The Ride of My Life - part 3

by David Goldman

Chris and me posing

We ate a special congratulatory lunch that was prepared to welcome us after our successful ascent of the mountain. It was not lost on us that everyone else partaking in it had successfully sat in the seat of a motorized vehicle that hauled them to the top rather than pedaling their bikes up there. No matter though, we had made it on our own and we were quite proud. We ate and prepared for our descent. We could see a portion of the road going down the other side. There were several steep switchbacks but then the road headed out of our range of vision.

Fed and rested, we mounted our bikes and headed down. I started pedaling and soon had to shift to a higher gear as my feet couldn’t keep up with the tension in the crank. My gears steadily rose until I was in my highest gear. This was certainly a switch. After having spent hours in my lowest gear I was now in my highest gear and that wasn’t even high enough. I glanced at my speedometer: 25 mph, 32 mph, 39 mph, 40 mph. I was going much faster than I had ever gone on a bike before. The speed kept increasing and it was exhilarating. I knew that every bike has a point where the speed causes a vibration through the bike. It’s a scary moment but it passes and the bike stops shaking. I hit that point at 44 mph. By 45, it was rolling smoothly again. I got up to 48 miles per hour and it felt like I was going 148. I was flying. I was cutting through the wind like a knife blade. When I hit 48 mph I decided I’d better slow it up a bit. There was more traffic and I wasn’t experienced at handling a bike at this speed. There was still a lot of riding left this day, and this week and I didn’t want to take a chance on wiping out and ending my trip early. So I slowed down to a reasonable 35 mph and enjoyed the easy cruise down.

When we got to the bottom it sank in. We had only just completed the beginning of the day’s ride. We still had over 60 miles to ride through the White Mountains. By now our legs were spent. On the few flat areas we encountered we were okay. But as soon as the road began to tilt up our legs burned like they were on fire. We pushed on and barely spoke because it took too much effort and there was nothing left to say. Again, I tried to appreciate the beautiful countryside we were riding through but it was just impossible. All I could think of was turning the pedals over. One after the other after the other…

A couple of hours later we reached a designated rest area for our group. At this point we were going to be riding on a highway. The road looked like an interstate – two lanes in each direction divided by a narrow strip of uncultivated land. The speed limit for cars and truck was 65 mph and bikes were to ride on the shoulder. Okay, I thought, this sounds a little scary but if that’s how it’s done out here, that’s fine with me. Then came the warning: be very, very careful of logging trucks. They WILL try to run you off the road. I was used to rude drivers; drivers who would blast their horns at cyclists because in their minds the road is only for cars. But this was different. We were being warned that we were going to be riding on a very dangerous road and drivers with very large trucks carrying large loads were going to try and run us off the road. Great, this is my idea of a vacation. 

We were given one more warning. There was another very big climb coming.

Needless to say, we were not happy campers. We still had over half of our day’s ride in front of us, we had crazed truck drivers trying to kill us, and we had another big climb ahead.

So we headed out once again, this time riding the shoulder of a highway. Sure enough, within a few miles we heard a different vehicle sound coming from behind. I glanced over my shoulder and saw a logging truck with a full load of trees headed toward us. The trucks are so heavy that you can feel the road vibrating as they get closer. The driver laid on his air horn. The horn got louder and louder and the rumble became stronger and more jarring as he approached. I was riding a good six feet into the shoulder. The truck was halfway onto the shoulder and still moving over. The trucker pushed me to within inches of falling off the shoulder when he passed. I ducked because as I saw him coming from behind I could see large branches sticking out of the truck at all kinds of odd angles. One truck down, how many more to go?

It went on like that for a long time. Each logging truck would follow the same routine. Blow their air horns to get you scared and come up on you and try to squeeze you off the road. There were a couple of times when we came within inches of going off. Once you did go off you were going down hard into rocks, jagged cement, or dirt and chances were if you went down you wouldn’t be riding again for quite a while.

We were lucky though. We made it through the hazard zone and were climbing yet again. This climb was different. It was a lower gradient so we could continue for longer periods before we’d have to stop. But it went on and on and on. We were both in miserable moods. This was way past being annoying. It was sheer misery. Who planned this route? What were they thinking? There’s a difference between a hard ride and a torturous ride. It was late afternoon by now and there was no end in sight. I had already suffered a couple of insulin reactions that day. All the hard work burned up the sugar in my body quickly. I had taken almost no insulin that morning and had ingested LOTS of sugar and carbs but the sugar burned off so fast from the riding that my blood sugar kept going too low. When it did I’d have to pull over, eat a couple of candy bars, and check my sugar until it got high enough to continue.

The day felt like it would never end. We rode on and on and on and climbed up and up and up. My body was numb. We approached the final rest stop and I got off my bike and checked my sugar. Once again, it was too low to read. I ate even more candy and drank even more Gatorade. Once my thinking started to clear I could tell how spent my body was. It was time to throw in the towel for the day. I didn’t see how I’d make it to the end of that day’s ride. We knew a lot of others had already given up and taken the ride to that night’s destination. They were probably showered, relaxed, and enjoying a beer. Yeah, I’m done for today.

Then something happened that had never happened before or has happened since. I became enraged. I had anger in me like I never experienced before. I wasn’t mad at the route or the guy that planned it, not the logging truck drivers or the mountains. I was incensed about being a diabetic and being beaten. I had been living with diabetes for almost 40 years. It had taken the vision in one eye and left me with only partial vision in the other. My kidneys had quit working, my heart was showing some of the effects, and my hands and feet were beginning to suffer from diabetic neuropathy. My dad died from diabetes. When he died he was blind and had become an old man way before he should have. In the process it robbed him of his dignity. On his last birthday I mentioned something about the next one and he said he wouldn’t be here for that one.

I was livid. There was a fury and a rage in me that I had never felt. I was not going to be beaten.

I stood up and told Chris I had to go. He looked at me like I was nuts. Honestly, I didn’t feel like myself at that point. He asked what I meant but I couldn’t even answer. I didn’t know what to say. How could I explain that this day had become a personal challenge? Who was going to win this one, me or diabetes? I got on my bike, placed my hands in the drops and started riding.

My body was functioning at a level that was foreign to me. My legs felt like pistons that would never stop. My heart beat at a steady pace and my lungs took in air through my nose and let it out calmly through my mouth. I felt perfect. I heard Chris behind me yelling to wait up but I couldn’t. I was going to finish this ride and I was going to finish strong. 

Chris caught up to me at a red light. He said I looked funny and asked what was going on. I told him I couldn’t explain it. I said something had come over me and I just had to ride. 

Chris and me somewhere in New England

About an hour later we were done. I had completed the most grueling day of riding I ever had attempted. That day I beat The Kanc, I beat the loggers, and I honestly felt for that one day, I had beaten diabetes.

I rode a lot after that day but I was never able to summon the strength to ride the way I did at the end of that ride. It was an hour where emotion controlled my mind and my body. If I had to have ridden another 100 miles that day I have no doubt that I would have done it. Not because I was such a good rider, but because I was fighting my own personal war.

We had other challenges during that week. There was a hundred mile ride through rain that varied from a light drizzle to downpour, more climbs that seemed to just go straight up, and finally, a 90 mile ride for the last day in 104° heat. 576 miles in all, and we pedaled every single inch.

At one point while we were struggling up a steep mountain pass Chris said to me, “you know, they say the body forgets pain.” He was right. The next year we signed up and did the ride again.