October 23, 2009
Joe, You touched the topic ever so slightly in your book, But have pros taken non performance enhancing drugs to race? I have heard of pot belge but do not know if people took it while racing or after. It seems as though heroin would not make you ride very fast. But have you heard of riders possibly smoking a doobie or dropping a hit of acid before a race? It was a little known fact that a few cat 2 riders from here would smoke the rope before races back in the 80’s.
Dan - DenCoDan, sorry it has taken me so long to get your question answered, but I had to go find Missy Giove .... I kid.
Yes, I have heard tell of this pre-race practice here in the USA but I honestly never heard about that being done over there in Belgica. Holland wasn't all that far away but I never heard anyone talking about recreational smoking either. As far as I know, pre-race enjoyment of the hippy lettuce is uniquely American.
Now, it's entirely possible that I may have heard a rumor about some alleged pre-race LSD consumption in some reasonably high-level mountain bike competitions on both sides of the pond, but I honestly don't know how those races turned out. I seriously have no personal experience with that particular substance, other than reading some Hunter S words and watching the following film clip. I was often stymied enough by things going on in races anyway, so riding through bat country doesn't seem like it would work all that well, but that's just me.
There definitely was recreational drug use in the pro peloton, but it was mostly pills and syringes. It wasn't uncommon for guys to shoot up with a pot belge type concoction before the race, during the race and then again after the race so they could go out all night. Oh, and the reason for the heroin is that the amphetamine inside the potje is some nasty trailer meth - probably even worse than some of the stuff you can get on the corner of Hennepin & 7th or so. Without that in there, the dudes would get even freakier than normal. The craziest time of the year for unbridled drug use was always directly after the Tour de France and then again at the end of the season.
There were also plenty of pills - pills to make you go fast and pills to slow you down. You get to the point where you can't sleep in another crappy 1 or 2 star hotel bed anymore, so you start taking sleeping pills - or at least that's what it was like for me. I enjoyed the things a whole lot. In fact, I think it's safe to say I developed a bit of a habit for them. The amount of Valium I could eat would put a lot of people asleep almost immediately and for quite a few hours, but it just made me euphoric. When I came back to the States at the end of my European career, I had about 60-80 pills with me. I ran out way too quickly and ended up spending about five days wide awake, fearing no sleep was in sight. Not fun.
Your question got me to thinking about this former coworker friend of mine who spent some time in the Philippines when he was a kid. My friend has been sober for something like 10 years now, thankfully for him, but during his time there he was an extra on the set of "Apocalypse Now" - the film I consider to be the greatest cinematic masterpiece of all time. We once found him in the Suzie Q scene. I don't think it's a surprise to anyone who likes that movie that there was copious amounts of drug use going on during its filming. I guess my former coworker and his buddies were all completely gourded on some sort of flower, which was traditionally given to women during childbirth. According to him, "Oh man, JP, I was out of my mind for 3 days."
This whole discussion has me needing to go listen to some Hank III.
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5 Responses to “Joe, You touched the topic ever so slightly in your book, But have pros taken non performance enhancing drugs to race? I have heard of pot belge but do not know if people took it while racing or after. It seems as though heroin would not make you ride very fast. But have you heard of riders possibly smoking a doobie or dropping a hit of acid before a race? It was a little known fact that a few cat 2 riders from here would smoke the rope before races back in the 80’s.”
I remember once going to see Zeke/Motorhead at The First Avenue with a local ex-pro, who shall remain nameless, and, well, that liquid morphine was a real kicker, esp. on the ride home when I puked leaning off of my fixed gear…
,.,,I do remember one NORBA race at Eldora, probably the early 90’s, where the cloud of marijuana smoke drifting through the parking lot was so thick I think I got stoned just riding to the start….got a top-twenty that day too…mmmmm…interesting….
“There’s blood on the carpet and holes in the wall, it musta been those pills I took. I don’t know what they were and I don’t know where I got ‘em but they sure did make me feel good.”
Talk to a guy in MN that goes by the name of ‘Hollywood’
Worked with some guys in the early nineties on the domestic road scene that always “disappeared” shortly before the start of races and came back very paranoid.
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