Lion by Jeff Stone Page A

quite so into it. Maybe go back to grunting like you did the first time.”
    I nodded and wiped beads of sweat from my brow. The seemingly simple strike was turning out to be a lot of work. “This is great exercise. Thank you for showing it to me.”
    “My pleasure. Practice it two thousand times a day, and you will have it down in less than a week.”
    “Two
thousand
times? Are you kidding?”
    Hú Dié shook her head. “There is a famous saying, ‘I fear the person who practices one strike ten thousand times, not the person who practices ten thousand strikes only once.’ ”
    “Good point,” I said.
    “If you truly do one thousand, nine hundred and ninety-eight more today, I promise I will teach you something else tomorrow. Make sure you alternate hands, though. Do one thousand with each. It sounds worse than it is.”
    “I’ll do it.”
    Hú Dié smiled. “I think you are going to make a great martial artist, Ryan.”
    I beamed. “Really?”
    “Well, you actually punch like a girl. We are going to have to fix that.”

The next five days were more or less the same. We would wake up and do our own thing until late afternoon; then we’d train as a team at Point Lobos. Afterward, we’d watch the footage together.
    True to her word, Hú Dié taught me five new kung fu moves, one each day: a hammer fist, a front kick, a side kick, a knee trap kick, and how to catch an opponent’s kick like Phoenix had caught her kick at his house. The last two could only be done with a partner, so she worked with me. Hú Dié took quite a beating, as both moves involved my knocking her down in the cold, wet sand and twisting one of her legs into a pretzel. We switched legs to give me practice from both sides, and I could tell that she was still pretty sore from the routines. She was tough.
    I was sore, too, but it was worth it. I was getting a great workout, plus I was beginning to feel like I could protect myself if I ever needed to. The dragon bone still seemed tohave a stranglehold on my energy level, but at least it wasn’t getting worse.
    Jake continued to train one-on-one with Peter and made amazing progress. Everyone noticed it, and no one was more proud than Jake. It was cool to see. Peter only needed to show Jake something one time, and he never forgot it.
    Phoenix spent his time alone on the ’cross bike, usually riding over to Point Lobos and tearing up the trails that allowed mountain biking. It was pretty obvious that he didn’t like being on a road bike, but being out on the trails seemed to make him happy, so Peter let him ride that far on his own.
    On our eighth night in California, we gathered as usual to watch the video, but Peter announced that he had other plans instead. There was something we needed to discuss.
    “I have some exciting news for you guys,” Peter said. “You all know that people are still gossiping on the cycling forums about you, right?”
    We all nodded.
    “Well,” Peter said, “it looks like it may have amounted to something. There is an invitation-only twilight criterium in one week that will take place in downtown San Francisco. It’s a race for adults, but all four of you have been invited.”
    Our jaws hit the floor.
    “This is … incredible,” Hú Dié said. “Even if none of us won, we would be sure to get attention. We could all find ourselves on teams.”
    “That’s right,” Peter said.
    “Wait,” Jake said. “What’s a criterium?”
    Peter laughed. “Sorry, Jake. It’s a special kind of roadbike event that’s usually quite short. A typical road bike race lasts several hours. The race usually begins in one place and ends in another. A criterium, or crit, takes place on a closed-loop course. It begins and ends in the same place, and usually lasts about an hour. It’s basically a really long sprint. This one is a one-mile loop, and the race will run for one hour, plus three laps.”
    “How does that work?” I asked.
    “After one hour, a signal is given.