With Eyes Wide Open
A Mountain Bike Race Escapade
Downhill Mountain Bike Racer
One of my most amazing mountain-bike race adventures occurred in 1989, in Big Bear Lakes, California, while I was participating as a downhill racer on the Tioga Downhill event of the Fall NORBA Nationals.
Back then, mountain-bike downhill racing was in its adolescence and so was I – in a way. As any adrenaline junkie knows, one good scoot down a technical singletrack with its whoop-de-doos, berms and break-neck switchbacks, makes a rollercoaster ride feel like you’re riding in a teacup at the local fair.
Winning Armando
Amazingly enough, even though I’d entered mountain bike racing as a relative latecomer, I did well. I came in first place in the first-ever Montana Grande fun ride in Rosarita, Mexico back in 1988, and I’ve still got the 15-pound bronze trophy to prove it. That trophy is an Aztec warrior with spear poised, and I call him “Armando.”
Big Bear NORBA Nationals - 1989 Tioga Downhill
But back to the NORBA Nationals. Anyone who has ever ridden in a mountain bike downhill race knows the feeling. With intestines clenched, heart racing and sweat pouring from your armpits, you and your “steed” just head straight on down, as fast as you possibly can, with a feeling that the rider behind you is right on your back tire.
I had zoomed down about three quarters of the downhill track in first place, surrounded by a cloud of volcanic dust when I realized that one of my contact lenses had popped out of my eye. I screeched the bike to a halt, and stood off on the side of the trail for a moment trying to regain my senses as two women passed me. With one hand over my blind eye, I ambled over toward where I thought the lens had escaped. I knelt on the side of the trail searching as another woman went by.
These were not the days of disposable contact lenses, my friends. This was a $150 lens and I HAD to find it or I would be blind in one eye for the next two weeks.
Just as I had almost resigned myself to a Cyclopsian fate, I spotted it. I picked it up, squirted water from my bottle on it, affixed it to my eye, blinked to secure it while suffering the sandpaper feel of grit and non-salty solution, jumped back on my Raleigh Technium, and roared down the singletrack.
Back in the Saddle
I was blazing! I passed up the first woman, and then the second, who was not far ahead of the first. Just as I saw the finish line in the distance like a hallucination in a desert, I revved it up just one more notch and blasted by the third woman, coming in first as the NORBA Downhill Female Champion in my class.
Celebration
You can be sure there was plenty of celebrating that night with several rounds of good beers and the camaraderie of great friends. When I related my story about the errant contact lens, nobody could believe it. I still can hardly believe it myself.
About ten years later, I underwent Lasik surgery and I was able to do away with contact lenses altogether. I think my riding even improved along with my vision. But when I think of that day in Big Bear, the way everything went down – literally – I know it’s one of my most pleasurable memories that I’ll enjoy until I reach the end of my trail.