I arrived home from work yesterday totally drained. I was the lone representative of my work group, and a number of problems were waiting for me as soon as I walked in the door. It was an extremely stressful and crazy day for a Friday. When the chaos finally subsided, I picked up Spencer from daycare and headed home.
Once at home I changed clothes, grabbed a snack and headed out to the garage. I gave my bike a half-hearted cleaning and tune-up. I went to the grocery store and picked up some supplies. Then I went home and sat in my chair in front of the TV for a while to unwind. I started debating whether I really wanted to race today. I was so damned tired.
During dinner I made the decision to blow off the race. I was just too tired.
As I lie awake in bed, trying to shut down my brain, I started feeling guilty about not racing. I fell asleep still undecided a little after 10:00.
I woke up at 3 a.m. and decided not to go. Then I woke up at 4:00 and decided to go. Since I had not finished with preparations the night before, I ran around the house and simply grabbed anything cycling-related that came into view. My original goal was to be on the road by 4:00, but I left at 4:45. I would have to put the hammer down to make registration.
I drove like an idiot and made it to the registration table at 7:40, 20 minutes before registration closed. After making it through the long line, I then had 30 minutes to get dressed and ready for the 8:30 start.
I decided to go with water bottles and jersey pockets over the Camelbak route. I would probably do that again, even though the course offered few places to drink from a bottle. I liked being able to stop at the truck and trade out bottles and throw a few things in the pockets rather than fumbling with the Camelbak. I also don't like putting energy drink in the Camelbak.
As I was getting ready, there were people warming up 30 minutes before the race. I found this quite odd. I mean, I can understand spinning around a bit, but people were actually climbing a steep hill and hitting it very hard. I heard that most of the course was singletrack, so I expected the first lap to be slow, which would offer plenty of time to get warmed up.
Right before the start of almost every race is the rider meeting where the course and rules are discussed. It's terribly exciting:
Everyone lined up and I was surprised how many people there were. As I looked around, and the vast majority were solo racers (blue numbers) and many of those were on single speeds.
The gun went off (a real gun, a first) and I rolled into my first 8-hour race.
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| That's me! Second from the left. |
The course had elements that reminded me of the Connector Trail, Sly Park and Georgetown, with a pinch of Oregon sprinkled in. The 9.2 mile course went like this: a fireroad climb to start (surprise), singletrack climb then decent, fireroad climb, awesome singletrack descent, tough singletrack climb, rolling singletrack for a while, a fire road climb, and a rolling singletrack downhill to the finish.
The first lap was slow, as expected—a long line of people snaking through winding singletrack. No problems on the first lap other than about 20 of us missing a turn. It only cost us a couple minutes to get turned around.
The riders spread out over the second lap, and I was enjoying the ride. The singletrack sections were really nice. Much of the trail was carpeted in pine needles and was pretty smooth, with rocks here and there and the occasional rock garden. Midway through the lap I had a bee fly into my helmet and sting me. It hurt for an hour or so, but after that I forgot all about it.
After lap two I pitted and swapped out my bottles. I scarfed down some food and drank some Gatorade. I felt slightly full, but that was OK. There was nothing on the course that put you into the red, so little chance of puking. I was back on the course in less than five minutes.
Lap three was uneventful. I rode most of it alone, passing the occasional rider. I was jumping off every lip and water bar I could find, just riding for fun and not really racing.
Towards the end of lap three was the first time I felt a little fatigue, which made sense because I was just approaching my typical mountain bike ride length of around 30 miles.
Lap four was more of the same—just riding and having fun. I started to feel more fatigue in my legs, so I slowed down a little to conserve energy. On the two steep sections of the course, I went down into my small chainring for the first time. Towards the end of the lap, I felt the first twinge of a cramp.
I pitted after lap four, eating more food and swapping out bottles. I lubed my dry chain and downed more water and Gatorade. I was surprised to feel a cramp because I had adhered to my "one bottle per lap" plan and I supplemented it with more fluids at rest and pit stops. After a 10 minute break, I rolled out for lap five.
Early in the lap on a downhill, I started feeling the cramp again. It was in my right calf and into my inner quad. I started downhilling right foot forward, which felt really awkward, but that stopped the cramping for the time being. But on the first steep uphill, both legs cramped up. I hopped off the bike and drank a whole bottle of Endurox while walking up the climb. I hopped back on at the top and continued riding. For the rest of the lap I rode gingerly on the climbs, spinning as much as possible. At the rest stop I was desperate enough to drink two cups of Red Bull (vile stuff) and a cup of water. I felt twinges throughout the lap, but no full-on cramps. An unfortunate situation, because except for the cramps, I had really good legs.
I pitted after lap five and drank even more water, Gatorade and Gu2O. It was only 70 degrees! I couldn't comprehend why I was cramping so badly after only 46 miles. I looked on the floor of the truck and there were SIX empty cycling water bottles, two 12 ounce water bottles and two empty Gatorade bottles. What the hell? It sure seemed like a lot of fluid. I sat in the truck while my legs twitched and spasmed. I really wanted six laps, but it wasn't looking good. Even though I had three hours until the cutoff to complete the lap, I didn't know if time would fix this.
After 30 minutes of resting, my legs actually felt worse. I was bummed out. I figured it's now or never, so I climbed on the bike and set off. As soon as the road pointed up I started feeling the cramps lurking. I turned onto the singletrack where the grade steepened, and both legs quickly cramped. I hopped off and uttered some profanities. I wanted the sixth lap, but I wasn't sure if I could endure an hour or more of the cramping, or whether it was even worth it. I stretched, drank a few gulps of water, and tried it again. No dice. I was done.
I rolled back to the truck going the wrong way on the course. A few people offered encouragement to keep going, but no amount of positive energy could reverse my situation. Back at the truck I sat down and both legs seized up. I had to stand up and walk around for a while. I went to the start-finish tent and took three bottles of water, which I promptly drank.
At that point my mood was pretty dark, so I decided to blow off the awards and raffle and go home. The cramps made changing clothes difficult. Every time I moved either leg powerful cramps struck. It felt like someone jamming an ice pick deep into my muscles.
I left at 3:00. I struggled with cramps every time I needed to shift gears. I was relieved to hit open highway where I didn't have to work the clutch. I arrived home a little before 6:00—a very long day on very little sleep.
Final stats: 5 laps, 47 miles, 5:11 riding time, 12th out of 15 in 40+ Solo.
I have always struggled with cramps, but never like I experienced in this race. If I can figure out the cramp situation, I see little reason why I can't knock out 7 laps next year.
Later.
