Finally

Unless you’re a freak of nature, aka Benjamin Button, we all slow down as the years tick by. Another Benjamin, Benjamin Franklin, said it best: “In this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes”. 

With the passing of the years, there are things you want to accomplish before age or death catches up. Each of us has at least a few. Last year, I finally was able to tick off one, and that was the climb to Baguio. It wasn’t just a climb to the Summer Capital of the Philippines, in fact, it was two climbs in two days! Day 1 was along the Marcos Highway and day 2 along Kennon Road.

But there was one climb that I never conquered, until three weeks ago. My definition of “to conquer” is to ride without ever dismounting. I had done the climb across the Transcentral Highway about 10 times, and every time I do, this mountain always brings me down on my knees- meaning, I had to dismount and walk. I first scaled the TCH back in 1999, as a preparation for the Maskara Race in Bacolod, when about 25 percent of it was still gravel road. I came close to riding it all the way back 7 years ago, but I came to grief on that steel bridge just after Cansomoroy. From that time on, I never thought I’d beat the mountain.

I also thought that this route was a classic and I suggested it to be used in the annual Tour ni Frank. Its inclusion gave me an annual motivation to challenge it. However, I wasn’t getting any younger so I never believed that I could beat it.

In each TnF, my mindset was to race, and to always  race with the best until my wheels came off. As always, with my weight, I could only go with the climbers so far and then the suffer-fest begins. Like clockwork, I always dismount at the dreaded “C”, the steepest portion along Cansomoroy. Ironically, walking is “faster” than riding at this point, since you will be using another muscle group, allowing you to recover a bit before saddling up again.

This time, I prepared a different strategy. I was going to do this climb within my limits. You see, one of the more difficult parts in a bicycle race is conserving energy and then unleashing it later at the right time and place. If you can do that, you will win most of the time.

How to rein this aggressiveness in check is usually the problem. This time, I finally did it. I didn’t mind if I was at the tail end of the race, knowing that this was a 2-hour race and if you can’t manage your energy storage, you’ll run out of gas before the finish. I  wasn’t even tired in the end but I knew I was able to finally beat the mountain.

This was fourteen years in the making.