Am I ready? I seem to be asking myself this question more and more as the event looms.


With less than a week before the start of the Trans-Sylvania Epic, I made an empty attempt at preparing for this magnanimous event with a checklist:



Regardless of how well I feel I am riding, I can't seem to garner the will to consolidate these items quite yet. It would seem too real, too immediate. I trusted my fitness in the past few months, but do I trust it now?


For quite a while now, I resolved to a theory that went something like this: you won't attain anything in a race that you can't create in training.


Although a seemingly logical assertion, this line of thought is simply boring and tends to ignore a blatantly human element in the equation. We don't race to reaffirm a wattage or a heart rate, and we are more than a number of accumulated miles and intervals. Sure, training is a way to "build fitness," as the common adage states, but it has a separate (and much more interesting) function. Training is reconnaissance; training is a way to throw yourself headfirst into the walls of your fitness, if only to know where they stand. Then, you can imagine the repetition of training as the monotonous rapping of a small chisel against these walls, creating ever so gently the soft cracks in the foundation. When the tune of the race reaches its grand crescendo, at the very time you find that wall again, the hours spent rapping and cracking those walls reward you: the walls are but ruins, small stones, dust for you to blur past; it is during the race that you destroy the constructs of your restraints.


It may only be a thought in its infancy, but this new theory is much more rewarding than the first. For three months, I have been rapping at my own walls. I found the limits of how long I can sustain without food, or water (both situations were accidental, but important lessons nonetheless). I found the limits of how long I can sustain myself without a day of rest, and the limits of my optimism when fitness is more elusive than palpable. I found that the extra time spent on my bike has given me extreme precision with my technical skills, and that these skills can save energy, or embarrass full-suspension riders, depending on how I use them. I found out that not everything will work in your favor, that the winds will not always be at your back, and the sun will not always be above your head. I found out that if experience means anything at all, it means you won't be shocked when these unique problems arise. Oh, I have been rapping at these walls I found, and slowly breaking them down.


And yet, in spite of all my preparation, I still can't seem to reconcile the magnitude of this event. Seven days. Seven tough days. It's a wall that training can do little to prepare you for. But this is not a debilitating barrier, oh no! Rather, it's a barrier that produces one dominating thought: Well, let's see what we can do.


In the end, this race is like any other. It is a test of potential and will, a silly way to validate our fascination with a sport hell-bent on breaking us down to the bones. When the day ends, the only thing left to do will be to smile, mockingly, with the knowledge that even at our worst moments, we remain triumphant in our accomplishments, not because we succeeded in them, but because we strived to achieve them.


Am I ready for the Trans-Sylvania Epic? Who knows. But I can affirm I am trained, anxious, and captivated, a mix of states which, for me, promises nothing less than a spectacular, unforgettable experience. My experience with training taught me a lot about myself, and was rewarding for more than just the fitness. With each week the lessons accumulated, the skills sharpened, and the walls cracked away to reveal more potential than I knew was possible...


Now, it's time to start checking off that list; I'm ready.