This Lunar New Year was supposed to be about four weeks of regular riding to rebuild and return to lost form in the wake of the wonderful life-bomb called parenthood. I was poised to take advantage of a generous vacation package with little weekday rides and longer weekend riding. Four days into my vacation I got sick. It always happens. Just as the stars start to align themselves... WHAM!... back to square one. I spent about a week coughing my lungs clear enough to get back on the bike. Things still weren't coming together. I had to do a couple rehab rides after being sick to wake the legs up a bit more. I messed around in the hills over Taichung for some training, but nothing too far. I was actually becoming moody that my vacation was slipping away without a trophy or monument to show I had done something special with the only valuable commodity I had in any reserve-- time. The posts on my Facebook feed were already streaming in with painfully spectacular updates and pictures of a crisp, gorgeous sunny day on a ride to Wuling that I had to un-invite myself from. Mentally, I was pacing like a caged animal. I was brooding, moody and growling under my breath about my blood pressure being higher than what is normally my normal. I was just really pissed off. Then on the way home from dinner the idea popped into my head to drive the car to Shuili and then bike up to Tatajia on Alishan's eastern flank and then cap the summit before heading back to Shuili. The idea made perfect sense and I quickly and half-assedly made plans for a day of climbing. This spur of the moment rush of inspiration gave me no time to properly prepare for a long climb with the right intake of carbs and liquids. It was also pretty late, so I would be riding on less than ideal sleep. As the notion of the ride edged closer to reality I was feeling the buzz of excitement again. It felt good to be riding with a purpose.
There was no way I could wake up early enough for a pre-dawn launch, so I hoped for the best and hit the road by around 6:30am. I pulled into a sleepy Shuili and thought I would take in a tall cup of black coffee and a few more carbs at the 7-11. I guess I lingered a while as I hit the road closer to 9:00am with leaden legs that were having a difficult time turning over. Climbing is like that. When you start out it feels like there is no way you can ever complete the climb if the first 50 meters of the slightest incline feel like your legs are made of concrete plunging into mud on every pedal stroke. Sometimes it takes a sharp climb to wake the legs up and they're good for the rest of the ride.
As I loped along the Highway 21, I kept looking for the legs to meet me somewhere over the next rise. The road seems relatively flat and the discouraging forward pace on the gradual incline is a real heart breaker. Only on the descent can you fully appreciate that the road is a constant 2%-4% grade. In the morning light the mountains appear to stack up all upon each other as the highway dips and curves in a slow-motion roller coaster ride around old landslides and water hazards. The narrow river valley passes through some small farming villages that seem keen on making more money from tourism than farming. I hadn't taken the highway 21 in several years, so I couldn't remember how far I had to ride before the real climbing started. it seemed the river valley just went on forever. Finally, it seemed I had veered away from simply following the river and I braced for the serious climbing. Oddly enough, once the steeper grades arrived I felt better and more comfortable climbing. I eased up the mountain at an even pace with a few stops to simply document the trip and not the occasional strategic leg-rest-photo-op. On the map the road squiggled all over the hillsides like an anaconda sunning itself on a Taiwanese hillside. On paper it looks much more formidable than it really is. The confusing pile of roadway folded upon itself on the map was really a sensible grade that used each curve and bend to take some of the severity off the skyward ascent to 2600m. (8530ft.) The scenery was spectacular and sheer cliff faces and towering mountains rise from the abyss below. If Wuling is Taiwan's first cycling monument for its incredible height (3275m.) and short distance from sea level, Tatajia is Taiwan's second cycling monument. While the ride to Wuling throws much nastier ramps in front of a rider, its course through mountain farms, cedar forests and alpine meadows has a somewhat friendlier countenance than Tatajia. There is something very severe, stark and raw about Tatajia that is both frightening and compelling. It has a cold ruggedness about the landscape, and a glaring silence as well, that makes a lone rider skirting the cliff's edge feel totally exposed and unteathered to the roadway.
