Collegiate MTB Deer Hit Rescue

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Yesterday took a bunch of twists. I like days like that, usually. Days you think are going to go one way and they end up going another. I went over to the Walberg’s to finish up the tile floors. I was planning on riding to Lawrence on gravel, but when I went out to leave, my van wouldn’t start. The batteries are toast and I’m trying to wait until after the weekend to change them. It takes a few hours. So, I just got in Catherine’s car and drove home. Both Keith and Catherine are out in Seattle now, so no one was going to miss it.

I get dressed quickly and was just ready when my friend, Ian, showed up to ride. It was a little ugly pedalling. I’ve sort of felt like I’ve had a mild cold or something the last week or two. I think it’s probably just allergies, plus driving 1000+ miles, and standing a ton. Whatever the reasons, my legs were super flat. We had a 20 mph tailwind on gravel riding East towards Lawrence on the River Road. In the back of my mind, I kept thinking how ugly it was going to be riding back West home. Ian had to abandon me to get back to work by 5pm, so I was on my own after 25 miles. I got to Lawrence relatively unscathed, but knew the ride back was going to be much harder. I got a cup of coffee and a donut and headed back.

I was surprised that it didn’t seem that much harder riding back. Maybe the windblock on the gravel was more than I had anticipated. Anyway, I was better than I thought, even though I was dragging. I called Bill and he was riding out to meet me. He had to go and help his Aunt with a roof issue, so he couldn’t start with us. Bill met me about 12 miles out on his road bike. By then I was in steady state, so it was what it was. I got home, not destroyed, but pretty tired.

Tuesday is the easy night, beer ride, for the local guys. I thought I’d go and see if my van would start, come back, get a beer with the guys and then work on my MTB bike. It all went good, van immediately started, met up with the guys before it got too late, and then went over to The Burger Stand to eat. Sometimes when I do longer, 4+ hour rides, eating red meat seems to add recovery. Maybe it’s only psychosomatic, but it really doesn’t matter. I don’t eat much meat in general, so I don’t worry about it.

Anyway, right in the middle of a burger, I get a text from Dave Wiens. I have known Dave forever, we were inducted into the Mountain Bike Hall of Fame together, but it is unusual getting a text from him late at night. He tells me that his guys from Western States, in Gunnison, are driving to Collegiate MTB Nationals in North Carolina and that they hit a deer near Topeka. He wanted to know if I could help out. He said he thought they were towing the van and trailer to the Ford dealer in Topeka and after that, they had no plan.

So, I text Dave back and said I could help. My mind started going over the different options and I figured that the best option would be that I just meet them at the Ford dealer, hook the trailer to my van and send them on their way. Hopefully, next week when they were driving back through, their van would be repaired and they would trade back. I was a little worried about how many of them were in the van, since my van is only a 12 passenger and Dave said they were driving a 16 passenger.

Dave texted me back and said they got their van moving and that there were only 4 in the van. Next thing I know, I get a call from the college guys saying they were pretty much in Topeka and wanted to try to get their headlight up and running. I imagined the worse, so I told them how to get to a Walmart, to get a headlight, and rushed home and grabbed a ton of tools from my garage. I grabbed a couple crow bars, a come along, a few different mallets/hammers, plus wire, Gorilla tape, etc.

The guys from the beer ride wanted to check out the situation, so by the time I got there, it was a small herd of people standing around looking at the damage. It wasn’t bad at all. Pretty much the right side was smashed, but not bad enough to push the fender back into the wheel. The headlight assembly was toast, but other than that, it was fine. I asked about the rumor of towing and they said that when you run into something in a van, there is a turn-off system and they had to flip a switch under the dash to allow the vehicle to run again. I’ve never heard of something like that.

Right then, the kids from Western States came out of the Walmart with a single light bulb. I told them that they needed the whole sealed light, not just a bulb. They were pretty lucky that they were driving a Ford van that doesn’t have a custom headlight and takes just a standard, dual beam, square headlight. We went back in and got the right light assembly. They were also lucky the still had the housing to mount the light. It was a pretty easy “fix”.

I pretty much just wired the light back into place. I had to drill a few holes into the plastic housing, wiring it back together and to attach the light assembly back to its position. It took maybe 20 minutes and they were good to go. I asked them if they wanted to stay, but they had to drive straight through because they were picking up the rest of their team in Asheville today.

We sent them over to an all-night local Mexican restaurant and off they went. I sort of wanted just to drop everything and head off with them. It would have been refreshing hanging with those guys for a few days. They had so much enthusiasm. I texted them this morning, but haven’t heard back from them yet.

I slept until 9:30 this morning. I haven’t slept that late for months. I still have to work on my MTB bike and do all the rest of the stuff I didn’t do yesterday. I decided that I’m going to go over and ride the Berryman Epic MTB race on Saturday. It is 56 miles, virtually all singletrack, South of St. Louis in the Mark Twain National Forest. They added 8 more miles of single track, so it really is nearly all singletrack. I don’t really have the form for a 4 1/2 to 5 hour MTB race on rocky singletrack, but that shouldn’t stop me. I’ve won the race the last couple years, so I don’t have anything to prove, but it is always nice to ride good where you’ve won before. I’m going to rest up, there is no reason to be tired for a long race like this. Brian is doing the race too, so we’re going to drive there early Friday, ride just a little and then race on Saturday. It should be fun.

