Mark Dominck

I'd be careful racing through intersections you might end up a hood ornament!

indyfabz

What is this point/purpose of this post? It has nothing to do with what I wrote or the topic of the thread.

Please leave me out of your insightful comments.

Fredo76

A local rider named David had a reputation as a dilettante - he had a frame with about 2mm clearances, and applied for a Guinness world record after a six-hour track stand, but never rode with us or raced, until the first race of the Arizona season, when he showed up at Marana, having supposedly spent the winter track racing in California. Marana consisted of one or more laps around what was a square of farming roads, four miles per side, and dead flat. It was our first race as new Senior IIIs in the Amateur Bicycle League (later USCF) classification system. I had won the race the previous year as a Junior, jumping the gap to the break and winning the sprint against two non-sprinters.

After two laps without a serious break it was coming down to a long, flat, straight field sprint, my favorite kind. David and I drew out the field until several bike lengths separated us from the rest, and I began to go around him, huffing and puffing as was usual for me. Whereupon David hooked me all the way across the road, into the oncoming lane and up to the very left edge, where to his credit, he left me a foot. I kept on coming, undeterred, and beat him by a wheel at the line.

I didn't win any money, but it felt like a shot - a shot of adrenaline - I wanted to pound him into the ground for that stunt, which didn't work, in the end. I was nicknamed 'Freight Train' back then, for a reason.
That turned out to be my last race. A knee injury from a touch football game in college, of all things, ruined my sprint, and ended my racing. I took up hiking and mountaineering and canoeing but kept my bike and still rode occasionally.

After starting riding again during the pandemic, my most euphoric moments so far came from riding around Saguaro National Park's one-way loop drive again. It was like moving through a time capsule. Everything looked almost exactly like it did 50 years ago, and only I had changed. That was quite a nostalgia trip, for me at least. I'd recommend it to any rider as nine of the best miles cycling has to offer.



Saguaro National Park

indyfabz

Money shot from Day 2 of my current tour.