Paris-Nice and the Itch

I used to watch every mile.

Paris-Nice, the Hell of the North, Flanders and The Grand Tours. I subscribed to NBCSN specifically for it and I would sit there for hours. Every breakaway. Every descent. Every moment where everything could go sideways with a little rain on a corner.

My favorite was the lone rider off the front at kilometer one, just grinding away while the peloton let him go. They always let him go. The question was never if they would catch him. It was when. And whether he had enough of a gap to survive.

I knew the teams. I knew the riders. I knew the rivalries and the histories and which climbs suited which riders and why. Nobody around me watched enough to be as into it as I was, so I rooted for people quietly, by myself, which is its own kind of devotion.

Phil Liggett was the voice of all of it. Precise, authoritative, with a local knowledge of European roads that made you feel like you were watching with someone who had ridden every one of them. When Bob Roll joined the broadcast team it became something else entirely, a former racer who understood suffering from the inside paired with Phil's encyclopedic knowledge. They were a great team.

Paris-Nice, This Spring

I turned it on a few weeks ago.

The racing was as beautiful as it has ever been. The tactics, the climbs, the drama of a peloton moving as one organism and then suddenly fracturing. All of it exactly as I remembered.

The riders I did not recognize. The teams I did not recognize. I sat there watching the best cyclists in the world doing what they do and I could not tell you who any of them were.

Except Bob Roll. I recognized Bob Roll.

I don't know exactly when I drifted away from the sport. It wasn't a decision. It was just time, moving the way time does when you're not paying attention to it. And sitting there watching Paris-Nice I understood for the first time just how much of it had gone by. Not just the years away from riding. The years away from even caring about riding.

That landed harder than I expected.

The Honest Inventory

I play disc golf. A good round gets me twelve thousand steps, which is not nothing. But it is also not cycling. And lately I have been feeling lethargic in a way that disc golf does not touch. Feeling heavier than I want to be. Not liking myself in the particular way that happens when you know what works for you and you are not doing it.

I have always known what works for me. I think I just didn't want to admit how far I had gotten from it.

So here is the honest inventory:

A great way to battle lethargy? Cycling.

A great way to feel less heavy? Cycling.

A great way to feel better about yourself in the specific way that comes from doing hard things? Cycling.

There is also the disc golf angle. Better core strength, better leg strength, better cardio -- all of it would improve my game. So cycling helps that too.

There is all win and no lose here. I have known this for three years and I have been sitting in the basement looking at a bike on a trainer instead of riding it.

Paris-Nice reminded me. Bob Roll, of all people, reminded me.

I am looking at my kit. I am looking at the bike. I am looking at myself.

I know the answer.

It's cycling. It has always been cycling.

The road back starts now. Again. For real this time.