C
czb
Guest
i am writing from southwest Arizona - the small town of Ajo. the
riding is very hard this time of year. tires get wasted. hard to
carry enough water. about the 3 hr mark the salt in your eyes takes a
toll. dust starts to add up. and the climbs - while not overly long -
are sudden and have some pretty nasty grades. what it lacks in cool
single track it makes up for in workout quality.
this is what happened yesterday june 19.
i got a good ride in but it was the first time i overdid it in the
heat. now have logged several hundred off-road miles in 105 plus temps
last few weeks, all without serious incident. but yesterday something
scary/weird happened.
i was about 15 miles out in the desert from ajo - maybe 30 miles from
border right at the edge of cabeza prieta and the organ pipe national
monument, at about the 30 mile mark of my ride, and i hadn't calculate
my water consumption right.
it was about 106 degrees and i was tired and i had about enough water
left for 5 miles with at least 15 left. so i had to conserve. i
slowed a little. but this as a tactic is tricky, because while you are
less tired because you're going a little slower, you are out in the
desert longer. so it is a judgment call on which is preferable. i
chose to slow a little, but not much. this in itself was also tricky
because the terrain is harder to work if you are going too slow. so i
was at 30 or so miles with what i thought would be 10-15 to go and it
would up being about 15. also i had ridden at dawn yesterday to try to
get a two-a-day effort in (only a short one hour TT), but i think it
caught up with me.
in any event there up ahead was a group of illegals doing a border
crossing and they were in a wash (an old dry creek that fills with
water during the august rains) under some trees. i was pounding
through the loose sand in the wash planning on how to climb out when
they came at me. maybe 4, or five people.
some illegals and their coyote (the person who gets them across the
border). and they looked really bad - by which i mean without enough
water.
they tried to stop me. to gang tackle me and my bike while riding;
presumably for the bike or the water or both. i had only a little
water left, and i could not go around them because of the ravine i was
in, so i had to power through them and up an embankment and leave them.
i was pretty scared, and this was the three hour mark of my ride at
105-106 degrees so i was not full of **** and vinegar at this stage. i
think adrenaline kicked in, and i maneuvered through them, up the
ravine, which had some slick rock - thank god for the traction at that
point because the wash was all loose sand and gravel and i barely got
any purchase on the terrain. i kicked into gear and rode the last
10-15 miles fast as i could to a fire road and then to a secondary road
and found a fish and wildlife officer from department of the interior,
and told them there were 4-5 guys without water about to expire back
over yonder. the guy radioed border patrol and they presumably then
went to rescue these guys, after first giving me **** about riding off
road on BLM land and in the Cabeza which is off limits. Said he'd fine
me $200 if he found me ouf there again. Nevermind the cattle and the
illegals.
the 10-15 miles i rode after the encounter was hard morally, to say
nothing of spending me physically.
i once stopped and tried to call border patrol on my cell but had no
signal. i could have given them my water but i'd have been screwed
myself. i didn't know how to tell if they were in genuine distress
from the heat or not. i couldn't tell if they were illegals crossing
for work or drug runners which is becoming increasingly common on this
west side of tucson on the edge of tohono o'odom indian nation lands.
i felt like what if one was injured and what if they would not have
harmed me, did i leave someone without offering to care for them. in
the end i decided to ride as fast as i could - i kept thinking about
last year's tour de france and lance telling floyd landis at the end of
stage 16 to "ride like you stole something" - and get to border patrol
and tell them where to find those guys. i hope that was the right
thing to do. believe so. but christ i used to think running into dogs
or cows out here, or the random redneck in an ATV was the worst of it.
not anymore. **** even the scorpions and rattlers kind of fade into
the background.
anyway, after a flat at the top of child's mountain on friday and
yesterday's run in with border crossings, i have to think my luck will
be better today.
anyone else have similar border/illegal run-ins?
