The Rundown: A Thanksgiving episode with one chair empty, Matt is off coaching at cross country nationals, where one of his runners just took a state title. The rest of the guys catch up on a month that held a trip to the south of France, one of Lance's best cyclocross seasons ever, and the loss of his dog Piper. Then the real conversation: what do you do when life crashes into riding and both seem to fall apart at once. Still here, still riding, still making a podcast.
Backpedal: France, a memorial ride, and a season full gas
Ian spent four nights in Nice and came back sold on it. He rode through Monaco to Menton and up the Col de la Madone, the climb where the Strava leaderboard reads like a Tour start list, then down the coast for coffee and pastries, and across the Italian border over the Col de Brai. The one snag was navigation: his head unit kept throwing a no-navigable-routes error, his phone ran out of data, and he spent a stretch guessing his way back by aiming at the Mediterranean. He is thinking about switching from Garmin to Wahoo over it, the kind of small frustration that quietly decides what computer a rider buys next.
Closer to home, the guys rode the Michael Myers Memorial on a rare dry, sunny day, 15 to 20 people at full Dialed training pace. Lance drilled it the day before a race and PRed the descents anyway. Then he walked through a cyclocross season that turned into one of his best ever: 52 numbers pinned on across the year, 24 cross races in about two and a half months, third overall in the Harvest Cross series despite never winning a single race in it, and a ninth in Cross Crusade that earns him a call-up next year. The Portland Trophy Cup overall slipped away on the last lap when two riders caught him, costing him a Silca tool kit in an engraved wooden case that he is still a little sore about. He also raced a single-speed event in a gold pair of joke-gift hot pants, which is its own story.
The hardest part of the month was Piper. Lance's dog, the unofficial Dialed mascot who came to the last five training camps and traveled to 45 states with him, passed away from bone cancer at 10. He raced the cyclocross championships in Independence that Sunday morning, then drove straight home to be with her and his grown kids when she went. He was open about how much it has hit him, and about why he is fine letting people see it. The guys also told the flip side, the Cross Crusade costume race he almost skipped that day, where his entire rival team showed up dressed as him, mustaches and orange jerseys and sandbags, until he changed his mind, drove down, and jumped into the race a minute late to a roar from the crowd. The kind of thing that only happens when a community actually likes you.
Leadout: a Lifetime Grand Prix down to a sprint for fifth
Champ takes the news. The European Cyclocross Championships ran without most of the big names; Wout van Aert and Tom Pidcock are skipping cross this year and Mathieu van der Poel is a question mark for all but a handful of races. Toon Aerts won the men's title in a sprint over Thibau Nys, ten years after his first European title and after serving a suspension, and his post-race interview in tears was the moment of the day.
The bigger story was the Lifetime Grand Prix finale. A flat wrecked Keegan Swenson's standing at Little Sugar, Cam Jones won it, and that set up a three-way fight going into Big Sugar. Then storms cut the 100-mile gravel race to 50 miles thirty minutes before the start. Matthew Beers soloed to the win out of an early break, while Matthew Wilson flatted so badly his tire left the rim with six miles to go. It came down to a 16-rider sprint for fifth between the title contenders, Swenson went early to try to shake Jones and could not, and Cam Jones took the sprint and the overall. The guys know him from the lab, where they have built bikes for him, which made it fun to watch. Closer to home, the OBRA cyclocross championships in Independence delivered a Dialed result: service manager Paul Furst won the Cat 1-2 elite state title by over a minute on a brutal course, and took the Cross Crusade elite series overall too.
When life gets in the way of riding
The topic everyone could feel coming. Cycling is one of the best stress outlets there is, until the moment you cannot do it, and then the loss compounds. Jake has spent roughly the last six months in that hole: three surgeries, a hip issue he is managing with an injection to buy time, work running at 70 to 80 hour weeks between running the business and rebuilding it, and a 1 a.m. call that someone had put a glass door through and walked out with a $7,000 bike. He was honest about pulling back, turning the phone down to a pinned list of people, and stripping things away just to get through, and equally honest that it is not sustainable and not the plan going forward.
Ian named the cruel part of it: for most people, bad health still leaves room for the thing that brings them joy, but for an athlete the joy and the physical pastime are the same thing, so injury is a double hit. He has been there himself, a couple of years off the bike a decade ago. The guys also thought about teammate Jordan, who put in 15,000 miles a year before a horrific crash with a car, and what it must be like to have that taken away. The throughline is an old one from early in the podcast: you can really only do three things well at once. When life floods in, something has to give, and the honest move is to admit it, lean on the people who care about you rather than shutting them out completely, and climb back when you can.
The lighter half of the topic: once life settles and you are riding again, how do you plan a destination trip. The guys agree booking it is itself motivation, you will ride more just to be ready. You do not need peak race fitness, but give yourself a real block, three to six weeks, enough for the early neurological adaptation so you are not cramping your way up a climb. Pick the place to match your fitness and do the recon, because finishing every ride in Tenerife with a 2,500-foot climb is a different ask than spinning the flats of Mallorca. For value, Spain and even Nice can beat a stateside trip on food and lodging, but for the least travel hassle, Tucson or San Diego in winter get you riding the same day you fly, with Tucson edging it on cycling infrastructure and friendlier roads.
One last thing
Ian sold his BMC Time Machine through buycycle and was impressed with how smooth it was, box and prepaid shipping included, and the buyer even followed him on Strava first to check he was a real rider. Lance is heading to Tucson for the El Tour prologue camp, a week riding alongside George Hincapie, Bob Roll, Christian Vande Velde, Chloe Dygert, Jens Voigt, and more, with hopes of catching some of them for his YouTube channel. Jake's was simple: he is closing in on some normalcy, getting excited about what next year holds, and hoping to get back on the bike soon. His one ask, if the lab has ever taken care of you, leave a review and tell him what you think of the new site, because in e-commerce right now the little things move the needle.
That is 376. A trip to France, a season for the books, a hard goodbye, and an honest talk about the weeks when the bike has to wait. The guys will be back before the year is out.
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