So I was riding over to volleyball practice last Friday morning – just riding my old Philly messenger bike and listening to my iPod. It’s just a short ride from OB to South Mission, but I was listening away anyway. It was early in the morning – like 7:30 – and it was completely overcast with a slight mist in the air – really weird for San Diego in September as it’s usually clear skies 24/7 this time of the year.

Anyway, I was just riding along and listening to a mix I made back in 2006, aptly named HQ ‘006 (Hardqore 2006). 2006 was the year that I hit the bike super hard. I was working just part time at work – 25 hours/week or so – and training was going really well. I made this mix as a sort of pump up race prep mix – especially for track events where I might find myself warming up on the rollers for 30 mins or so before racing.

1. Cap’n Hardqore – It is the Appointed Time
2. Rancid – Born Frustrated
3. Social Distortion – I Wasn’t Born to Follow
4. Soundgarden – Rusty Cage
5. Social Distortion – Reach for the Sky
6. Tom Petty – Runnin’ Down a Dream
…

The songs go on for awhile, but you get the idea. Look up the lyrics – just a great mix to really get me going. So I was listening to this mix and of course it made me think back to 2006. As I’ve alluded, 2006 was an interesting time. The best and the worst. I was really making improvements on the bike, and that was really important to me (as you can imagine since I was only working part time at work!). One of the biggest memories – and one where I played this mix constantly – was during the Athens Twilight criterium in April ’06. The day before the “big race” (Athens Twilight is one of the major crit races on the American cycling calendar) they had 6-up time trials on stationary trainers on a stage in the downtown plaza. Anyway, I did my part and I was on form – winning my heat. I beat a couple pro’s which had me super stoked. This put me in the final where I got totally dead last – guess I had spent it all in the heat? ;-) I still won prize money plus a call up to the front line at the big race the following day. Do I need to mention that I was late to the race start and actually missed my call up? Yeah, I was taking a last minute dump. I didn’t miss the race, but I sure missed that golden call up…

Anyway, the mix had gotten me thinking about how the first half of ’06 was a great time, and it was exactly what I needed to be doing at the time. That season took a big plummet in the July timeframe, though, when I broke my jaw while racing in Wisconsin. Making matters worse, while my jaw was still wired shut in August, I got a pretty bad annual performance review at work. That shocked me and actually made me quite depressed – especially since my jaw was still wired shut for another 2 weeks at the time! I had never done substandard work before and that probably depressed me more than anything else – I just couldn’t let that happen again.

Once the wires were off, I made a bit of a comeback on the bike before sustaining a new injury from overtraining (stressed Achilles tendon). I basically quit cycling after that tendon injury, and rededicated myself to work and took up snowboarding just to do something totally different. Of course with snowboarding I took that too extreme and started racing Boardercross almost immediately. New injuries followed… :/ The snow season ended with amateur nationals in April up at Tahoe – yeah, I went and raced Slalom – and then I basically went back to full time work. I rode bikes a bit, but never with any real passion. Work was the thing to do at that time, and I had 2 really exciting projects to work on. Long story short, I impressed the people at work a million times over and was suddenly found to be ‘indisposable’ at work. This is still playing out, and there’s actually a good chance that I’ll get a promotion to the next pay grade come the new fiscal year + a month or so, which is actually quite hard to get. Kinda funny.

Now all of these thoughts coalesced and passed through my mind in a span of 2 or 3 minutes probably. The beautiful moment came at the end in a flash in a moment of clarity. Racing bikes and working part time in ’06? Giving it up and taking up Snowboarding? Giving both of those up and working full time + overtime? They’re all worthwhile tasks, and they were all the right things to do at each of their times. I try not to hold any regrets, but I’ve always had some lingering ones from quitting cycling at the end of ’06. But in reality, it was simply the right thing to do at the time. At that time, I truly needed a break and Snowboarding provided that. I *did* need to buckle down at work and there was actually interesting work to apply my talents to. And now beach volleyball and surfing? I’ve finally embraced the locale that I’m living in. And who knows – maybe cycling will eventually come back in to the picture again – nothing’s off limits…

The clarity was that I should be confident in my choices. I have a sound head on my shoulders and I’ll pursue what I need to pursue, whether I’m conscious of it or not. I always did what I ‘needed’ to do at the time. Looking back on the past 3 years – I wouldn’t change a thing. Well, maybe I could avoid breaking that jaw – that would be kinda nice… ;-) But as morbid as it sounds – that broken jaw is a vital part of the whole puzzle.