Hardly a flesh wound. I expected much worse.

Hardly a flesh wound. I expected much worse.

I just wired it back into position.

I just wired it back into position.

It's a good thing they didn't try to swear to avoid the deer with this setup.

It’s a good thing they didn’t try to swear to avoid the deer with this setup.

The portrait in front of the Walmart sign.

The portrait in front of the Walmart sign.

Finished floor, with a little grout haze.

Finished floor, with a little grout haze.

Unbelievable Chris Horner

This entry was posted in Comments about Cycling on by .

I’ve been sort of avoiding commenting on Chris Horner and his situation since……well since, I guess he started racing bikes. I’m a Chris Horner fan. I admit. I like the guy. But, he is most likely going to suffer the fate of all the others that have been exposed to be on the dark side recently and have to pay a price.

Chris, historically, hadn’t done too much to draw any individual attention to himself. That obviously changed when he spanked everyone at the Tour of Spain this year. I wrote a webpost a couple months ago, Something is Screwy with Chris Horner, wondering why he would call his shot and say he was planning on winning a Grand Tour when he had never finished on the podium before. I pretty much toned down that post, which I’m probably going to do here, somewhat.

But, the circumstances have changed since then and Chris’ situation is in the spotlight. A couple days ago, the New York Times did a piece titled, Anti-Doping Agency Exposed Armstrong, but What About Others? The article goes through a little of the background of the USADA decision, but the meat of the story is pretty much about Chris Horner and his situation.

It isn’t like it hasn’t been in the news before, but when the New York Times makes serious implications, then everyone should take notice. I’m sure that they contacted Chris to get his side of the story, which they didn’t include, so I surmise he didn’t respond. I know that you are supposed to be innocent until proven guilty, but in this day and age of cycling doping scandals, it doesn’t always work that way.

Cyclingnews did a story back in September titled, Is Chris Horner a redacted name in USADA’s Reasoned Decision? They contacted him and asked him pretty much outright if he is the redacted named rider #15 in the USADA report. Chris doesn’t answer the question and cuts the interview short. This isn’t a good sign for the future of Chris. There are forums all over the internet that address this. (Just type “Rider 15” into a Google search.) If someone calls me up and asks me if I’m a redacted name on the USADA report, I’m going to say, Hell No! That wasn’t Chris’ answer. Obviously, it is clear that Trek was up to speed with what was going on, so they failed to “offer” Chris a contract.

This makes me go back and think about all the times that Chris has destroyed me, and the rest of the field, over the last 15 years. I’ve ridden 100’s of races with the guy. Trying to put personal bias aside, he’d been doing it a long time domestically before he finally made the successful leap to Europe.

At the 2003 Redlands Classic, Chris, Tom Danielson and Nathan O’Neill, on the final day, the Sunset Loop, rode away, virtually from the gun and nearly lapped the field on a 6+ mile course. Three Saturn riders killing the whole rest of the field. It was a joke. I eventually just quit the race after trying to help Vaughters and his guys chase for a few laps, only to be losing nearly a minute a lap going full tilt. And we know what eventually happened to Tom and Nathan, eventually turning up positive or eventually having to confess. I have no idea why I would be so naïve to think that Chris wouldn’t be in the same class.

Later on in 2003, during the Tour of Georgia, Chris had the Saturn team setting tempo up a climb. Everyone was climbing hard when Chris pulled over to the side of the road, relieved himself, and casually rode back up to his slot behind his team. I heard that story from a few different guys. It totally destroyed the morale of nearly everyone in the field. Chris won this race overall.

Like I’ve said, more than once, I think Chris Horner is a good guy. I’ve watched him humble himself many times. He rode Cyclocross Nationals two years in a row in Providence. Both years, I had the “pleasure” to watch him hit the ground nearly harder than anytime I’ve ever fallen in a cross race. I obviously didn’t see him again during either of those races. But, he got up and finished both races. Back in the 30’s, but he didn’t quit. He just went about his business. He is really a blue-collar bike racer.

In the New York Times article, there is a quote from Matt DeCanio, saying Chris told him, “‘If everybody’s doing it, it ain’t cheating.’” That might have been the way of the past, but this is the present and we view it different now.

I view it different now. My personal view is if you are deemed to be positive once in your career, then all your previous results are valueless and should be ignored. That is hard for me to do here, because of my history with Chris, but there comes a time when enough is enough. And this is enough. Sorry Chris, your career has been unbelievable. But, not in the incredible definition, but the not able to believe, unlikely to be true, definition.

I kind of respect the guy, taking the big risk and winning the Tour of Spain, knowing the card house was collapsing around him. He could have stayed under the radar for a bit longer and just went about his business. You know the saying, Go Big or go Home. He went big, but in my opinion, it is time for him to just go home.


Chris, Todd Wells and me at Jingle Cross a few years back. Maybe Chris can come by Jingle Cross again, next month, for a last hurrah. Only this time as a spectator.