After a succession of tunnels a huge, ugly scar rips across the mountain like nature's own warning sign. The area is strewn with concrete, rubble, rebar and other debris. As I made my approach the entire area was thick with the smell of burning brake oil as drivers overheat their brakes unsure and fearful of the scene of such obvious violence. As a rider I instinctively knew that this was the main event. It had the terrifying look of battle and I brought the fight to each pitch and ramp.
The road looked as if someone had hastily flopped a wet ribbon across the brick-red clay and called it good.
With my adrenaline pumping from hugging the guardrail away from oncoming traffic, I realized I had made it past the most imposing stretch of my ride and I would soon be surrounded by the cool shadows of cedar boughs in the forest. The air hand the crisp clearness of Winter. Off to my left I could see each crack and snarl in Jade Mountain, the highest mountain in East Asia (3952m./12966ft.) It looked just like the picture on my bank book. With the turn of a corner I was looking down the northern face of Alishan. I was becoming aware of the thin air and I worked harder to make progress. I was also becoming aware of a growl in my stomach. I had burned almost 4000 calories on the ascent and I was out of food. The extra food was gone. I had been hoping to find a tourist stop with a few vendors selling stuff I swore I'd never eat. As I closed in on my goal of the God Trees, I was beginning to think more about food. The rule is to drink before you are thirsty and to eat before you are hungry. I was in caloric deficit and my body knew it. I did not want to bonk on Alishan. At last I turned a corner and found my trees. There were several tourists milling around taking pictures, but no food.
I took a rest for a few minutes and posed for some tourists who obviously couldn't see how little enthusiasm I had for pictures. With my late start I was still able to summit by 2:00pm, which was my plan to land me back at my car before 5:00pm. My descent was incredibly fast. All the parts I had thought were dips or flat, were showing themselves to be pointing down hill. The only thing on my mind was to get whereI could grab some quick fuel for my legs. At the bottom of the climb there was a 7-11. I stopped for a late lunch that looked like it was chosen by an 8yo. It was all food high in sugar and caffeine to give my legs something immediate to burn. I threw in a rice ball to digest, but it was mostly all junk. I had about 1000 calories in 10 minutes and was back on my way. After about a half hour I was feeling much better with a new spring to my stroke. I launched up the remaining hills to Shuili and was back at the car early after logging 150k of riding. I popped open a bottle of water and quenched my thirst before heading toward home. As soon as I left Shuili I was stuck in a three and a half hour traffic jam to the #3 Freeway. All the mountain roads feed like tributaries into Mingjian causing severe holiday traffic. After al that riding I was stuck without dinner until after 8:30pm. The road up Tatajia is higher than the 149甲to Fenqihu, but it is also easier with easier gradients to climb. I had actually been contemplating returning on the 149甲, but my morning coffee was just a bit too long to give it a try. There were too many tourists on the road on my way out, but it was doable. The scenery was the type of spectacular you get when riding Taiwan's Central Mountain Range. Lots of good stuff on this ride, just remember to bring enough food.
Contrary to plan I have done relatively little riding this vacation. If you happen to see me on the road, don't remind me. I started my vacation with the pleasure of riding with Wing, a visitor from Aussie/Hong Kong, who had chosen a pretty challenging route to circumvent the island. I was able to meet Wing in Jhuolan and pilot him through Taichung to Bagua Shan, where I sent him on his way to Nantou. Wing rides an exquisite custom steel Jim Bundy frame from the Bundy frame building family; one of the oldest frame makers in Australia. The three triangle design really sets it apart. We swung by Caffe Terry on our way through Taichung. Unfortunately, Wing came down with the flu and was unable to continue his ride. A few days later I too was leveled by a fever and congestion in my lungs. Wing was a very capable rider and I hope he can return to Taiwan and make good on his plans. I would love to see someone do the round-island trip with a bit of flare, style and panache-- the hard way.
News:
The 2013 NAHBS (North American Handmade Bicycle Show) will be on from Feb. 22-24. NAHBS is a great way to see what the imaginations of non-corporate designers can come up with. Sometimes the small builders can shake the industry.
