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A Balancing Act

by Greg Dobbs                                                     

You have to admit, life’s a balancing act.  And it’s a more delicate balance the older we get.  Fifties?!?  I feel like I’m balancing my repeatedly problematic hernia with my blown out knees with my chronically bad back!   I can’t weight-lift, I can’t jog, I can’t do sit-ups.  At least, I can’t without hurting.

So what can I do?  What’s left to balance?  A bike!  A mountain bike, a road bike, even a stationary exercise bike.  It doesn’t matter; I’ve got ‘em all.  Peddling a bike -- sometimes pushing pretty hard -- doesn’t hurt the hernia, seems to serve as fluid movement for the knees (kind of like swimming), and by leaning over the handlebars, comfortably stretches the spinal column in my back.

And, by the way, it’s not bad for the belly.  It’s not wonderfully good -- what is, anymore? -- but what I’ve noticed is, while I don’t seem to actually lose pounds while I’m peddling, I don’t seem to gain any either.

The best thing is, every time I take a ride, I pass the joggers.  I remember, back when I jogged, time crept by in agonizing slow motion.  Jogging meant making your way one crushing step at a time, and realizing you’re still seeing the same view through three checks of your wristwatch.  Biking, on the other hand, means rolling rapidly down a road, or a trail, and finding yourself in a brand new environment every time you check the clock!

What’s more, biking means fresh air in your face (without the deafening noise and stifling fumes of a motorcycle beneath your legs). And, if you plan your rides right, spectacular scenery all around.

Last Summer, for instance, while I took lots of early morning and early evening rides where I live in Colorado, I took a few terrific bike trips out of town.  One was north to Wyoming with a huge group of friends on road bikes.  We set out from our forgettable motel on the Saturday morning for Snowy Mountain Pass, climbing against the wind and into the cold, but sag wagons -- everyone was supposed to drive a 20-mile stretch -- met us often enough with fluid and food.

We all made it over the above-treeline pass and cruised to the bottom of the other side and all told, ending up at a splendid spa in the resort town of Saratoga, we rode something like 82 miles one-way.  A great dinner, a midnight dip, a scandalous bacon breakfast (please-don’t-tell-my-doctor), and back on the road the next morning retracing our tracks.

Nothing wrong with retracing your tracks.  How often on the way in, after all, did any of us look back?  Now, it’s a different set of scenery, a better way with the wind (at our backs!), but a longer climb to the summit.  That’s something you have to remember: you may set out from, say, 8,000 feet, and summit at 12,000, for a 4,000 foot vertical climb.  But the other side of the hill may be lower, so on the way back, you may start from, say, 7,000 feet, which means a 5,000 foot vertical climb to get back.

But here’s the good news: you can make it!  I did. 82 miles each way, with the longer (and ugh, rainier) climb to the summit coming in the last 20 miles of the return ride.   By the top, out of 18 riders, there were just four of us left.  The combination of rain and cold and distance put all the rest in the sag wagons ... which met the four of us at the bottom, the end.  The other three rode in to polite congratulations, but I was swarmed by my friends. We’d determined at dinner the night before that I was the oldest member of the whole group, and they were saying things like, "I can’t believe you made it."   (They were too polite to end it with, "You old fart!") I’d have been hurt if I hadn’t instead been so proud!

The other trip worth noting was to Moab. If you don’t know about Moab, you’re not really into bikes.  Yet, Moab calls itself the "mountain bike capital of the galaxy," and I think with the possible exception of Crested Butte Colorado, no one would argue the point.  Moab is in eastern Utah, north of Lake Powell, a bit further north from the Grand Canyon but in fact, geologically, the whole region is Grand Canyon country.

There are hundreds of mapped trails, some meandering atop smooth stone summits, some climbing narrow paths along the edges of cliffs; you don’t have to look very hard for a thousand foot drop.  And then there’s "Slick Rock".  Slick Rock is like a moonscape, thousands of beehive-shaped mounds of smooth rock undulating across the desert.  You simply ride up one and down another and down one and up another and .... well, it’s unique.

Four of us, all in our fifties, took off at the start of Slick Rock one day, sweating and struggling up the steep slopes but struggling even harder not to tumble head over heels on the descents.  About a hundred yards ahead of us, maybe two peaks away, was another small group ... standing stone still, watching us coming.  As we got closer, we could see that one was a studly twenty-something guy, with a pair of gorgeously fit young girls in halter tops.  It was obvious they were having trouble getting down these slick steep slopes, and wanted to see how someone else handled it.

My inclination would have been to stop alongside them and wait for someone who really knew how.  But knowing they’d expect that kind of caution from a bunch of old farts like us, my stronger instinct was to show them that we could do it.  And so, as if we hardly noticed them, we kept on moving, first up to their position, then -- scared almost out of our wits -- over the top and down to the base of the beehive.  No fears (a lie), no falls (the truth).

Sometimes you’ve just got to stand up for your age group!!  And sometimes, you’ve just got to do something your age group can do. 

Bikes are a good balance.

Editor's Note:  Moab, Utah, offers many great outdoor activities in addition to bicycling:  http://moab-utah.com/

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