Chipps ponders those moments where the path you choose makes all the difference.
We all like to think that we’re, to a greater extent, in charge of our own destinies. Those decisions we make every day propel ourselves towards some ultimate goal. Occasionally, though, life throws us a tangent and we end up down a different trail. That nudge can be tiny, but the effects can be dramatic.
Mountain biking seems to amplify these little shifts too, with the smallest of things having great effect. Simply staying upright on a bike is an exercise in micro-shifts in steering and weight balance. Too much overcorrection and you’ll be in the hedge, but anyone who’s ridden a bike with stiff or seized headset bearings will testify that not being able to steer at all is as impossible to control as too much.
Usually, these micro moments in life and bike riding pass unnoticed. Taking one track over another at the trail fork, or riding in the morning compared to the afternoon. Every decision affects what choices you’ll have to make next. But that’s just life. There are times, though, where you can see directly how your decisions are going to affect how things turn out later that day. These are usually in situations where time, daylight or warmth are at a premium and whatever you do has a direct consequence on what happens next.
I’m thinking about that puncture that happens on a late afternoon run down a foreign mountain to catch the last chairlift of the day, on the wrong side of the hill from home. Everyone snaps to attention to help get that tube fitted with minimal faff: one rider gets the tube or the tyre plugs, another rider gets the pump from a third rider – but picking Bob’s pump over Harry’s sees the valve head tear off the new tube, leading to renewed panic as the clock ticks and riders search for new tubes to fit. Those ‘spare, spare’ tubes might have been packed at the bottom of a bag months ago, so who is confident that their tube hasn’t had a tool wearing a hole in it? And, all the while, the clock ticks and your future oscillates between the triumphant last lift back or a half-hour taxi ride round the mountain back to the hotel leaving your bikes stashed in a hedge.
Or there are moments on a damp British hill, where you’re in a cloud and presented with a fork in the trail. One way leads swiftly to a pub fire and at least three baskets of curly fries, while the other leads to several more hours of riding and perhaps a trudge across a featureless bog in the fading light… At the time, though, the consequences are forgotten and we’re going to pick the trail that looks the most tempting from the 200 metres or so we can see of the choices. At least it’s a choice.
There are other times, though, where there’s no choice and you’re a complete bystander to the mountain bike world as it sails past. Usually this is when you’re crashing. A hidden rock or diagonal root and you’re suddenly facing the wrong way and looking for the ejector seat handle. Time here nearly stands still, as your heightened senses take in every stimulus and clue in order to get out with the least damage to self and bike. Your brain scans back over the last second of visual info, making complicated, geometric calculations of your speed and trajectory (and a prediction of where your bike will end up, if it’s not with you any more). Then it checks the likelihood of self-arrest handholds on the trees whizzing past as you head towards the unknown edge. Eyes drink in all of the information: is the ground hard (bad) or wet and slippery (also bad)? Can you see anything beyond the approaching edge? Are those the tops of trees far below? Or are they soft and welcoming saplings that’ll bend under your approaching velocity? Your ears listen out – is that the cold emptiness of a void ahead of you? And finally, are your friends laughing at your flailing descent? Perversely, this is often a good sign – it’s when they gasp with shock that you know you’re in trouble. And if all you can hear is stony silence, followed by rushing footsteps, then you know you’re really in trouble.
All of this is a mere wrong root away. But we keep coming back and rolling the dice at the gaming table of mountain biking because most of the time, we win big – and that makes the odds worthwhile.