The legendary Dario Pegoretti teams up with some art students from Stuttgart in the name of charity.
Tom's Bike Trip details one guest's experience on a government sponsored junket to ride Taiwan. Not a bad article, though I wish writers would quit using the false construct of parity between China and Taiwan. The idea that Taiwan is what China "could have looked like" is wishful ignorance at best, that ignores Taiwan's unique historical trajectory that traverses numerous state projects and the popular reaction to those projects. *sigh*
When I find a brand I like, I am not ashamed to champion the products or core values of a given brand. I have remained aloof from tricky sponsored writing, not necessarily by design, but my current equipment was purchased with my hard earned cash and with a baby at home, I can not be buying superfluous things. This stuff counts. I don't mind using this space to highlight products and companies that do right by me. Then there are the products that don't.... After seven years on Crank Brothers pedals, I have decided to leave them behind. Crank Brothers uses a light weight innovative design that allows four points of entry. They are minimalist and attractive for mountain bike pedals, and they seemed to make sense as a pedal system I could use on both my road and cyclocross bikes with just one pair of shoes. It made for some redundancy, despite running against roadie etiquette. For me, the problem comes from their reliability. More pedals optimized for the world of cycling that exists away from the pavement, my pedals could barely handle a season of light road riding before falling apart. I used a set of Crank Brothers Candy SL pedals, the mid range 1st Generation pedal, and they lasted for four years despite cosmetic damage. I "upgraded" to the Eggbeater 3, a lightweight pedal without a platform. The numeral 3 indicates its stature as one of the more expensive in the line. It was supposed to be a bit more robust. After several months the pedal started to feel a little loose. My foot would occasionally pop out of the pedal. This can be pretty dangerous on a climb as you can easily lose control and veer into traffic. There were a couple of times I popped out at critical times. I blamed the fast wear of the brass cleat and switched to newer cleats. I always hated to mess with the cleats because Crank Brothers uses very soft screws to hold them in place. On my first set I completely rendered the screws unusable while finding my ideal cleat location. Mind you, I was doing nothing out of the ordinary, just installing a cleat a few times to find the "sweet spot". Anyways... The long term effects of a loosening pedal manifested themselves in an overuse injury as I overcompensated with my left leg. I still feel the effects of this. I finally retired the pedals after about a year of light road use (not much riding in 2011) and pulled the Crank Brothers Candy pedals off the CX bike. After about six rides the spring went out on the left pedal. I had a ride I was hoping to catch the next day and picked up another set of First Gen Candy pedals on clearance for NT1000 ($30). They are having trouble selling in Taiwan and many retailers are just trying to recoup their cost. I only switched out the broken pedal and left the remaining pedal. On the very next ride the right pedal had the spring go out. Again I was hobbling back home too early and having to fight my own bike to get home. There are several people who have had their Crank Brothers pedals last for several years. I may have simply had two defective sets... in a row. That is a possibility. But it also seems Crank Brothers recognizes that their pedals sacrifice durability for weight and form factor. They offer a fantastic rebuild program for their pedals, which tells me the company recognizes the gentle limits of their products. As a consumer, I was attracted to the idea that the equipment had been designed for off-road use. It made me feel I could expect quality and longevity if I never left the road. I was wrong. So, I am looking to replace my pedals and the Crank Brothers pedal system with something else. Again, it may have been a bad batch. I understand that in the manufacturing process shit happens. But as consumers and users and cyclists and as people... trust goes a long way. I no longer trust Crank Brothers pedals to serve flawlessly when I need them. I do not expect them to function correctly 100% of the time. I do not believe they will not fail me high on a mountain road or stay clipped in as I hug the rail on the Route 129 as a cement truck flicks my earlobe in passing. As cyclists we put our trust and safety in the products we buy. Once that trust is gone, it may never return. There is lingering doubt. That is not to say we can't expect nothing will fail, but we need to believe it likely will not. It is fine to be loyal to a brand or a system, but always be ready to leave it behind when it becomes a liability. Crank Brothers had their chance and failed. As a rider and consumer, Taiwan in Cycles can not recommend Crank Brothers pedals at this point in time. If you want reliability, look elsewhere. Let's see what the future holds.
