(no subject)
100 km by noon. Why am I still bummed?
I set out this morning to do a 200 kilometer brevet. I hadn't actually admitted this in public, yet, but I was hoping to do the Boston-Montreal-Boston ride this year. This is a 1200-kilometer ride from Newton to Quebec and back, in 90 hours. It's modeled after a famous race held in France every four years, the Paris-Brest-Paris. At least, PBP is as as famous as any randonneuring event can be. For both BMB and PBP, you need to do a set of four qualifying races, called "brevets": one each of the 200, 300, 400, and 600 kilometer brevet distances. Today was to be my first 200k.
There's a large community of randonneurs in the Boston area -- enough, anyway, that Massachusetts actually has two different randonneuring clubs, each with its own spring brevet series. Of course, I'd been hoping to do the Boston Brevet Series, which starts in May, but -- poof! I'll be gone in May. So I looked around for alternate rides. There's a 200km brevet in Chicago on April 27th, but I'll be flying out of the country that day. I don't have any reason to go to, say, St. Louis, so that left DC. David's grandmother is having a birthday party tomorrow (Sunday) and we'd been thinking about coming down. And, lo, there was a 200km brevet on Saturday! That cinched it. Nevermind that my tendon has been acting up all week, and that I haven't biked more than twice in the past two months. Nevermind that my mileage tally for the year to date is about the distance that I was hoping to bike, meaning that I would just be doing the ride cold. 125 miles should be NO problem for me, right?
On the way down here, in the car, I told David that I was waffling between being scared out of my gourd at my complete lack of preparation, and being convinced that this ride should be NOTHING, a trivial exercise for the likes of Endurance Girl. Ever the reasonable one, he said, "OK, so it'll probably be difficult, but doable, right?" Well, er, yes. The plan was to drive down here during the day on Friday, turn in early, show up well-rested and bushy-tailed on Saturday to the event, and proceed to kick some serious butt. But one thing led to another, and we left two hours late and got stuck in traffic for three extra hours (why was there a traffic jam on the New Jersey Turnpike at 11:30 PM?), finally rolling in to his parents' place around 2:20 AM. Yow. We greedily nabbed almost three sweet hours of sleep and then turned around and headed for the starting line.
That was an interesting scene. I'm normally a solo rider -- I don't ride with clubs very often, and so I felt a bit out of place in a crowd of other people dressed just like me. Really, they were dressed just like me, only a little shinier. Their bikes looked like mine, only a little sleeker. They were all, every one of them, awake and cheery and pleasant. The ride coordinator remembered my name from an email I'd sent him a month ago, welcomed me to the area, and instantly made me excited about the event rather than nervous or weirded out or anything. I got my "cue sheet", a set of written directions with mileage points made somewhat less useful by the fact that I'd forgotten my odometer in the bathroom at home (don't ask). Also got a map, free fruit, and a short lecture on the scary gravel cuts in the road on a sharp downhill turn around mile 90. And then, with no real ceremony, all 60 bikers rolled out of the HoJo's parking lot and onto the streets of Warrenton.
It was heady at first -- there are so many of us! We are all happy and pumped! And in the manner of any race with a haphazard starting line, we spent a little while sorting out into our respective packs. The speedy woman from New Zealand and the crazy guy on a fixed gear bike zoomed ahead, while I pulled in front of the admirably scruffy tandem couple and the guy bundled up on a fancy Softride.
Even in a crowd of randonneurs, I am a Mack Truck. My bike is bombproof. My equipment is thick and sturdy, made for the long haul, not built for speed. What I lack in finesse, and in hill-climbing ability, I make up for in dogged perseverance and a love for barrelling down hills, hunched over and pumping my legs. The advantage of rolling hills is that even non-climbers like me can keep up a decent pace with a little bit of daredevil overcompensation.
Side note: my hill-climbing skills really suck relative ass. I'm not bad in an absolute sense, it's just that in comparison to how I ride in other ways, my climbing muscles are pretty weak. I should start commuting via the route with the big hill (left at the fork in Lexington Center, out that road a while, up the big-ass ascent, over the highway, past Lincoln Labs and out to Hartwell). I could also try to solve this in the classic endurance athlete way, by losing all of my body fat and 5# off my bike, but that would take a bit more effort.
The start was slow -- I hung with a small group for a while, but we broke apart during a long series of kicker hills. They all stopped for a break at a general store around mile 16, but I didn't feel the need; I just kept going. It was around this time that I discovered two very important facts:
* Cleavage in a sports bra makes an excellent and accessible pocket.
* Clif bars can be eaten like flavorice: Bite the food through the packet and shimmy it out into your mouth with your teeth. Beautiful!
