ALC overview

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This year on AIDS/LifeCycle, 1,840 riders raised $8M to end AIDS. People rode for all sorts of reasons: the physical challenge of the ride, a personal experience with AIDS such as the loss of a loved one, or being HIV+ themselves. On the night of the talent show, one man read a devastating poem about the loss or his partner, bringing the entire audience to tears. HIV+ riders had a special club, wore jerseys identifying themselves, and had preferential bike parking. The food was excellent and the entire event extremely well-organized. (In fact, I didn’t have a logistical problem until my first interface with the outside world, when I attempted to ride the Super Shuttle to the airport.) The follow describes a bit of my own experience:

Highlights:
• The peanut-chocolate thing from the top of the first hill, and the pie later that day (day 1) (See Note 1)
• Deep fried artichoke hearts with garlic mayo (day 2)
• Swimming in the river on the longest day (day 3) (See Note 2)
• Half-way to LA and the views from the top, and, honestly, climbing the “evil twins” of which there appeared to me to be 4 (day 4)
• Red dress day and dancing in the street of Casmalia (day 5) (See Note 3)
• Random conversations and learning about people (most days)
• No knee pain (See Note 4)
• “Mom and Dad” (See Note 5)
• Communication with the outside world (See Note 6)

Low points:
• Butt rash (despite at least one application of Chamois Butt’r every day) (See Note 4)
• Back and shoulder pain (See Note 4)
• PMS (See Note 7)

Note 1: We started from the Cow Palace in San Francisco early Sunday morning, and then rode over Hwy 92 to the coast. There’s a hill along that route. I was riding with the pig ladies (cyclists with pink seat covers and curly tails and pink helmet covers with little pink ears). That is, I was trying to keep up with them. We began the climb, and one said “Here comes the hill.”

Not noticing much, I said “this isn’t a hill.”

But she disagreed: “You’ll see.” And then she went on the say something encouraging like: “You’re looking good, looking strong.”

Anyway, there isn’t much to this story, other than for some reason they were very impressed with my climbing. They knicknamed me “frisky girl.” We reached the top, where volunteers generally hand out treats to the riders. I declined the red vines and chips ahoy, but then I saw a man handing out something that looked good. It was a kind of peanut shortbread dipped in really nice chocolate.

The next day, someone was talking about some treat they’d had. They wanted to marry its producer. I mentioned these peanut-chocolate treats. “Oh, I know that guy. But he has a boyfriend. You can’t marry him.” I tried to argue with her, but, well, you can probably guess that it went nowhere.

Note 2: I heard about the swimming that morning, and I wanted to make sure not to miss it. People assured me that that wouldn’t happen. The day was long, and my need for a cool dip increased as it passed.

Before the swimming hole, you cross a bridge. I looked over the edge of the bridge as I rode and saw only men. Now, they’re all gay; so, what difference does it make? But I didn’t want to be the only one in there with different parts. Once I stopped my bike, I realized that the ladies had self-segregated and were bathing under the bridge instead of beside it. I joined them.

The conversation quickly came to this self-segregation phenomenon. One woman had been reading about the “red tent” where women in biblical times would segregate themselves when they menstruated and tell stories similar to the ones in the bible but from women’s perspective. We quickly began to formulate our own adages: “one must wash one’s bottom 3 times before one puts back on one’s bike shorts after bathing if one has sat on a rock.” (The reason being to remove all sand from places where it may cause discomfort before locking it in place with bike shorts.) I was struck by how beautiful all these fit bodies looked – bike clothes don’t do anyone any favors, but this did.

Note 3: I had heard about red dress day before I left for the ride, but I didn’t realize how important it was. The idea began that riders should all wear red so that as they snaked up this one hill they would look like the red ribbon of solidarity with victims of AIDS. You can imagine how this quickly changed from “dress in red” day to wear a “red dress” day. I’ve heard that straight men who do the ride as much for the physical challenge as anything else begin by brushing off this tradition, but by their second year, they’re as decked out as anyone else.

But I only brought a red jersey, alas! I felt left out of the fun and like a disappointment to my fellow riders. Appearances ranged from gorgeous to comic in various get-ups. Someone observed that since the ride goes thru the same towns on day 5 every year, the locals probably think that the AIDS riders dress this way every day.

