To Build a Fire

"Also, he noted that the stinging which had first come to his toes when he sat down was already passing away. He wondered whether the toes were warm or numb. He moved them inside the moccasins and decided that they were numb."


(some guy dying in the snow due to cold)

The post topic is actually the name of a short story by Jack London. I read it in high school and never forgot it. It's about some guy that takes a walk in the snow and freezes to death because he can't build a fire to stay warm. For some reason I always think of this story when I'm really cold.

This past Saturday (2/24/07) Andrew thought it would be a good idea for us to simulate the Counting Coup start. That meant we needed to be _riding our bikes_ at 5:30am. That translates to waking up at something like 4:30am. Anyone that knows me knows that that time is just plain unreasonable. I'm more likely to go to bed at 4:30am rather than wake up at 4:30am.

But since my buddies were doing it and since I wanted to hardcore, I did it. I woke up a little after 4:30am and went and did the ride.

To the ride ...

The group was pretty small, but that's understandable considering the start time. It was me, Andrew, Matt and Junior. Poor Junior had to drive from Corona, so who knows how early he got up.

I remember getting to the parking lot first and just dreading getting out to get ready. It was a little windy and totally dark. No sun at all anywhere. I had the heater running in the car and was happy in my little warm igloo.

Andrew showed up and so I decided I had to get out and get ready. Man the cold hit me hard. My stupid Trek hardtail had a flat on the front tire and I needed to replace the tube. My hands were so cold that I couldn't manage to get the tire off. It was very hard to grip and hold things because my hands would start to go numb.

I ended up putting on everything I owned to protect against the cold. Knee warmers, booties for my feet, arm warmers (sleeves) and a wind breaker. The helmet and camelback actually help a lot too. Even with all the protection I was still freezing at the start of the ride. Hands quickly started to go numb, feet turned into bricks, nose started to run and my ears got that familiar piercing feeling as they went numb as well.

Since it was dark outside we used Andrew's little light to see the road in front of us. It was just enough and worked out ok.

The climb up to Beek's was again not that fast for me. I want to go a little faster come race day. I was trying to push a little bit on the ride though because it was only Blackstar-Motorway and nothing more. I figured I could ride a bit harder since it was such a short ride.

We all started to warm up on the first climb and we all took layers off in anticipation of warmth with the sun. Needless to say we were wrong about the sun bringing warmth.

When I got to hidden valley I got really, really cold. I had my windbreaker off and the stupid cold made my chest burn. I remember feeling that my entire chest was burning because of the bite of the cold. That was a first.

I actually beat everyone up to Beek's which really surprised me. Usually Andrew and Matt beat me on every climb, so it felt good to be the first up.

Beek's to the Motorway wasn't that interesting. Andrew got in front and destroyed all of us on the climbs. I would turn a corner to see him climbing the next hill. Eventually I lost sight of him, which was kind of discouraging. The only thing that made it ok was that I was doing the same thing to Matt and Junior. Haha.

The fire road had quite a few ice puddles on it. I had never seen those before. Big pools of water in the middle of the road that were frozen over. I had to ride through at least two of them because there was no way around. They just make a cracking sound as you go over them. Nothing special.

When we got to the top of the Motorway there was some dude guarding these pools of water. Kind of strange. I guess some punks had slashed the old pools and so they needed someone to guard the new ones. I do remember this was the first time going down the Motorway where my feet felt like bricks. Even with the booties they were gone.

Going down the Motorway was good. I'm feeling really good going down the Motorway right now. I ended up dropping my sunglasses on the way down trying to put them in my pocket, but left them since they were only 8 bucks at Walmart. When I got to the bottom Matt and I waited quite a while for Andrew and Junior to come down. Turns out Andrew saw my glasses, stopped to pick them up and got a flat. Haha. Sorry dude!

The ride overall was good and almost a personal best time wise. The cold is the only thing I'm a little worried about for race day. It helps with my heart rate (it's 5-6 beats lower in the cold), but it kind of saps energy and isn't as fun as a moderate temperature.

I'm getting anxious for Saturday.