Twenty-two years of April 17ths, and if there's a theme running through them, it's this: momentum interrupted. Sometimes by blizzards, sometimes by rust-eaten water heaters, sometimes by lockdowns and snow that refuses to quit. Always something.
In 2004, I was sorting photos before heading west. By 2006, I'd learned to mistrust my own weather forecasts... the hard way, descending Lost Trail Pass with frozen brake cables and a body temperature trending toward hypothetical. A year later I was announcing the MORS race on Mother's Day, and in 2008 I was pondering Cervelos and team affiliations while also frantically moving gear away from a dying water heater.
2011 brought the ritual of Thursday Night Rides and Bridge Pizza. 2012 taught me what falling apart looks like mid-race. 2013 was saying goodbye to Turner. 2014 involved rental-company headaches. 2020 was lockdown, day twenty-one, escaping on Orca through endless snow.
Then 2023 gave me fat bikes and broccoli in the sand, and last year I found a paw print bigger than my glove pressed into spring snow.
What I've learned: April 17th doesn't owe me good weather or dry basements or working brakes. But it keeps handing me reasons to keep moving anyway.