A Dog in a Hat…

That is the title of a most excellent book by Joe Parkin about the less glamorous side of professional cycling. Never heard of Joe Parkin? Such is the lot of the domestique.

Aggressive and dangerous drivers are on the top of the cyclist’s list of least favorite things, but loose dogs are a close second. I have been bitten, requiring 6 stiches. My friend Kent got bitten as well. Paul, another riding buddy, had a dog run out in front of him on the steep downhill part of Chili Camp Road. He crashed and had to spend a couple of nights in the hospital with broken ribs and head trauma. If he hadn’t been wearing his helmet he could have been killed.

Recently, the Thursday group has had Close Encounters of the Canine Kind on Curran Road. Last week Kent was in front and went ballistic when the dog came at him. This week it was my turn.

This mutt lives on the right side of the road on a pretty steep hill. I was riding with Jeri and G-Man. Chivalry is not dead; I told Jeri to stay on my left so that if we met the mutt I would be between him (dog pronoun assumed) and her. I’m pretty sure Jeri would say this pronoun is correct, though I’ve never asked.

Sure enough the dog came after us. He (pronoun assumed) looks like a short haired herding dog. They like to chase bikes, thinking we are cows or goats or sheep. This type of dog can also nip at our legs the same way they do to get the big stubborn cows to move in the right direction.

I unclipped and yelled “GO HOME!” using my full voice. The dog stopped and Jeri was able to keep riding up the hill. G-Man who was just behind stopped too, and after a few more “Go Home! ‘s” the animal turned and headed back toward the house.

Cycling Friendly Dog

Since the road is uphill at something like 9% where G-Man and I unclipped, we pretty much had to walk the 50 yards to the top of the hill. As we plodded awkwardly in our cleated cycling shoes, along came Shaun, who hadn’t witnessed the dog confrontation and said something clever: “Hey Rich, you can’t go to France if you have to walk up a hill like this!”

Shaun was trying to be funny, but I decided to play along and fake umbrage. When G-Man and I finally got to the top of the hill, we remounted and coasted down to our regroup. I said to Shaun “Hey, I had to get off because the dog came after us! We’ve been riding together for over 20 years, and you’ve never seen me walk! Not on Sierra Road, not on Slug Gulch, or on the Del Puerto Canyon Wall. Not anywhere!” And not on the Mortirolo or Ventoux or the Tourmalet or any other Euro monstrosity either. Bar one…

There are two times that I have had to dismount on a hill and walk. The first was on the very steep Charleston Road just out of Volcano. A car came down the narrow road and I had to unclip and put a foot down. I was riding behind Ray R who somehow managed to stay in the saddle. I started walking and even though he was pedaling I managed to keep up with him on foot.

The other time I was forced to hoof it was on the steepest, nastiest climb I’ve even been on,  the Col de la Gallina in Andorra. Supposedly this is 12 km averaging 8.4%, which doesn’t sound impossible, but the last 7 km are much much steeper; I saw 18% once. This was the second climb of the 4th day of a week long trip, and my legs gave out on the steepest pitch. I had to unclip and walk for about 100 meters. I decided to remount and somehow after a couple of tries I did it without falling and managed to pedal the rest of the way to the summit.

Everyone on this trip was a 44-5 regular and we had all done the Mortirolo in Italy, which is one of the most feared ascents in cycling, but we agreed that the Gallina was harder, although I think only Lyle and I had to walk. Looking at the profile I see why we all thought that.

Harder than Ventoux or Mortirolo

There is a trip to France in my future, and while there are some hard climbs on the agenda, nothing like this. So unless a French dog decides to go all Calaveras County on me, I probably won’t have to hoof it.