Unfounded Fears

I'm a wimp, I admit it right up front. I'm scared of pain, scared of crashing, and even scared being scared. On a recent ride I fully exposed my list of fears to my fellow riders. The only response I got was something to the effect of "you'd think somebody who used to race moto wouldn't be afraid of a little root or log". Another kind piece of advice was "you'll be fine, you just need some more confidence" or something along those lines. They just don't understand.

It was the same in MX when it came to clearing new obstacles, mainly double jumps. I'll assume you know what a double jump is, the name's kind of self explanatory. They would build them just far enough apart so if you backed off just a little you'd nose dive into the landing jump. Not fun. Or if you did clear it, maybe you'd clip your rear wheel on the landing jump, thus sending you head over heals. I thought about these things every time I lined up to do one. In fact I'd wake up early on race day in a cold sweat imagining the approach and what would happen if I failed.

I know that's negative thinking. I should picture myself flying off the take off and landing perfectly on the downslope. But I always thought about the crash instead. The root of all these problems goes back to my very first attempt to clear a double. Waaaaaay back in 1983 I entered a MX race in Milton Fl. I had a Yamaha 125 and absolutely no business racing MX. I'd only raced a couple of off road races before, how hard could it be?

This was the first double the track owner had ever built. I remember it being not much of a gap but deep, kind of like jumping a ditch. It was hard to roll it and dangerous since you ran the risk of getting jumped on. On the first lap of my first moto I was in the back of the pack as I came around to the jump. The only thing I remember is twisting the throttle and pulling back on the bars. The next thing I know track workers are gathered around me while I tried to breathe. The flagger said I looped over backwards and landed on my butt from about 6 feet in the air. I walked away eventually but it was weeks before I could take a breath without wincing.

Anyhoo, there you have it. I went on to clear some doubles but I never got comfortable with it. It's really amazing I participate in anything remotely dangerous. The point of all this old man rambling is that I have 2 obstacles that have buffaloed me when it comes to MTBing. If you know me you know what they are. They have both been cleared by almost everyone I know. But that doesn't help my fear. I can picture rounding the corner, gathering speed, lining up for the best line, pulling up on the bars, annnnnnnnnd plowing face first into the ground. I tell myself "this is the day I hit it" and then find some lame excuse to back off.

The only positive side of this is I've been able to enjoy some fairly dangerous sports for a long time (I raced my first moto off road race in 1974). I can still get out of bed in the morning without groaning and my list of broken bones is very short (so far, I don't like to tempt fate). But still I have a little panic when I think about that spot on Cadillac or that section on Red Bug. Some things never change. But you know what they call somebody with no fear? An ambulance.