The Oddball Diet
Words by Richard Belson
Photos ~Cam McRae

Every so often, with all the Atkins dieters, health club attendees and the generally lethargic pace modern-day society has conned itself into believing is a fulfilling way to live, I have to remind myself that even after all these years, I’m a bit of an oddball.

Sure, riding trials for the past 15 years has made that plenty apparent, but I’m talking an oddness more profound than what a decade and a half wrought by a deadly fear of dabbing could explain.

If you’re on this site, I am assuming you have embraced the more aggressive form of mountain biking that seems to have crept into the mountain bike scene over the past few years, and therefore you know the oddness of which I speak. But even still, I’m talking about something more - the kind of aberration that separates us as riders from the throngs of misled souls who dare dub themselves “normal”.

I’m talking about living a lifestyle that actually accepts, and better yet, embraces the concept of exercise that is fun and fulfilling.

With all the promotions and press lately, it seems that if you’re not scarfing down a rack of lamb and a protein shake with every meal, you’re going to swell up to the size of a Gazzoloddi. And then you’ll need to head to the gym to bow to the exercise gods and repent for your gastronomical sins; to Stairmaster and Treadmill your life away, climbing and speed walking to nowhere.

Exercise is supposed to be work, right? No pain, no gain?

Well, last time I checked my Grade Eleven Physics textbook, Work=Force x Displacement. By those means then, you can spend three hours sprinting your life away on a treadmill, but you would literally only have accomplished the work it takes to get your fat ass from the locker room to the infernal machine.


Richard paying for his play.
There are other reasons for heading to the Holy House of Lycra and Nikes. There’s the sweat, the 12-step program that got you away from Tim Horton’s in the first place, the on-again, off-again training buddy who you regularly catch gnawing on a carb-rich bagel - but if you don’t actually get anywhere, you’ve done nothing in the eyes of Einstein.

But really - work or no, how does going to a club fit into living a life that’s worthwhile?

I’m not saying I have the definitive answer, but I started riding mountain bikes when I was a 15-year-old kid, when skateboarding was cool the first time, and mountain biking was far from anyone’s idea of cool. Back when the riding gear of choice was hiking short-shorts or corduroy knickers and a Blackburn rack to keep the mud from splashing up on the back of your K-Way jacket.

I pedaled around the suburbs of Montreal’s West Island in pursuit of my loner, geek-inspired sport, because I loved it. From the first second I laid eyes on a mountain bike, it just seemed right. From that moment on, I have been hooked on a life that has carried me to most every province throughout this great nation of ours, many states south of the border, and has enabled me to experience things others have never known.

When he's not riding Richard enjoys a rousing session of Xtreme walking.
Photo From Strolling Extreme 6: Burning Soles.
I have had the opportunity to ride and dine with such luminaries as Mike King, Jimmy Killen, Hans Rey, and Dave Wonderly and several others. I’ve managed to squeak a third-place at a national Expert XC championship thanks to one of my fiercest competitors losing his SPD shoe in a mud hole and, most importantly, I have met more friends and kindred spirits along the way than I could possibly count.
Sure, my story is no different than most other peoples’ in Mountainbikeland. In fact, it probably pales in comparison to many of the tales my fellow riders can recount, but for better or worse, XC geek or freeride homey, we’re all riders for the very same reason. The trails are out there, and we each have an innate need to be riding on them, no matter what the obstacles in our path. With that in mind, I have recently reacquainted myself with a climb. It starts in the North Village of Port Coquitlam and heads up Coast Meridian and eventually to the Peak of Burke Mountain. About the first third is paved, then dirt road for the second third, and the last haul is loose gravel, steep access road. To the end of the dirt road alone is an hour on a freeride bike at best.

About halfway up that leg of the journey, there is a road jutting off Coast Meridian called Darwin. This is usually the point where I have to remind myself that I have yet-again fallen into the trap that mothers fall into after their first experience with childbirth.

“I am never doing THAT again,” they exclaim with a resolve and tenacity usually reserved for lazy farm animals and Republicans.
Then one day, in walks a friend with her newborn with that unique, oh-so-special “fresh baby smell” and she forgets the pain - like the pain never even happened.

Well, somehow, Burke seems to have that fantastic baby smell, because I was out this weekend yet again - climbing for two hours on a seven inch travel full suspension bike with 2.5-inch DH tires.

And why, you might ask? Because it’s there. And, for some reason, I get a maniacal sense of satisfaction riding past Darwin, grinning and giggling my way up the hill on a bike meant for the complete opposite activity.
The author in his happy place.
It is this very thirst for adventure and athletic masochism that has afforded me the opportunity to meet new and interesting people along the way, and live stories I would never have been able to dream up in the wildest corners of my imagination - stories and adventures I would never have lived if I had been bound to a Stairmaster day after day.

Take that, you treadmill-walking, Atkins-eating, “I’m in The Zone” diet freaks… I’m not saying you’re wrong doing what you’re doing…I’m just saying I have FUN when I suffer and shiver in the rain and cold, grinding up-hill on the 40-pound bicycle-equivalent of a jacked-up monster truck.

I like to think of it as taking life’s metaphorical sketchy Expert line as opposed to the sissy bail-out line to the left...You're only given one life to life. Why would you possibly want to spend it going nowhere at a health club when you can challenge Darwin daily as a Knobby-Tired Oddball?

Or maybe I just need to start eating more meat...