Beyond TrailCentral: Bicycle Downgrading. The Gateway Drug.

This morning I spent some time posting a message about muni (a.k.a mountain unicycling). While posting it, I remembered a post I had written written at the beginning of the 2004 season called "Bicycle Downgrading. The Gateway Drug." Little did I know back then that muni would start to become a popular sport on Colorado mountain trails. I felt the post was worth of a re-post on my blog. Enjoy!

Bicycle downgrading. The gateway drug.
Originally Posted: April 22, 2004
4 years ago I met a man, no, make that, a mysterious man. He was chillin' on a particularly technical section of trail doing some yoga. Lets face it, that isn't all that uncommon in Boulder. What struck me when I met this guy wasn't his muffled breathing and his look of unconsciousness, but his bike. It was one of those single speed bikes. A bike so pure stripped of its gears, fancy paint, and suspension that in a silent way demanded respect.

When I bent down to move his bike from the trail, he appeared not to care that he left his bike on the track, I heard a muffled "help me" from the rider that appeared to be doing yoga. I then realized that he wasn't doing yoga, but had just taken a nasty digger! As I untangled his limbs I kept taking glances at his simple bike and started to wonder, why in the world was he riding that here?

2 years ago I became so bored with my mountain bike that I needed something new. I looked through all the popular mail order magazines. I looked to see what the most popular racers of the time were riding, but you know what? I'd been there and I'd done that. I had reached the limit. I had tried everything there is to try and as physics can prove; "What goes up. Must come down." I had nowhere to go but down and I realized this. I then remembered the tangled mountain biker on the technical trail with a simple bike. I thought, "Maybe I'll give that a try."

The next 2 weeks I built a bike that looked exactly like the mountain bike the, now crippled, mystery man was riding. Ok, I don't have an extreme personality, I ended up just building a hard tail and it only took 2 days to build. I then took a week and a half off.

When I took it on its maiden voyage I was incredibly disappointed. It was uncomfortable, it was primitive, and it was making me walk sections that I could normally ride. I hated it! I hated it so much that I was determined to ride it for a straight month.

Soon I was clearing obstacles that only a month ago made me put my foot down. In a way, I started to enjoy it.
It wasn't long after the 2-month anniversary that disaster struck. I broke a chain and didn't have a replacement. I saw the once noble, full suspension, steed collecting dust in the corner. I dusted it off and took it to the trail.

Have you ever experienced a time when you were conditioned to riding in a new car, lets say a Honda, and then you got into an old LTD or Scout. The LTD was big and awkward, it's old school, pure metal, but you felt safe and you didn't feel any bumps.

I got that same feeling when I jumped back on my full suspension rig after a couple months of riding my hard tail. I loved that feeling, but like anything else, the feeling started to fade the longer I rode it.

Determined to get that feeling back I once again rode the hard tail for a straight month, all the while anticipating that wonderful feeling I would have when I jumped back on that comfy full suspension rig.

The day came, the full suspension rig was taken to the trail and moot, nothing, zero. That feeling was gone! On the ride home I analyzed what could have gone wrong. Why didn't I get that "lazy-man sitting in his lazy-boy" feeling when I rode it? Then I figured it out.

I needed to go even more basic. This pattern of a little more basic to appreciate the excess has helped up until now, but it is getting more and more difficult to get more basic. All the while, my need hasn't wavered to once again be able to jump on the full suspension rig and feel like I'm driving that 2 ton LTD, 50 mph on a dirt road covered with washboard, while the coffee in the cup holder doesn't even ripple from the constant beating on the suspension that each wave in the road delivers.

Well, it's present day and I've taken it a step further and gotten rid of the front suspension and all the gears too. I'm beginning to understand why that crippled mountain biker had such a simple bike on such a technical trail. He needed the fix! He was caught in this horrible downward spiral that I am caught in, the crew has bailed long ago, but like any good captain, "I must go down with the ship."

This realization is almost more than I can handle.

What next? There is only so much deprecation a bike can withstand before it is no longer a bike. Scared of my future and hoping to get that feeling each time I ride on full suspension I know there is a finite limit and an end in site. Needing that feeling, I contemplate more ways to simplify my bike. I need it to be more difficult so I can truly enjoy the full suspension.

Maybe unicycling.

Yeah, I can start with a simple trail. Full suspension will feel great after that. But after a while that too will fail to satisfy the Cadillac feeling the body so desperately wants when choosing to ride the full suspension rig. I entertain thoughts of unicycle free riding. 10, 20, 30-foot drops. Rounding corners at full speed on loose ball bearing sand, the very tread on my single tire barely holding on, all the while thinking about how good it will feel when I do this same trail on that polished beauty sitting in the garage with all the right curves that bend in all the right places.

But I know my fate and I will continue to spin, downward, until someone on a slick, high tech rig, mistakes me as a mysterious man doing yoga on the trail.