(Photo Credit: Stanley Tai) Taichung at 4:00am was simply frozenly dead. The streets that are familiar by day were unrecognizable in the darkness without the lit-up signboards or clouds of scooters pointing the way. With a few droplets of rain in the air I wondered what I had signed up for. It didn't help that I had a hunch I was having a fever, but without proof positive in the way of a thermometer reading or note from a doctor I was free to pretend I was simply a little sleepy. I knew the Tylenol would be kicking in at any time to muffle my headache into a whisper. I had signed up for a bit of adventure to do some riding I had been dreaming of tackling for several years, and I would be damned if a little flu bug was going to keep me out of the action. On a trip to Famous Bikes I was informed that they were planning a trip from Wujie, the Bunun village I rode a few weeks back, to Bakalas Village via what is known as the Wu-Ba Highway. The Wu-Ba Highway is the meandering path carved out between towering cliffs by the Suqi River, one of the rivers that feeds into the Jhuoshui River. The area is a spectacular wilderness hemmed in by the central mountain range. In the winter, when the rains subside and the water levels drop, the river can be navigated by 4wd vehicles and mountain bikes. My weapon of choice was my Salsa La Cruz, a bike I have had few good words for as it is heavy and slow and about a size out of my comfort range. On the up side, it is durable, and with a quick wheel change I was sporting some 34c knobby tires. Compared to the rest of the group with heavy mountain bikes, suspension and fat tires, I was a little concerned how a light, skinny tire bike with drop bars would fare against the elements. My easiest gear would be a 34 tooth sprocket coupled to a 27 tooth cassette-- a typical compact road crank. I would be the only rider with 29" wheels, so I was sure to pack extra tubes. This would be a great test to see how well this disc equipped CX bike could slip between the worlds of road and mountain biking. I also chose to ride with clipless pedals and wondered if my super-discounted Crankbrothers pedals would leave me stranded in a riverbed. We bussed in to Wujie and unloaded our gear. I was pleased to be riding with Stanley, a Taiwanese cyclist I met about this time last year on his attempt as a round-island trip who also had Salsa bikes. It would also be my first time riding with Ricki, a South African cyclist with a well-worn Surly Long Haul Trucker. With a few instructions from Tom, our group leader, we were soon rolling under misty grey skies into the river. The opening stretch was a wide lick of hard-packed sand in stripes of grey and black. I was pleased to find that my bike responded so well. Off-road it was a totally different machine that seemed nimble and sure as opposed to its Lincoln Continental road manner. My uneducated guess earlier in the morning that 60psi would be good pressure in the tires also seemed to be paying off. I figured it would be enough to avoid a pinch flat and it would be easier to take air out on the way than to put it back in. I pedaled through the first water crossing. My wheels deftly sliced between submerged stones. I was a bit surprised how easy it felt to ride such a lightly equipped bike through the rugged terrain. The group gathered speed as we disappeared into the morning mist. A warn 4x4 track left a darkened stripe of wet overturned earth for us to follow as we scanned the immediate landscape for obstacles. The sun never made a serious attempt to come out for most of the day leaving the impression that it was forever 10:00am in the mountains. The group atmosphere was lively and light hearted. As every bump in the track reminded me of my concealed headache I could not do much to shake more than a half smile out of my face. The deeper we plodded down river, the more interesting the scenery became. We were constantly stopping to admire striped columns of stone jutting up over our heads or gaze hypnotically ahead at chunks of missing mountainside that had been suddenly scooped away in some calamity or another. On a ride like this it is easy to keep energy and spirits up with occasional displays of mock bravado. I felt my gearing was fantastic for the level riverbed. I could easily close ground on the group if I stopped for pictures or wanted to get shots from the front. We were forced to make dozens of river crossings. The first several dips were fine I mis-navigated a large stone and fell part way in, bumping my knee and rethinking how badly I needed a new injury. For me, the key was to sit lightly on the saddle or simply stand and pedal to best balance, pull and finesse my way through the landscape. At times it can be a bit tricky as you are required, in a moment of controlled panic, to both heave forward and then sit back over the rear tire to best negotiate a minefield of deep sand traps and pumpkin-sized stones.
