Picking a Line

As mentioned before, keeping your eyes ahead and down the road is a difficult but vital task in riding. Closely connected to this is "picking a line" (significantly different from picking your nose or snorting a line, either of which one assumes would be rather difficult while wearing gloves and a faceshield) which simply means tracing, in your minds eye, the route your tires will follow to a given point. Although you know your ultimate destination, however distant it might be, you recognize that to get there you must pass through a series of other immediate/closer destinations which are at the most only a few hundred yards ahead. So while looking ahead to your immediate/closer destination you pick a line of travel, scanning that line for potential hazards (like bumps, slick spots, or dead animals) and continue doing so as you move through that line. You don't look down directly in front of your tire, but constantly look ahead and extend the line to a new point. And you continuosly repeat this process until at last you arrive at your final destination.

This sounds quite easy but in fact is not because, as discussed in the Sept 10 post Looking Ahead, our natural tendency is to look at our immediate surroundings for imminent danger. To survive we have learned to focus on the problem close at hand. The difficulty with this evolutionary turn in our modern world is that imminent has become a relative term; when one is traveling at 50 MPH imminent can look a long way down the road when in fact it is ... well, imminent.

So it requires great discipline to pick a line, keep you eyes ahead, and then follow that line without staring at it but instead keep tracking ahead to pick a new line. You have to trust the decision and course you have chosen. And of course implied in this is that as you are picking your line, should you observe a potential danger you would adjust to a different line to avoid that danger with plenty of time to spare, thus avoiding the need for any sudden inputs which might result in disaster (as discussed in the Oct 25 post ... see how this all goes together!?).

For example, just the other day I was traveling to work on a dark and stormy morning (oops, literary theft) and following a van which blocked my direct line of sight. In such situations one increases the following distance and makes certain to ride to the outside of the lane in order to increase the possibility of escape in an emergency.

Now, here in the Seattle area I am learning about "Northwest Nice" which means there is a general tendency to allow pedestrians the right of way. The exception proves the rule, however, as some folks do ignore it. We approached a curve and I could see 'round the bend the flow of traffic; at the same time I observed a crosswalk with a pedestrian waiting even as traffic continued to move in disregard of Northwest Nice ... perhaps there is an exclusion for rainy mornings at rush hour? At any rate, I immediately assumed that the fellow in front of me WOULD exercise Northwest Nice and I had better adjust my line of travel to make sure that should he suddenly hit the brakes I had someplace to travel other than his rear bumper, as four wheels stop much better on slick surfaces than do two wheels (remember that "suddent inputs" stuff?). Sure enough, he hit the brakes, I had to slow to a controlled stop, and because of my pre-emptive actions (adjusting line AND slowing down) I stopped with no problem. Whew!

It seems to me that this concept of picking a line has great value in achieving a goal as well. In business circles they might call it following a process, but by whatever name it smells as sweet (more theft - my apologies to the Bard). For example, in my current church we are discussing how we might best leverage our highly desired downtown property to better provide ministry in our setting. Many attempts have been made to do so over the years, but as I have read all the documentation it appears that not enough was done in the way of picking a line; instead folks tended to jump to conclusion - ultimate destination - far too quickly. Frankly some of these conclusions I have found absolutely brilliant, but without a process - a line of travel to follow - they simply were never able to be actualized. When confronted with the need to adjust because of changing circumstances, there was no mechanism to do so.

You can't just look down the road, you have to look through the road, through the line of travel, to discern the best route to the destination and then trust your decision as you move forward. Only then can you avoid potential dangers and be prepared to adjust to changing circumstances.