I hadn't had the easiest two weeks leading up to yesterday's race, the Frank O' Rourke memorial in my home county. A week ago my daughter wound up in hospital with pneumonia and in the previous week I'd had that seasonal pain-in-the-face (No the farmers aren't pulling silage yet), actually it was sinusitis. I felt more than a little sheepish signing on. A couple of easy spins in ten days hardly qualified me as a contender. Maybe marshalling would have been a better option? How do you disappoint all those smiling faces; the people who've relied on you and given a damn?
Scarier than my impending retirement (that I seem to be dragging the ass out of) was the bunch of cyclists in my race. You see, the Christian Brothers may have hit me 35 years ago as a reminder that my maths ability was Neanderthal, but on yesterday's start line I did a quick calculation and worked out that more than half wouldn't have had the pleasure of knowing/ racing with/ been on the receiving end of the rapier wit of... Frank O'Rourke. That scared me because I don't fit in anymore. Bygone era and all that. Frank tore strips off me in races more than 15 years ago. At about twice my age. He helped us all to race hard and smart. One of only a handful of Wexford men that did it all in Irish cycling circles. And when I went to his removal I just remember feeling a little lost.
And that's ages ago. Most of us have grown up. A lot of us have come back to cycling. The races we did have died. And now I feel like a Luddite, not wanting change. Too happy to sip red wine and wear rose tinted glasses.
So Frank took a break from his celestial chaingang yesterday afternoon and cycled beside me on the back road. It was obvious to him I'd burned all my matches just getting to the race. A waste. So he channelled his raspy-voiced spirit into a couple of buckos that escaped up the road, buckos who subsequently handed us our asses and a lesson in grit and spit. All thanks to Frank mind... for that was how he rode.
So I can do two things. I can call it a day, grab a bag of Amber Leaf and some skins and sit on my front doorstep regaling passers-by with stories of valour and bravery on the roads to nowhere. Or see out the season with Frank's attitude in my head. What have I to lose? I know its hard to keep going and justify racing. But I feel it would be even harder to simply fade out. Harder in the long run. So what's the plan? Yesterday I met a whole bunch of people that maybe don't race so much as they used to but when they did... they did. And most of them knew Frank. And I feel I let them down. I've only got a few races left. Why not rewind the newsreel to the good old days? Give those folks a show? Failing that, for nothing else than to remind myself (when I am smoking roll-ups on the doorstep) that I tried hard. That I made the race. That something I did, counted. Aggression, surprise, cunning... just to utter those words, thrills me.
So what if lots of those I raced against yesterday have no clue who the race was in memory of? That's just time. No reason though not to get back in there and remind them of his legacy. Wexford cycling was full of attacking, have-a-go heroes when I got stuck in. Why can't we see a little of that again?
I was tired yesterday but a little rest and we'll get going again. There was no way I'd miss the race though. No way. Annual Pilgrimage to one of my religious icons.
That era is what got me through life. I can't thank Frank and his kind enough. All of those leagues and line-outs are like a giant tattoo on the inside of my skin, a deep, personal homage to a magical time. When I hang up my racing wheels I'll make sure the hubs are rough from thousands of miles in slop and rain and peeling heat. I imagine the rims will be scored and scoured thin from stopping and cornering, the spokes brittle from inertia. Twenty weeks to say goodbye in a manner that befits my beginnings. Sounds like a challenge.
Sorry about yesterday Frank. It won't happen again.
No comments:
Post a Comment