Keep pedaling
Two seasons ago I competed in a 50 mile mountain bike race. The race course meandered its way through the Black Hills of South Dakota outside the picturesque town of Spearfish, climbing (and descending) more than 6000 feet of elevation from start to finish. Unlike many mountain bike races that accumulate most of the miles on gravel forest service roads, this course was almost entirely on singletrack. (For those unfamiliar with the term, imagine a rocky, dirt path that is just wide enough to fit a single person or bike.) The course would demand a level of physical output and mental focus far above most other races. Professional athletes were expected to finish in less than 5 hours and the event organizer would begin shutting down the course by about 10 hours. The morning of the race, I warmed up with friends who had been working with a coach all season and I found his words on point for more than just the event. He began by reminding his athletes of the work they had completed to get to this point, of the successes they had already demonstrated. He reminded them that they had each developed a plan for the race and encouraged them to stick to their individual plan — to not be swayed by what other athletes were doing. And then he said, “At some point today, you will likely find yourself in a bad place. It may be a crash, it may be nutrition, it may simply be physical and mental fatigue. When that happens, keep pedaling.”
In psychology, the term “grit” refers to an individual’s perseverance to overcome obstacles combined with a passion for a particular long term goal. (Not coincidentally, one of the bike brands began using the term “grit” to define the difficulty of a particular course.) Volumes have been written on the topic of perseverance in the face of adversity, about overcoming challenges, about heroic outcomes despite the odds… but nothing captures the mental fortitude in the face of the darkness as elegantly as “keep pedaling.” There are always forces at play that are beyond our control, despite the best laid plans and preparation; perseverating on uncontrollable externalities is unproductive at best (and potentially destructive at worst). “Keep pedaling” focuses on what is controllable, despite the unforeseen and despite the inevitable changes to course.
For better or worse, I’ve had ample opportunity in my life to build up my perseverance and grit. I’ll make an attempt to share some of those stories in the coming months. (There is an entire saga that cuts close to the bone and I’m still struggling with reliving them through writing. But those are stories for another day.)
Last year I had many grand plans for adventures on snow, dirt, water, and beyond. All of those adventures were sidelined when I tore my ACL in March and had ACL reconstruction surgery in April. I made it 48 years without a major injury — that was an incredible run, all things considered. Talking with the medical team and many friends who had been through this before me, the choice was clear. If I lived a more sedentary life, I could have taken the John Elway approach and chosen to carry on without this critical stabilizing ligament in my knee. But as one surgeon put it, I didn’t want to be hopping through a boulder field in the alpine environment many miles from nowhere and have to worry about my knee giving out. The procedure went as good as the medical team could have hoped and then the long road to recovery began in earnest.
I spent a lot of time researching the medical literature for the specific procedure that I had performed. What I should have spent more time appreciating was the recovery. I had been warned by many friends (and medical professionals) of the importance of doing the physical therapy, but I honestly never gave it much thought. Of course I would do the physical therapy (PT)— there was never a doubt about it. As the months turned to quarters, the mantra of Keep Pedaling was a consistent driving force for me. In some ways, the mantra was quite literal as the first and some of the best PT was time spent on first a stationary bike (with one leg propped up) then moving to my gravel bike, and then to the mountain bike. And it was also mental — I took the opportunity to use this time as a reset for my body and made a goal to come back stronger than ever. Keep pedaling.
The mantra is applicable in science and business as well. Good experimental design always provides an answer to a question; that answer disproves a hypothesis more frequently than it proves it, triggering another cycle of hypothesis generation and testing. Keep pedaling. Commercial partners are fickle and markets are volatile. Keep pedaling. A potential partner will invite you to travel halfway around the world to close a deal only to ignore everything that was discussed for the prior year. Keep pedaling. Feedstock costs and product pricing will change year over year, triggering more or different contingency plans. Keep pedaling. The regulatory landscape may change in your favor (e.g., carbon tax) or it may delay a product launch (e.g., bureaucracy at its finest).
Keep pedaling.
