Category Archives: Uncategorized

“They say time is the fire in which we burn. Right now, Captain, my time is running out.”

Uncategorized

Every picture tells a story. The time of day shown in the garmin screen (upper left)- 9:36am. This ride used to finish between 9:18-9:22pm. As early as 9:14 on a really fast day.

I can still ride my bike up the same hills, ride the same distances (I think), but every single Tuesday & Thursday morning, as I end my ride at the official start/end point (Olive Hill and Canada Road), I have an in-my-face reminder of how much slower I am than just a few years ago (well, it seems like just a few). I start the ride at the same time I always have, but instead of hitting the end (still 2.7 miles from home) at 9:20am, I consider it a good ride if my Garmin says it’s anything earlier than 9:40.

That’s twenty minutes I never planned on losing from my life. Twenty minutes less time to take a shower, eat something and get to work. When I was faster, I never once thought wow, this is great, I’m so fast I can do all this and still have plenty of time to get ready for work! There was never a thought to getting slower, other than not being able to keep up with someone who was really fast. It’s a rude awakening.

From age 50 to maybe 62, the decline was very gradual, and it remained the case that one year could be better than the year prior, if I spent more time on the bike. Strava PRs were still possible. My diagnosis with Essential Thrombocythemia (a mild bone marrow cancer that you generally live with, not die from) was towards the end of that run, but didn’t stop it. And even those years from 63 up to now, 69 in just a couple weeks, have seen times I’ve really surprised myself, especially in France where I seem to hit my stride after a few days of tough rides.

But the Tuesday/Thursday-morning ride times don’t lie. It wasn’t that long ago that we had “guidance” for those coming out on our ride- you had to be able to get up Kings in 30 minutes or less. Then it stretched to 33. And the really strong, fast riders started going elsewhere, because the ride wasn’t challenging enough for them. I was never the fastest on Kings, but I could hang in there and did really well in the three sprints- first, the top of the final rise heading into Sky Londa on Skyline, next the short steep pitch at the end of West Old LaHonda and, finally, my favorite. The sprint up Albion to the intersection with Olive Hill. The only person who could reliably beat me there was Todd. My breathing issues didn’t matter; I had 18 seconds of full power available, if I wasn’t already gassed leading into it.

I don’t know if I’m aging gracefully or abruptly; this is new territory for me! It’s possible that changes to my work/life balance (meaning, more time to ride) could turn back the clock a bit, but I don’t see that happening anytime soon. The brick & mortar side of the bicycle business is tough with steadily-increasing costs of keeping the doors open, difficulty finding employees and suppliers that are sometimes more interested in selling directly to customers than to shops. Add my wife’s cancer to the mix and I should consider myself fortunate that I’ve been able to keep my routines going as long as I have.

But yes, there is some feeling that time is not my friend.

A different type of weekend

Personal stuff, Uncategorized

So what’s this email all about?

Last weekend I attended a medical conference for specialists and patients afflicted with MPNs (Myleoproleiferative Neoplasms) in Phoeniz AZ. Really tough for me to give up a Sunday bike ride, not to mention be away from the shop on a Saturday, but this was my chance to hear from and talk with the experts for my rare bone marrow disease, a type of chronic cancer that causes my bone marrow to product way too many platelets.

Because it’s so rare, there aren’t that many specialists in the field, in particular none local in the Kaiser health care organization. I’ve gotten pretty good at reading med-speak and there is continuously-updated documentaion by the NCCN (National Comprehensive Cancer Network) that defines the standard of care for all types of cancers, including MPNs, in the United States. This puts me on the same page as the health care professionals and anything included for treatment in the guidelines will generally pass the hoops and hurdles required for insurance coverage.

It’s one thing reading about such things; it’s another thing entirely being in an environment where most of the top experts in the field are in one place. Probably 80 or so patients and a dozen experts, so plenty of opportunity for questions and follow-up.

My specific MPN is called Essential Thrombocythemia, driven by a gene mutation called CALR. The CALR gene wasn’t discovered until 2013, as seen in the email above. In fact, the woman who discovered it was at the conference! How cool is that? My inner geek (ok, not so inner) would have liked to have her sign a copy of my original labwork confirming I have that gene mutation.

It wasn’t cheap; I’m not used to $250/night hotel rooms. My standards are created by my travels to France, where I rarely pay more than $100/night, in July, when I’m at the Tour de France. I did stay as true to my non-car self as possible, taking the train from Redwood City to the airport, but no option other than Uber for getting to the event location, about 50 minutes (and $70) away from Phoenix airport. Arriving at the airport at 9pm, just not much choice.

It was different on the way back; I had a couple hours to kill so I took a pair of busses from the event back to the airport. Two hours instead of 50 minutes but $4 instead of $70.

I also got in a small amount of exercise Saturday evening when, at the end of the first day, I decided I’d try to hike across open dessert between the event and my hotel, about 2 miles away. Well, it didn’t turn out to be 2 miles because there were several fences out in the middle of nowhere, and a canal I had to navigate around, so think it was about 3.4 miles. Still, kind of nice being out in the middle of nothing but scrub brush and Cactus.

Next conference is in two years, and I’ll likely be there!