An open letter to the old guys buying up the EPO.

Usually when a drug suspension comes out, it’s an announcement about a professional racer; and I can guess and speculate about the motives of the accused racer, but I can never really know what the racer went through, because I’ve never been a pro. I’ve never been close. I cannot know the pressures or temptations that they face simply because I haven’t lived the lifestyle that they lead. It’s a culture as alien to me as that of a small Pacific Island or a place as perplexing as Alabama.

But I do know a thing or two about domestic category and masters racing. I’ve met and known guys like the ones that are showing up on the UASDA lists these days. I’ve raced against them. I’ve seen them in the parking lots methodically pedaling on trainers before 45 mile races. This letter is for you guys, the guys who decided to go "full pro" and order yourself up some EPO on the internet. Most bike news outlets won’t couch the story in the vernacular that follows, as they are classy and have editors, but here at NYVC we are free of such dignity and will tell you what your peers are saying. Simply put, we think you pulled a dick move.

Anyone who’s been around racing for a while knows that cycling scenes in towns across the country resemble rolling high schools, containing at most a couple hundred people. The groups are tight knit communities, bound together by their small numbers, their love of lycra and sense of shared separateness from the rest of the athletic world. The members get to know one another quite well as the years pass. We in these communities know who’s fast, who trains a lot and who’s naturally talented. We end up on each other’s teams. We have beers together.

That’s why ordering EPO on the internet is a dick move, as you are making a concerted effort to screw over the people you’ve raced with for years. And don’t think I don’t understand the temptation. The irony here is that you probably aren’t a lazy or evil person. You probably put in long training hours, kept track of every morsel of food that you eat, sleep well and strain every relationship in your life to the breaking point in order to find enough time to train and race. You may be living with 4 roommates and work in a bike shop. You may never get married or have kids, but you get to race every weekend. Granted you’ve been not very successful—the same guys tend to beat you over and over again—and that’s frustrating. You’ve done everything you can think of and just can’t get any faster. And you’re not getting any younger. I’m guessing it starts out as a small thought, "Everyone knows I’m awesome, why are these guys always beating me?" Certainly they can’t be better or work harder? It must be something else—it has to be.

And that’s where the dick move starts, certainly no one can be working harder or just more talented physically, they must be taking something. Once that thought takes hold, the rest is just filling up your shopping cart and checking out (or borrowing someone else’s laptop to do it—wait, that just sounds stupid). Armed with your justification that everyone else is doing it, anything becomes possible. Unless you get caught. Then things get complicated.

Your name shows up on the internet, people want to know why you did it. Guys on stupid web sites (like this one) write things about you. You have to come up with an excuse or explanation for ordering the EPO. It’s best to come clean here. Try to not insult anyone’s intelligence. Don’t blame ex-teammates or phantom twins, no ones buying those excuses anymore—we’ve been burned too often. And don’t diminish your dick move by saying it was a momentary lapse of reason. You didn’t cut the course. You ordered substances that required injection, planning and (God I hope) medical supervision.

You may want this to blow over quickly and it might, especially if a bigger name gets caught while you’re in the news cycle, but the people in your local cycling scene will remember what you did, and while they won’t necessarily think that you are a dick, they will certainly know that you are capable of pulling a dick move. But I digress, I just really wanted to say congrats on your recent 44th place finish, you earned it.

Thanksgiving week

Now I realize the irony in writing a diatribe about obsessed bike racers and then writing a journal recording my own semi-obsessive activities, but you can rest assured I am not purchasing any "speed pills" from China or elsewhere, as I am too cheap to buy them and I haven’t the sense of self worth capable of justifying such a transaction. But enough about me buying illicit substances, lets get to me being slow.

In a nutshell, I rode five days in the past week, which sound pretty good if you put it that way, but the ride I did on Saturday and Sunday were only 30 minute spins on the rollers, just to keep the streak going, probably like the games Cal Ripkin played really hung over during his streak (I’m not sure if Cal Ripkin ever played hungover, I just think every baseball player looks like he’s playing hungover to me). No gains were made athletically, I just didn’t want to feel like a turkey stuffed load of sloth—and I almost made it. Actually I rather enjoyed my few days off near Thanksgiving, as it gave me time to act like a person. I didn’t do anything preposterous like plan a Thanksgiving or Black Friday Ride—those things are reserved for those without families or happy home lives—I just delved into some slight pre-Thanksgiving manorexia and then gorged like I had been rescued from a mineshaft. That’s how I like to spend my holidays.

Consequentially, my weight is hovering at the limit of my marsupial based scale. My metabolism isn’t what it’s been in years past, so I will try to be diligent in the run up to Christmas, but no so diligent as to be the guy munching baby carrots at the Holiday parties—that guy drives me nuts.

It hasn’t been all doom and gloom though, this past week I was able to dispatch a 20 minute interval at a non-disgusting pace, and with all the turkey-loading I’ve done the past week, I was able to accomplish some very satisfying bathroom-based intervals. Yes, I consider those an accomplishment; and you should too, otherwise you’ll end up trolling the internet for speed pills from China.