PedalTrout

Everyone loves his or her hero.  The popularity of Superman is proof of that.  Though fictional, he has grossed millions of dollars in revenue, and amassed legions of loyal followers since his creation decades ago.

In real life our heros tend to be professional athletes.  We all want ”to be like Mike”, or have balls as big as Tiger Woods, and no, I am not making reference to his sex-capades but instead to a song by Dan Bern.  Though I imagine that Tiger’s personal life has gained him some new fans.

 

Scandal is not a taboo word when you are a sports superstar.  It seems that it follows them all.  The NFL suspended Michael Vick for betting on dog fighting, Pete Rose was banned from baseball for betting on games, Magic Johnson and Tommy Morrison both had to give up their respective professions after becoming infected with HIV-AIDS.  Let’s not forget the steroid scandal that Mark McGwire endured, as well as other major baseball has-beens.

 

In our world of Cycling we have heroes also.  In the past there was Eddie Merckx, Fausto Coppi, and Greg Lemond, to name just a few.  None of whom have ever failed a drug test that I know of.  Though it is no secret that there were dopers in the sport during their time, records show that even in the beginning of competitive cycling one can find evidence of drug use to remain competitive.

 

Today’s cycling world finds teams with multi-million dollar budgets and payrolls, as well as sponsor obligations to remain competitive and be the best.  It is now a sport where first to tenth place in a major tour can be split by mere seconds. The intense pressure to remain in this elite field has led many to take chances.  Today’s drugs are becoming increasingly invisible and undetectable.  I bet Alberto Contador never thought that his drug would be detected, if in fact he really did take it.

 

Now, I don’t want this to read like a bitch session on dopers.  From a scientific perspective I find it fascinating that we can create super-humans who can ride a bicycle at a sustained speed in excess of 50 kilometers an hour for an event that spans more than 2000 kilometers.  However, from a personal and moral view point I find it disturbing that there are so many cheaters out there who want to win at any cost.

 

That cost is the purpose of this article. 

 

My hero.  The man who brought me back to my bike with a renewed passion was once dead, or damn near close anyway.  Diagnosed with the worst case of testicular and brain cancer his doctors had ever seen, he was not supposed to survive. 

 

Instead he did what superheroes do.  He fought back against the evil that threatened to destroy him and beat the odds to become a cancer survivor and return to his sport of cycling to become a legend of his time.

 

In his incredible journey he gained a cult following.  Many people who would never give a rat’s ass about a bunch of Lycra-clad, leg-shaving stick-thin bicycle riders began tuning into the sport, riding bicycles and wearing yellow bracelets. Yellow bracelets. Remember them?  I still see them now and then.  It seems that now- a-days they are just on bike jersey sleeves and Twitter profile pictures.  But back in the day they were on everyone.  And everyone knew what they were for - cancer awareness!

 

Because of the fall, and heroic rise of one American cyclist the world learned a lot more about cancer, and the whole world began to fight cancer together. Since 1997 the Armstrong Foundation has raised over 14 million dollars for cancer research.

That is 14 million reasons to appreciate this man and all that he has accomplished and contributed to the people of this world.

 

 Recently allegations have been rampant that all of this time, during the miraculous comeback, the seven Tour de France titles, and the always negative drug tests, that Lance is a doper.

 

What if this turns out to be true?

 

He is being investigated by Jeff Novitzky, a USA Food and Drug special agent who has a notorious reputation of being bloodthirsty and never takes a case unless he knows that he can win.  It seems that if we were writing comic books he could be a great nemesis for our hero.  Sadly this is real life and there are no comics in this story.  This battle will be fought and only one man will be left standing proudly in the end. The other will fade into the history books, I am sure.

 

Lance Armstrong is probably the best thing that cancer patients have for inspiration today.  His book, “It’s Not About the Bike” is a motivational, epic story about his rise and fall and rise that can lift fallen spirits and give hope when all hope is lost.

His life is written like a fairy tale and gives us mortals a glimmering chance that great things in life can happen.

 

If he is found to be a doper will all his work for cancer become erased?  Will all who reach out to him for inspiration lose hope? Will his legacy and foundation become erased?

