The Mostly True Story of Doctor Spectacular

"If memory serves" can be prelude to nothing but fiction, however well-intentioned it might be. The fact of an event happens once, and then disappears beneath the waves of the retelling. Thus is the legend born.

Well I won't have that. Before this thing gets too far out of control, I want to set down, once and for all, the origins of Doctor Spectacular, that gravity-taunting gentleman who adorns your kit.

It started with my second bright idea of the last 25 years (the first was to get Chrissy to agree to marry me before she developed a true appreciation for my special brand of genius): Yard Sale Cyclocross. In a sport that all but guarantees that which cyclists otherwise avoid like a pack of Team In Training triathletes, that is, falling often and repeatedly, plastering "Yard Sale" across your kit is the ultimate rolling "I meant to do that." I fell? Of course I fell. This is Yard Sale CX. Thankfully, none of us are possessed of a sufficiently broad ass to properly display the original team motto: This Side Up. I Hope.

Hard to believe now, as the accolades come pouring in from far and wide, that not ALL YSCX'ers actually raced in Yard Sale kit during our first year. Which is ok. No one around here is going to call a Board meeting if your socks don't match. Which is a good thing, if you've ever seen my socks. But of those of us who did race in Yard Sale kit, none were truer to our embryonic ethos than Kevin Max. From showing up late for his race - a tradition I'm happy to report he still embraces - to stealing someone else's bike from the pit, Kevin displayed the sort of panache that comes from not merely a complete lack of training and preparation, but an active avoidance of anything that even suggests a familiarity with cyclocross. However, Kevin has one special talent that allows him to race as if he was raised by a Belgian nanny in a muddy crib: he is made of antigravitium, the antigravity element.

It was cold on the afternoon of December 10, 2009 in Bend. Nineteen degrees at the start of the Men's 40+ non-championship event. I should have known that in an event whose name ensured not even the winner could declare himself a champion, Kevin would be in his element. Or of his element, as the case may have been. Photographs suggest my pre-race focus was excellent, and that Kevin had nodded off for a quick pre-start nap.

Or perhaps his antlers were a bit heavier than anticipated. Whatever the circumstance, I lost track of him soon after the start. Why? Because I was racing. And race I did, until the sun dipped behind the Deschutes Brewery, and the course turned to black ice.

Sometimes Yard Sale is a noun: What team (gang) are you on (in)? Why, Yard Sale, of course.

Sometimes Yardsale is a verb: What happened when the sun went behind the brewery and the course turned to ice? I yardsaled. Yardsale, Yardsale, Yardsale, Yardsale...AND Yardsale. And that was just lap three. Surely, I thought, no human can stay upright for more than a few meters at a time in these crazy, frozen conditions. And I was right, everyone was falling around me, over me, behind me, on top of me. Then I noticed Kevin had somehow worked his way ahead of me on the course, and was riding as if he could do anything he wanted except for two things: 1. Stay up. And 2. Fall down. He looked as if he was being tossed and shaken by some evil cycling demon that would do anything but let him end his suffering by actually crashing to the ground. Over the next several laps I thought nothing of myself or my own progress around the circuit, so engrossed was I in the living cliffhanger episode playing out in front of me. With each crash avoided my certainty only grew that the next would spell the end of Kevin's race. Perhaps it was the cetrifugal force of his flailing limbs, perhaps is head really is filled with helium and it's not all an act, perhaps he's a marionette whose strings are pulled by a palsied adolescent from a parallel dimension, any of these explanations are more plausible than believing my lying eyes as he crashed dozens of times per lap yet never hit the ground.

(This is where the "mostly" part comes in. Of course he fell. And it was spectacular!)

Mercifully, we were pulled with a lap to go, overtaken by non-champions intent on being heralded as the greatest non-champion of them all. We crossed the finish line arms raised and clasped, and I swear I felt my tires float from the ground.

Months later, as preparations were made for the YSCX 2010 team kit, we realized we needed an icon, a totem, a talisman to shield us from....well, ourselves mostly. It's not like we're forced to do this. In a flash of inspiration, I contacted legendary cycling blogger and noted liker of things made of art, Stevil Kinevil, of AllHailtheBlackMarket.com. Surely Stevil, who knows they take cyclocross seriously in Boulder and that there is honor in ruining the race for everyone, would be able to make real what until then was only in our heads. In one of our early exchanges I told him the story of Kevin's glorious non-championship ride. "It was like he was trying to fall, but he couldn't," I said, "Every time he went flying towards the ground, he missed."

Within days, Stevil gave us the image you now proudly display. And without ever having seen the flying refutation of the laws of physics that was Kevin Max's non-champioship performance, he gave us a name as well: Doctor Spectacular. Which I think we can all agree is better than calling it Kevin.