As a result, I barely had to stop at all: between the camelbak and the cleavage-snax, I felt perfectly well-fed, and my pace was such that I could just keep it going as long as I wanted. Around mile 25 I realized I'd hit my stride; I turned a corner and I saw a bright indigo bird fly into a tree, the breeze cooled my neck, my body felt strong and capable, and I thought, yes, yes, this is why I'm here, this is what kicks ass. I can do this, I WANT to do this, I am GOOD at doing this.
Right after realizing this, I headed down a curving hill and saw a church marquee that read "God will give you the strength you need." Honey, someone had better give me the strength I need, because it's going to be a long day without it...
10 miles later, I started feeling (admitting?) a mounting pain in my left achilles tendon. Goddammit! I'd even cleared this ride with both Cee and Rob, didn't my leg know that? Well, I figured, it can't be that bad, since biking isn't supposed to strain your tendons that much. At mile 40, I pulled into the gas station to get some more water and beg some ibuprofen off of a fellow biker (because you know they all have a stash). I found a willing donor, and he even offered me a Vivarin chaser. I also hooked up with a couple of women I'd been pacing on and off all morning, and we all set off together. For a while, it was great. I was just waiting for the Advil to kick in and having pleasant chatter with speedy women. But the hills were hurting my tendon more and more and they pulled ahead during a particularly rough spot and here it was, almost 90 minutes later, and I didn't feel better, I felt worse. The last two miles were painful with every pedal stroke. I tried to favor my weaker right leg and then it started hurting in the same spot as the left.
Damn it! Damn it all! When in the hell am I going to find another 200km brevet? In freaking Germany? I was shaking a bit with frustration and sadness when I pulled into the halfway point. I knew that I had to pull out of the race but I felt so fine! I'd finished the first half a full hour ahead of when I'd thought I would, and I was on track to finish the course with 2.5 - 3 hours to spare. I'd met good, compatible riding buddies who asked interesting questions about my bike and I was feeling so fast and competent and it would have been a triumphant lunchlet with David had it not been for all of the freaking PAIN.
But at the same time, the last thing I want is to be so needlessly macho that I work on through an injury and cause myself permanent harm. That would be counterproductive and shamefully stupid. Continuing on the course, even if I could finish the race with sufficient Advil and willpower, would be a big fat "MAKE YOURSELF AT HOME" sign for the tendinitis.
I called Rob on the cell phone and made him tell me what I needed to hear. He did. Just like David, he said, "hey! kick ass that you were so speedy this morning, but you should definitely pull out now when you're still happy and ahead". We talked for maybe 10 minutes, and he gave me good advice like sage older brothers are supposed to do. I walked over to see Jim the event organizer dude who asked about my ankle before I even said anything; apparently, people were very concerned for me, which was way sweet.
So I pulled out, registering a big DNF for the day. I finished half the ride, 100km, by noon, on zero preparation and three hours of good sleep. I rediscovered the joy of smooth unbroken pavement and the feeling of working with your bike to become a beautiful coherent machine (cyborg?) floating over the roads. In short, I had a great ride and stopped myself before I took it too far.
I know I did the right thing. I'm even happy I did the right thing. I'm still a bit sad, though, at the thought that I might not have a chance to do the BMB ride at all this year. I may have to save it up for next year and ride in Paris-Brest-Paris, which would hardly be a hardship. I'm also worried that I won't be able to do any significant exercise at all for a month. I wonder if skating would be OK -- after all, the boot holds your ankle firmly in place so there's no stress due to flexing. I'll give it a shot when the hurt goes away again. But certainly no running, no leg weightlifting, and no biking until further notice.
So, like, sigh.
I set out this morning to do a 200 kilometer brevet. I hadn't actually admitted this in public, yet, but I was hoping to do the Boston-Montreal-Boston ride this year. This is a 1200-kilometer ride from Newton to Quebec and back, in 90 hours. It's modeled after a famous race held in France every four years, the Paris-Brest-Paris. At least, PBP is as as famous as any randonneuring event can be. For both BMB and PBP, you need to do a set of four qualifying races, called "brevets": one each of the 200, 300, 400, and 600 kilometer brevet distances. Today was to be my first 200k.
There's a large community of randonneurs in the Boston area -- enough, anyway, that Massachusetts actually has two different randonneuring clubs, each with its own spring brevet series. Of course, I'd been hoping to do the Boston Brevet Series, which starts in May, but -- poof! I'll be gone in May. So I looked around for alternate rides. There's a 200km brevet in Chicago on April 27th, but I'll be flying out of the country that day. I don't have any reason to go to, say, St. Louis, so that left DC. David's grandmother is having a birthday party tomorrow (Sunday) and we'd been thinking about coming down. And, lo, there was a 200km brevet on Saturday! That cinched it. Nevermind that my tendon has been acting up all week, and that I haven't biked more than twice in the past two months. Nevermind that my mileage tally for the year to date is about the distance that I was hoping to bike, meaning that I would just be doing the ride cold. 125 miles should be NO problem for me, right?
