts of interaction and communications between our team. I can’t seem to remember all of it, but a few remain tucked in memory. First, I recall calling Don and asking him to join our outfit. He asked who are teammates were, and when I mentioned Salstrand, he reacted calmly, but tellingly with the utterance, “oh shit”.
There was also tons of conversation with Eric. Actually, it would be better described as very specific instruction. “Eric, understand the strength difference in our team”, “we need to ride as a unit”, “the key to going fast is pacing”, “we are faster with 4 guys than three”, “we need to start slow”, and “no gaps in our formation”, “if we tell you to slow down, slow down”…anyway, you get the picture. So we’re on the start line and ready to go. But, here is where what could have been some really nice R.E.M., becomes a complete train wreck. Salstrand immediately behaves like we did something to upset him. Like we kicked his new born, Paige. All of our pre-race chatter, and instruction…the pacing, etc. he completely ignores. It’s like we never had the conversation. And the more we yell at him to slow down, the more upset he becomes. Not good.
So five minutes in, after 3 or 4 monster “Salstrand pulls”, Schraff looks at me and says, “I’m done”. I seriously considered asking if I could leave with him...you know, just sneak away without the other two even knowing...hide in some bushes or behind cactus. Bad decision, I decide to soldier ahead. So now we’re down to three. And to make my personal experience even worse, Don is in great form and the two of them are just killing me. How can I describe this? It’s truly like someone holding a flame to your lungs, for 55 flipping minutes, and these 55 minutes feel like 55 years. The pain and suffering is just unbearable. In this horrible dream, I keep slipping off the back, trying to get back on this 34 mph locomotive. I pray for a flat tire. I consider an intentional overlap of a rear wheel, as I’m totally convinced at this point that sliding on pavement would be more comfortable than trying to hang on. What excuse can I come up with? I politely ask, more than once, for them to take it easy. When they look back at me, they have fangs, and red eyes lacking pupils. Their stare startles me, waking me in a pool of sweat.
Only a dream! Thank goodness. After calming myself, I begin to chuckle. So absurd, clearly my common sense would never put me in such an idiotic position. Now I’m laughing out loud, right…so ridiculous! This could just never happen. But the images are so concrete, and the pain so irrefutable, that I’m starting to wonder could this really have happened.
Please, somebody, tell me it isn’t so?
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