It's not a race though, it's just a ride. I was able to keep up with Tony for the first 20 miles, but it just became too much work. I let him go. I caught up to him around mile 30. He was on the side of the road with a flat. I hung around and watched him effortlessly change his tire and thought about how bad I suck at changing flats. Once we got rolling, I eventually fell back again. Around mile 40, the mountain climbing began. Apparently I had no idea what I was in for with this ride. I must not have been paying attention when Coach Dave said this ride has 6,180 ft of climbing (!) The 3,312 foot climb to Henry Coe was so friggin' hard! I had to get off my bike twice. My heart rate was too high and my bike was going so slow that I was at risk of just falling over. I caught up to my teammate, Belinda, at the very steepest point. She and I were swearing like sailors all the way to the top. We were eventually rewarded with the 50 mile rest stop where we met up with the some of our teammates and waited for the rest of Ironteam.
What goes up must come down. And as you can see from the elevation chart above, we came down fast. Since I apparently wasn't listening when the coach described this course and never checked the elevation chart, I had no idea we still had another 1,184 feet of climbing starting around mile 70. So my downhill relief was quickly met with my uphill despair. I was spent on this hill that I wondered if I was hallucinating when I saw a zebra grazing with ponies. Either it was real or Coach Dave was tripping too. He claims to have a picture of it.
The last 20 miles of the ride were awesome. It started with a thrilling downhill and then put us on the flats. Coach Dave and Tony allowed me to draft off of them for the last 15 miles or so. Drafting is when you ride directly behind the rider in front of you (inches between their back wheel and your front wheel), it somehow creates a pocket of lessened resistance, you can conserve over 30% of your energy by doing this. This is ILLEGAL when racing triathlons but it's fair game in a headwind at the end of a 100 mile bike ride. Once we turned onto the last stretch of highway, we were treated to a tailwind! We were hauling 28 miles per hour on the flats. At the last 5 miles, Coach Dave said we had 2 more small bumps to get over and then we were home free. I gave everything I had to stay on his wheel over the first "bump" and when we reached the top, I knew I wouldn't be able to hold on for another hill. Tony was feeling the burn as well. Then Coach Dave yelled back that he was mistaken, that was the last of the hills. Woohoo!! Shortly after we pulled into the finish, racked our bikes, and I had completed my first 100 mile bike ride. It was amazing, I felt like a rock star. I checked my Garmin, I burned over 5,699 calories - time to eat!
Eating turned out to be a problem, at first I was ready to stuff my face with whatever was put in front of me, but a wave of nausea put that on hold. It was important that I eat for recovery because the next day I had the Primavera Metric (60 mile) Ride to do. I was eventually able to eat a vegetarian Ethiopian plate, I figured the protein packed lentils would help me get the nutrition I needed. I took an ice bath that night and propped my legs up on pillows while I slept.
Sunday morning came too quickly. My wonderful fiance woke up early with me and made me a bacon and egg breakfast. I drove down to Union City and showed up at registration 30 minutes late (are you seeing a pattern here?) Once again, I really had no idea what I was in for with this ride. As you can see from the map above, there were lots of hills, 3,786 feet of them. I got through the ride and at the end of the day, I felt like a rock star.
- Don't forget to bring a recovery drink. Fill it with ice cubes so it's not warm hours later.
- I had a really low heart rate on Sunday. This is an indicator that I'm fatigued...duh!
- Next time I need to bring my running shoes and do a short jog after riding 100 miles. This will be a hint of what race day will feel like.
- Electrolyte pills work.
- Careful what you eat. Stick to salty stay away from sweet.
- Ride at your own pace.
- Ice bath and elevate the legs
Condition: Stick a fork in me...I'm done!
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