Gate #60

On September 14 I raced the third race of six that I had planned this year.  It’s a very big race year for me, but I thought I should do it while I am relatively healthy and able.

This race was the Baja 400 in Mexico.  I entered on a motorcycle in the 60 and over class.  That’s the oldest class they have bracketed out and is typically used by ex-pro racers – guys with a lot of experience and smarts.  If they weren’t smart, their career would have been over a long time ago.

There was a team of four riders, a team of five riders, and me.  I was solo.  I wanted to solo it and become the oldest to ever do so.  If I had four guys on my team I could go 100 miles and give the bike to the next guy.  That’s easy.  But I don’t race to make it easy.  

I preran the whole course.  205 miles on Tuesday.  Brutal.  I was so beat at the end of the day.  Armando was my chase truck driver and I had my film crew of Ted and Jesse with me as we are trying to make “Into the Dust 5”.  We were at a taco stand in Valle Trinidad, a dusty little town 2 1/5 hours from our hotel in Ensenada.  I was very uncomfortable just sitting up in the van’s passenger seat.  If we went back to Ensenada tonight we’d have to come back here in the morning to pick up the pre-running where I left off.

Armanda suggested we stay in this little town that night to save five hours of driving.  I jumped at the idea.  No toiletries, no change of clothes….but I needed to sleep.

My knees aren’t great and I had a nagging shoulder injury that hurts some when I ride.  You might think that if I was this uncomfortable and beat after 205 miles, how could I race the 432 miles on race day (Saturday)?  I always wonder the same thing.   But I have experience and I know that on race day you can out things together that you couldn’t on a regular day.  Don’t think about that.  Just get some rest right now.

In the morning I put all the same dirty clothes and gear on and set out for another 170 miles.  At the end of the day – I was beat and just wanted to lay down.  Baja is very rough.  It’s hard to explain.  The course takes me on terrain you would have great difficulty walking on.  Steep hills climbs and decents.  Silt filled ruts.  Rocks.  Deep sand.  And it goes forever – and ever.

I rested on Thursday.  On Friday we went through tech inspection, got interviewed on the podium, and waded through the throngs of race fans who showed up for a pre race festival to see all the race vehicles.  Then I had to get my gear on again.  The last thing I wanted to do the day before the race was to burn more energy.  I needed to rest.  But I had to prerun the first 30 miles and the last 20 miles of the course.  They only open it for prerunning the day before the race, and the last section was brand new in the hills, which I had heard would be a challenge.  I’d hit it in the dark on race day so I needed to see what I was getting into.

At 6 pm there was a mandatory rider meeting.  After that I went to my hotel room and tried to sleep.  It’s not easy to sleep when you have to get up at 2:45 am to get geared up and go to staging.  I didn’t sleep much.

At 2:45 the alarm went off and I dutifully got up (I was awake) and began doing what my morning preparation checklist said to do.  KT tape in 8 places, sunblock on the back of my neck, socks, padded bicyclists tights with a padded butt, bicyclists shorts with padded butt, knee braces…..

I ate the sandwich and banana I had in my room for breakfast while I got ready.  I walked out to the parking lot where my team had my bike ready. I got on and started the beast, and rolled through the city streets of Ensenada to the starting line.  The starter official put us in order.  At 4:15 they started letting bikes go. Every 60 seconds for the Pro Unlimited Class, then every 30 seconds after that. 

But this was just a ceremonial start. We were in the middle of a big city. Granted there was no traffic at this time, but you can’t go screaming through a city at race speed without grave danger.  So we gathered up and got a police escort 17 miles up into the hills where they had a timed start location. 

On my way through town my GPS wasn’t tracking.  Oh no.  I shut it down and rebooted it while I was riding.  Problem solved.  

We ascended up and away from the Pacific Ocean and city heat island and the temperature went down.  I had only a thin race jersey on and I was freezing.  As we got closer to the timed start we rode into a fog bank.  This is worst-case scenario for vision.  My goggles fogged up.  Luckily I was prepared with a white terry washcloth hanging from a wire tie on my backpack strap.  I could reach down with my left hand and grab it and wipe my goggles off.

It was 5:10 am now.  Thirty seconds before I was to get the real green flag I watched the rider in front of me take off into the darkness and fog and disappear.  My turn.  I hit the gas and let the clutch out.  432 miles to go.

There was no wind.  Dust from the guys in front of me hung in the air and stuck to my wet goggles.  I had to wipe my goggles with my trusty rag every 20 seconds.  How long before it became filthy and saturated?

I had to go slow because I could not see.  The beginning had a lot of off-camber turns where the course pitches left but turns right.  It’s these conditions that break bones and end your race if you over ride them.

Slow going.  Dust.  Fog. Dark.  50 minutes later I notice the sky is getting lighter – there is a horizon.  Slowly, mile by mile, it gets lighter.  I can start seeing in color – the colors of the desert.  Up into the hills and I breakout of the fog.  I’m riding a ridge looking down at the top of the clouds – like riding in heaven.

Back down into the fog.  At mile 40 I meet my east side chase team for the first time.  Another rider comes in screaming in pain.  He crashed in the fog and broke his shoulder and foot.

I swap my goggle rag and get going.  I pass one bike in my class – I’m in second place after starting third.  The fog is burning off from sunlight.  My cold hands are aching on the grips.  The temperature is coming up and it feels good. 

370 miles to go…

Keep your goals in front of you

At the beginning of this year I wrote all my goals for the year down on one index card.  I have personal goals, business goals, family goals – all of them.

I have that index card on a little stand at my desk where I see it everyday. 

When I accomplish a goal, I color it with a yellow highlighter.

Do you have goals written down?  If so you are a small group – only 3% of Americans do.  Once written however, keep the goals in front of you every day.  Re-read them.  If you do you will find yourself acting on them.