-------
on another note...the riding challenge out here 2 hours south of
Phoenix is tough. if there was an Ajo 100, and it was marketed as a
really hardcore endurance challenge, does anyone know how hard it would
be to get snactioned race going and would anyone enter given the
isolation out here?
riding is very hard this time of year. tires get wasted. hard to
carry enough water. about the 3 hr mark the salt in your eyes takes a
toll. dust starts to add up. and the climbs - while not overly long -
are sudden and have some pretty nasty grades. what it lacks in cool
single track it makes up for in workout quality.
this is what happened yesterday june 19.
i got a good ride in but it was the first time i overdid it in the
heat. now have logged several hundred off-road miles in 105 plus temps
last few weeks, all without serious incident. but yesterday something
scary/weird happened.
i was about 15 miles out in the desert from ajo - maybe 30 miles from
border right at the edge of cabeza prieta and the organ pipe national
monument, at about the 30 mile mark of my ride, and i hadn't calculate
my water consumption right.
it was about 106 degrees and i was tired and i had about enough water
left for 5 miles with at least 15 left. so i had to conserve. i
slowed a little. but this as a tactic is tricky, because while you are
less tired because you're going a little slower, you are out in the
desert longer. so it is a judgment call on which is preferable. i
chose to slow a little, but not much. this in itself was also tricky
because the terrain is harder to work if you are going too slow. so i
was at 30 or so miles with what i thought would be 10-15 to go and it
would up being about 15. also i had ridden at dawn yesterday to try to
get a two-a-day effort in (only a short one hour TT), but i think it
caught up with me.
in any event there up ahead was a group of illegals doing a border
crossing and they were in a wash (an old dry creek that fills with
water during the august rains) under some trees. i was pounding
through the loose sand in the wash planning on how to climb out when
they came at me. maybe 4, or five people.
some illegals and their coyote (the person who gets them across the
border). and they looked really bad - by which i mean without enough
water.
they tried to stop me. to gang tackle me and my bike while riding;
presumably for the bike or the water or both. i had only a little
water left, and i could not go around them because of the ravine i was
in, so i had to power through them and up an embankment and leave them.
i was pretty scared, and this was the three hour mark of my ride at
105-106 degrees so i was not full of **** and vinegar at this stage. i
think adrenaline kicked in, and i maneuvered through them, up the
ravine, which had some slick rock - thank god for the traction at that
point because the wash was all loose sand and gravel and i barely got
any purchase on the terrain. i kicked into gear and rode the last
10-15 miles fast as i could to a fire road and then to a secondary road
and found a fish and wildlife officer from department of the interior,
and told them there were 4-5 guys without water about to expire back
over yonder. the guy radioed border patrol and they presumably then
went to rescue these guys, after first giving me **** about riding off
road on BLM land and in the Cabeza which is off limits. Said he'd fine
me $200 if he found me ouf there again. Nevermind the cattle and the
illegals.
the 10-15 miles i rode after the encounter was hard morally, to say
nothing of spending me physically.
i once stopped and tried to call border patrol on my cell but had no
signal. i could have given them my water but i'd have been screwed
myself. i didn't know how to tell if they were in genuine distress
from the heat or not. i couldn't tell if they were illegals crossing
for work or drug runners which is becoming increasingly common on this
west side of tucson on the edge of tohono o'odom indian nation lands.
i felt like what if one was injured and what if they would not have
harmed me, did i leave someone without offering to care for them. in
the end i decided to ride as fast as i could - i kept thinking about
last year's tour de france and lance telling floyd landis at the end of
stage 16 to "ride like you stole something" - and get to border patrol
and tell them where to find those guys. i hope that was the right
thing to do. believe so. but christ i used to think running into dogs
or cows out here, or the random redneck in an ATV was the worst of it.
not anymore. **** even the scorpions and rattlers kind of fade into
the background.
anyway, after a flat at the top of child's mountain on friday and
yesterday's run in with border crossings, i have to think my luck will
be better today.
anyone else have similar border/illegal run-ins?
-------
on another note...the riding challenge out here 2 hours south of
Phoenix is tough. if there was an Ajo 100, and it was marketed as a
really hardcore endurance challenge, does anyone know how hard it would
be to get snactioned race going and would anyone enter given the
isolation out here?