My achy body and head were forgotten as my concentration narrowed on the immediate front tire area. I felt as though I was simply skipping over the stones barely cognizant of their arrival or departure under my bike. It was incredible.
The eddy in the water often belies the shallowest crossing point, and those ripples were becoming fewer and further between and we were forced more and more to portage or pull our bikes to the opposite bank. For the end of January, the water was not all that cold. It was never an issue on the ride. We simply plunged in and air dried.
By mid-morning it was decided the time was ripe for a coffee break. A camping stove emerged and we were soon lounging around the sandy riverbank with coffees all around. It was definitely a four coffee day for me.
The striation in the stone made for some interesting pictures as the violent story of Taiwan's birth towered above, painted into the crumbling cliffside in hues of reds, yellows, blues and grays.
We pushed on through the river valley with the only audible voice coming from the hiss of forty wheels grinding away through an alley of sand punctuated by the occasional metallic clank of a hard impact or missed gear.
At a wide fork in the river we pulled up for lunch. Tom from Famous Bikes had arranged a local from Wujie to drive out and meet us at that particular location with a full spread of chicken, sausage, fish and vegetables. I was more than pleased to be eating something that didn't come in the masking flavors of grape, lime, or cherry. Roadies tend to over focus on gels power bars and miss out on the home cookin'.
We took the right turn in the fork and the road immediately became more challenging. There were sections where I had to simply hop from big stone to other big stone. My headache came back with a vengeance cluing me in to the fact that I had been too thrifty with my single water bottle.
The portaging after lunch was more frequent than ever. It seemed we were hopping on bikes only to immediately hop back off and throw them into the drink. I continued to be surprised by how well my bike was handling the obstacles. I was trying to find reasons to justify a heavier mountain bike, but there were none. Only once did my skinny tires cut too deep into a sand trap to launch me into the ground. No more mishaps than anyone else, really. As the day wore on I was finding it harder to fight back my physical discomfort. I tried to shake it off, but the oscillation between chills and burning symptoms of a fever kept me wishing I hadn't left the extra tylenol on the bus in my bag. Right where it shouldn't have been.
I sensed our journey was nearing its end, but I still couldn't figure out where were would end up. There had been too little time for me to research the route and so I was blindly following intuition and the guidance provided by Tom and crew.
At Bakalas Village, a "village" in the sense that there were about two buildings located there, we followed a road that climbed an impossible 3.5km out of the river to the opposite side of the ridge where our busses were waiting. The climb, with my limited gearing, was absolutely painful. I rode about half way and then hiked the rest. I was in no condition to even make the effort at the whole thing. I was simply happy when it ended.
The descent was lit by the my knobby tires screaming like a TIE fighter as gravity took hold and pulled me at ever faster speeds down the mountain. My forearms burned as I clamped hard on the brakes. Hydraulic discs would have been better, but I survived the descent and waited for the rest of the group to filter in. We all cleaned up and used the restrooms at one of those semi-abandoned resorts that littler the hillsides where someone's idea of leisure getaway smashed head first into the realities of tourism patronage. The ride was incredible. The bike performed flawlessly in proving that a good CX bike can be a really great tool if you need a one bike solution for on and off road. The folks from Famous were excellent companions. This was a very well executed trip. It really got me thinking about some crazy ideas for river riding in Taiwan. I went home having used muscles I had forgotten existed. Finally, I could allow myself to be sick and I checked in with a medium fever and a wet cough. Despite this totally unexpected deviation from my training plan, I would do it again in a minute.