Live on purpose.

Get it!

There's nothing wrong with being wrong

“If anyone can prove and show me that I think and act in error, I will gladly change it – for I seek truth, by which no one has ever been harmed.  The one who is harmed is the one who abides in deceit and ignorance.” – Marcus Aurelius

If you are getting better then you SHOULD be changing your mind about things. 

Do you want the same ideas, beliefs, and philosophies that you had when you were 25 years old when you are 50?

Search for truth, not validation that you are right.

It’s ok to see and admit you were wrong and change your mind.

The "Tough Crowd"

“Don’t join an easy crowd.  You won’t grow. Go where the expectations and the demands to perform are high.” – Jim Rohn

Do the people you have around with have high expectations of you?

Does conforming to them mean you have to up your game?

Clear Mental Pictures

Your mind can’t act on fuzzy mental pictures.

A person can accomplish anything so long as they can see very clear mental pictures of themselves doing it first.

Take the time to establish a clear mental picture of what you see yourself doing, being or having.

Get very clear.  See it first.

Then keep it present in your mind until it becomes a reality.

From the inner, the outer.

Race Report!

For those that don’t know – I race.  Desert racing to be exact.  Long distances.  Two wheels sometimes, and four wheels sometimes.  It gives me a reason to stay in shape, something to look forward to, and teaches me mental and physical toughness that makes the rest of life easy.

I am racing 6 races this year.  Two on a motorcycle, and four in a desert race car (UTV).  Three races down, three to go now.  I am behind on reporting.  The second race was the longest race in the United States – Vegas to Reno.  I soloed the 555 miles with my navigator Dustin Gebers who is from Nashville area.  

There is no pre-running this race.  You show up and race it by following a GPS and course markers.  

We started 5th of 8 in our class. By mile 20 we were in third but we hit a big rock in a silt rut I couldn’t get out of fast enough and got a flat. Dustin changed it but it took longer than normal (11 minutes, should be 4-5) because of some technical difficulties. 

15 vehicles went by us in that time and we were now last with 535 miles to go. We worked our way back up. 

Trying to pass is tough in the dust. You are blinded the closer you get to the guy you want to pass. But lucky there was some wind to help blow the dust away. 

There are 13 pits set up. Our strategy is to only stop twice for fuel at pit 5 and pit 10. Our chase team would throw ziplock bags with sandwiches to us and on smooth sections Dustin could hand me pieces of sandwich while I was driving. That and Kind bars kept us going for 12 hours of non- stop driving at race speed. 

This strategy worked as we passed a couple of our own class competitors while they were pitting and we weren’t, but we passed many race vehicles from other classes who were making dust in front of us. We didn’t change drivers like most other teams either. That takes about four minutes each change.  So no race vehicle in this 555 mile race stopped less than us. One flat and two 90 second pits. 

We caught up, 5th, 4th, 3rd, 2nd….we passed our main competitor from Baja and the Factory Honda team who both broke down. We were told that we were 8 minutes behind the leader. (When we drive through a pit we are close enough for VHF radio communication to our team, and they’d tell us how far back we were). 50 miles later they said 10 minutes. 

Our Honda Talon is underpowered with only 105 hp compared to most others who have 130 or so. (We are a non-turbo class). So on the high-speed straight sections they were doing about 10-15 mph faster and that’s where they’d pull away on us. In the technical sections, (which means rocks or tight turns) we’d catch up. 

Then the leader had to pit once for five minutes and another pit for 7 minutes to work on their car. We were only 4 minutes down with 80 miles to go. At one point about 50 miles out we saw a UTV on the side with the driver out working on the car. We thought (hoped) we could be in the lead. But it was not them. 

The last 35 miles, were brutal rocks up and down the mountain. We made it through fast and with no flats. The leader got a flat there but had it changed in 4 minutes and he had pulled on us again on the fast sections before that. 

We crossed the finish line fourteen minutes behind him so it was not to be. We finished second. 

Besides the one preventable flat (my bad) we ran a perfect race.  Dustin called the turns perfectly for 12 straight hours without a break. We were physically run down for sure.

So far this year I have one motorcycle race and one UTV race completed- with two second place finishes. Four more races left including the two most epic races on the planet – The Baja 1000 and Dakar in Saudi Arabia. 

I’ll give you report on my September Race soon – solo the Baja 400 on a motorcycle!

Do YOU DO hard things to test yourself?

Want to look ten years younger and feel good now?

Want to look ten years younger in an instant?

Smile.

AND, when you smile at people, they smile back at you…which makes you want to smile.

AND, when you smile it uses many muscles in your face to do so.  When those muscles are activated like that it sends a message to your brain that you are happy.  The brain then releases the feel-good chemicals into your bloodstream and you actually feel good and happy.

You can wait for something to come along to smile about, or you can smile and be happy now.

Try it.

Habits of a champion!

“Live a champion’s lifestyle.  Live champion habits.” – Mike Tyson

If someone else accomplished that big goal that you have, what would their habits be?

What are yours?

You have to have the habits of a winner to be a winner.

What habits do you need to get rid of?

What daily activities do you need to will yourself to do each day until they become an easy habit?

From the inner – the outer

“Be the champion in your mind first before you can be the champion in real life.” – Mike Tyson

From the inner – the outer.  In that order, always.

The world gives you what you deserve.

You have to be the person that gets the results before you get the results.

Are you being the person who gets the results you are getting now – or the person who gets the results you want to get?

This is about YOU

The better you get, the better “IT” is. 

Your life getting better is not about anything but you getting better.

It’s not about the economy, the company, your friends, or outside events.

It’s not about your boss, the weather, interest rates, the election or prices.

It’s about you.

Once you accept that, you are in control.