 

I want to believe that Lance accomplished all he did honestly. 

I want to live the rest of my life believing in a real hero.

 

 

 

They say that what goes around comes around so this month the Propeller Brewing / PedalTrout Rider of the Month comes to us by way of nomination from a past winner, Doug Smith.

Steve Bedard is Co-chair of the Halifax Cycling Coalition. According to Doug, "He's been doing a ton of work on planning and is about to present a proposal to the city for a bicycle lane or path that connects each end of the Halifax peninsula. He also has a small newsletter. He is one of the main people in the HCC." In fact, Steve joined the HCC in 2007-2008 as Director of Education and Advocacy.

While Steve spends a considerable amount of time making things happen with the HCC, he also finds time to pedal his Giant OCR and compete in duathalons and distance running events around Nova Scotia.  The Wolfville native is also on the verge of graduating in Nursing so it's a pretty safe bet that he doesn't have too much downtime on his hands. Despite his serious aspirations and dedication to making Halifax a better place to ride, Steve manages to maintain a wicked sense of humour and can only be described by his friends as "Overall great guy, totally wacky!"

WE can't think of a better bunch of reasons to make someone Rider of the Month so on behalf of PedalTrout and Propeller Brewing, congratulations, Steve! Your Propeller prize pack is in the mail.

Do you know someone who should be the PedalTrout/ Propeller Brewing Rider of the Month? Send us your nomination.

On the road!

By William Clarke

I live for the 8 hours of Gore.  Really I do. The atmosphere and the camaraderie are unheard of at many other sporting events that I have partaken in during my thirty-two years here on planet Earth.
I am not an elite level racer, nor do I really consider myself a weekend warrior.  I eat a lot of hamburgers and rare steaks and love a cold homebrew, oh and ice cream cones from Withrows Farm Markets.  I am just a guy with a couple of bikes who likes to ride.

Nonetheless I always look forward to competing at Gore. This year my training was a little less cycling and a lot of backpacking. My wife (bikergrl) and I spent vacation backpacking in Iceland, I carried a 28 kilo pack for four days across glaciers and up and down mountains, so I wasn’t really sure what to expect from my body come race day.

When the calendar hit August 9 and our alarm went off at 6 am I was very, very glad to see that it wasn’t raining.  In fact it promised to be a beautiful Sunday.

Like little kids eager for Santa we ate breakfast and chugged our coffee before making the short drive to Gore.
Coming over Court House hill we could see the MTB village up in the field, the morning dew glistening off of the grass and the sun slowly rising up over the horizon were signs that it was going to be a great day.

For those who are not familiar with the concept of the 8 hours of Gore I will explain it a little.  It involves riding a bicycle around a course a tad longer than 7 km long as many times as possible in an 8 hour time window.
It can be done in teams of three, two, or as I chose solo. There is also a single speed category for crazy people.

The race starts at the bottom of a fire road with a foot race to the top of a hill where all of the bikes are waiting, from there it is a mad dash through the field to the little trail head to avoid the bottle neck, from that point on the day becomes a little blurry…

Last year I managed to get 11 laps out of my body while the winner (Martin The Machine Austin) threw down 14.  Before the race started this year I promised myself that I would do 14 laps stupid, stupid!!
I felt really strong for the first three laps, I was hydrating really good, pacing myself well, the bike was handling the technical stuff without any help from me (or so it felt) and then the cramping started.  The pain was not nearly as bad as last year but enough to make a difference in my goal.  I had added a pinch of salt to my water to help prevent the cramps and quickly figured out that I need to add a pinch more.  The next pit stop fixed the cramps, but the back pain was just starting, and then I couldn’t get into my big ring, But hey the sun was still shining and I just could not get that big cheesy grin off of my face and I was having a blast.
All of the cheers and encouragement from the people there really helped me on my way, or was I just hearing the elves in my head singing elf songs.  I am not really sure any more.  By lap 13 I am positive that the smile had vanished and my body was becoming lifeless. That’s when my brain told my body to, “ suck it up princess and keep spinning.”


By the end of the day my GPS told me that I rode 99.62 km with a moving time of 7h 47m so when you factor in the price of admission it only cost me about $4.69 an hour to have an awesome time.