Day 5 is also by far the shortest day with only 45 miles to ride. So, when, in Casmalia, the second break stop and a small town with Erin-Brockovich-type problems, the general store piped dance music onto the street, I joined the dancers. Dancing in bike cleats is no small task, but we were more than up to it. And I thought to myself, these folks who have been bike touring hard for so many days, trying to raise money to end a pandemic, and are now disco dancing in the street in the middle of the day… these are my people.

Note 4: This is probably more information than some of you want…. But, when training, I had 3 physical complaints: my knees, my shoulders, and my butt. Well, at least one went away and was replaced with a new one: my mid-back. By the end of the ride, I started to notice entirely new pains, in my feet, for example. I heard many people complain of their “crotch” being “on fire” after a week in the saddle. But, strangely, that ended for all of us when we entered the LA City Limit. It’s as if our butts knew we were almost finished.

Note 5: One rider’s Mom and Dad follow the route each year and are somewhere along it every day to cheers us on. They have a sign that says “Mom and Dad” and they wear name tags to that effect as well. They look like any of our Mom and Dad’s – they’re super cute, and they play little drums for us (probably bc it can get tiring cheering for so many hours). I can imagine how much this must mean to some riders whose parents aren’t supportive of them (because they’re riding to end AIDS? because they’re gay?). Every time I saw them, I told them how much it meant to me to have their support.

Note 6: I had my mobile phone turned off during the day, and used it only between when I rolled into camp (between 3 and 7 PM, depending on the day’s mileage) and when I went to sleep (9 PM). I turned on my phone to find voice messages from my mother in France and texts from Jared. They always made me smile.

Note 7: One morning, the breakfast people sang to me as they served my breakfast. If you know me at all, you know how this went over. But I kept my jaw clenched shut and said nothing as I collected my oatmeal, eggs, fruit and breakfast meat. Fortunately, they didn’t have a problem with my silence. I decided it was wise to sit at a table alone and eat my breakfast quietly, avoiding any dangerous interactions.

But it only took a few moments for a couple of chipper women to join me. They bantered pleasantly and asked me how my ride was going. (Note, on the ride, no one says “How was your day?” or “Have a nice day.” Instead the word “day” is always replaced with “ride”.) I said OK, and then I added: “I’m sorry. I’m a non-talking morning person. It’s not personal, and I’m really a very nice person. I just don’t talk in the morning.” They were fine with that, and after a few minutes I was able to talk.

Just to bring the conversation full circle, on day 7 (some time later), I sat down with a group of women at lunch. I remembered one of them from lunch on day 1, but not the other two. One of them said: “I remember you. You were apologizing for your hair the other morning.”
“That doesn’t sound like me, but it’s possible,” I replied.
The second woman laughed, “No, I remember how we know you.” She laughed harder, “You’re the one who doesn’t talk in the morning. You were so funny.”
I guess I managed not to offend.

Around the same time as the breakfast singers, we rode our longest day. It was 105 miles, 5 miles more than the Wine Country Century I did with Jared about a month earlier. By the end of the day, I had had it. I rode into camp and, as usual, dozens of people cheered and welcomed me home. They had no right to do that. I scowled at them, and headed for the bike parking. One person even had the nerve to tell me to “smile, you made it!” I tried to comply, failed, and continued along my way with my mouth clenched tightly shut.

This reminded me of one of the opening speeches, at 5 AM the previous Sunday. Mark Cloutier, the executive director of the SF AIDS Foundation said (I paraphrase): “Over the next week you will be experiencing many emotions. One emotion that people don’t talk about is the grumpy bitch emotion. Riders, grumpiness is not a victimless crime. On day 4, when you find that you have just yelled at the woman trying to hand you a banana, you will think ‘why did I do that? I’m not a bitch.’ So, when you feel the grumpy bitch coming on, I want you to think instead ‘I’m a kitty. You’re a kitty.’” And he made stroking motions with his hand in the air.

I didn’t use Mark’s mantra suggestion, but I still wanted to share it with you. I’m proud that I rode my bicycle from San Francisco to Los Angeles. Now that I’ve done it, I realize that it’s a very very long way to ride a bike. Possibly even more impressive is that, through that process, I didn’t say anything unkind out loud.


THANK YOU to ALL my sponsors. An additional special thanks goes to Alison, for driving me to the Cow Palace at 5 AM Sunday morning (!), and to my mother, for the songs and voice messages of encouragement from France every day of the ride and for her un-equaled assistance with my fundraising efforts. I couldn’t have done it without you!

I’ll add other stories if I remember them.