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the 10K run, and took
    third. The next day, there was a big article in the paper about how I’d been hit by a car and still finished third. A week later, my mom and I got a letter from the doctor. “I can’t believe it,” he
    wrote.
    NOTHING SEEMED TO SLOW ME DOWN. I HAVE A LOVE of acceleration in any form, and as a teenager I developed a fascination with high-performance cars. The first thing I did
    with the prize money from my triathlon career was buy a little used red Fiat, which I would race around Piano–without a driver’s license.
    One afternoon when I was in llth grade, I pulled off a serious piece of driving that my old friends still marvel at. I was cruising down a two-lane road with some classmates when we approached
    two cars moving slowly.
    Impatiently, I hit the gas.
    I drove my little Fiat right between the two cars. I shot the gap, and you could have stuck your
    finger out of the window and into the open mouths of the other drivers.
    I took the car out at night, which was illegal unless an adult was with me. One Christmas season, I got a part-time job working at Toys “.H” Us, helping carry stuff out to customers’ cars.
    Steve Lewis got a job at Target, and we both had night shifts, so our parents let us take the cars to work. Bad decision. Steve and I would drag-race home, doing 80 or 90 through the streets.
    Steve had a Pontiac Trans Am, and I upgraded to a Camaro IROC Z28, a monster of a car. I was in a cheesy disco phase, and I wanted that car more than anything. Jim Hoyt helped me buy
    it by signing the loan, and I made all the monthly payments and carried the insurance. It was a fast, fast car, and some nights, we’d go down to Forest Lane, which was a drag-strip area, and
    get it up to 115 or 120 mph, down a 45-mph road.
    I had two sets of friends, a circle of popular high-school kids who I would carouse with, and then my athlete friends, the bike racers and runners and triathletes, some of them grown men.
    There was social pressure at Piano East, but my mother and I couldn’t begin to keep up with the Joneses, so we didn’t even try. While other kids drove hot cars that their parents had given
    them, I drove the one I had bought with my own money.
    Still, I felt shunned at times. I was the guy who did weird sports and who didn’t wear the right labels. Some of my more social friends would say things like, “If I were you, I’d be embarrassed
    to wear those Lycra shorts.” I shrugged. There was an unwritten dress code; the socially acceptable people all wore uniforms with Polo labels on them. They might not have known it,
    but that’s what they were: uniforms. Same pants, same boots, same belts, same wallets, same caps. It was total conformity, and everything I was against.
    IN THE FALL OF MY SENIOR YEAR IN HIGH SCHOOL I
    entered an important time trial in Moriarty, New Mexico, a big race for young riders, on a course where it was easy to ride a fast time. It was a flat 12 miles with very little wind, along a stretch
    of highway. A lot of big trucks passed through, and they would belt you with a hot blast of air that pushed you along. Young riders went there to set records and get noticed.
    It was September but still hot when we left Texas, so I packed light. On the morning of my ride I got up at 6 and headed out the door into a blast of early-morning mountain air. All I had on
    was a pair of bike shorts and a short-sleeved racing jersey. I got five minutes down the road, and thought, I can’t handle this. It was frigid.
    I turned around and went back to the room. I said, “Mom, it’s so cold out there I can’t ride. I need a jacket or something.” We looked through our luggage, and I didn’t have a single piece of
    warm clothing. I hadn’t brought anything. I was totally unprepared. It was the act of a complete amateur.
    My mom said, “Well, I have a little windbreaker that I brought,” and she pulled out this tiny pink jacket. I’ve told you how small and delicate she is.