On the way down here, in the car, I told David that I was waffling between being scared out of my gourd at my complete lack of preparation, and being convinced that this ride should be NOTHING, a trivial exercise for the likes of Endurance Girl. Ever the reasonable one, he said, "OK, so it'll probably be difficult, but doable, right?" Well, er, yes. The plan was to drive down here during the day on Friday, turn in early, show up well-rested and bushy-tailed on Saturday to the event, and proceed to kick some serious butt. But one thing led to another, and we left two hours late and got stuck in traffic for three extra hours (why was there a traffic jam on the New Jersey Turnpike at 11:30 PM?), finally rolling in to his parents' place around 2:20 AM. Yow. We greedily nabbed almost three sweet hours of sleep and then turned around and headed for the starting line.
That was an interesting scene. I'm normally a solo rider -- I don't ride with clubs very often, and so I felt a bit out of place in a crowd of other people dressed just like me. Really, they were dressed just like me, only a little shinier. Their bikes looked like mine, only a little sleeker. They were all, every one of them, awake and cheery and pleasant. The ride coordinator remembered my name from an email I'd sent him a month ago, welcomed me to the area, and instantly made me excited about the event rather than nervous or weirded out or anything. I got my "cue sheet", a set of written directions with mileage points made somewhat less useful by the fact that I'd forgotten my odometer in the bathroom at home (don't ask). Also got a map, free fruit, and a short lecture on the scary gravel cuts in the road on a sharp downhill turn around mile 90. And then, with no real ceremony, all 60 bikers rolled out of the HoJo's parking lot and onto the streets of Warrenton.
It was heady at first -- there are so many of us! We are all happy and pumped! And in the manner of any race with a haphazard starting line, we spent a little while sorting out into our respective packs. The speedy woman from New Zealand and the crazy guy on a fixed gear bike zoomed ahead, while I pulled in front of the admirably scruffy tandem couple and the guy bundled up on a fancy Softride.
Even in a crowd of randonneurs, I am a Mack Truck. My bike is bombproof. My equipment is thick and sturdy, made for the long haul, not built for speed. What I lack in finesse, and in hill-climbing ability, I make up for in dogged perseverance and a love for barrelling down hills, hunched over and pumping my legs. The advantage of rolling hills is that even non-climbers like me can keep up a decent pace with a little bit of daredevil overcompensation.
Side note: my hill-climbing skills really suck relative ass. I'm not bad in an absolute sense, it's just that in comparison to how I ride in other ways, my climbing muscles are pretty weak. I should start commuting via the route with the big hill (left at the fork in Lexington Center, out that road a while, up the big-ass ascent, over the highway, past Lincoln Labs and out to Hartwell). I could also try to solve this in the classic endurance athlete way, by losing all of my body fat and 5# off my bike, but that would take a bit more effort.
The start was slow -- I hung with a small group for a while, but we broke apart during a long series of kicker hills. They all stopped for a break at a general store around mile 16, but I didn't feel the need; I just kept going. It was around this time that I discovered two very important facts:
* Cleavage in a sports bra makes an excellent and accessible pocket.
* Clif bars can be eaten like flavorice: Bite the food through the packet and shimmy it out into your mouth with your teeth. Beautiful!
As a result, I barely had to stop at all: between the camelbak and the cleavage-snax, I felt perfectly well-fed, and my pace was such that I could just keep it going as long as I wanted. Around mile 25 I realized I'd hit my stride; I turned a corner and I saw a bright indigo bird fly into a tree, the breeze cooled my neck, my body felt strong and capable, and I thought, yes, yes, this is why I'm here, this is what kicks ass. I can do this, I WANT to do this, I am GOOD at doing this.
Right after realizing this, I headed down a curving hill and saw a church marquee that read "God will give you the strength you need." Honey, someone had better give me the strength I need, because it's going to be a long day without it...
10 miles later, I started feeling (admitting?) a mounting pain in my left achilles tendon. Goddammit! I'd even cleared this ride with both Cee and Rob, didn't my leg know that? Well, I figured, it can't be that bad, since biking isn't supposed to strain your tendons that much. At mile 40, I pulled into the gas station to get some more water and beg some ibuprofen off of a fellow biker (because you know they all have a stash). I found a willing donor, and he even offered me a Vivarin chaser. I also hooked up with a couple of women I'd been pacing on and off all morning, and we all set off together. For a while, it was great. I was just waiting for the Advil to kick in and having pleasant chatter with speedy women. But the hills were hurting my tendon more and more and they pulled ahead during a particularly rough spot and here it was, almost 90 minutes later, and I didn't feel better, I felt worse. The last two miles were painful with every pedal stroke. I tried to favor my weaker right leg and then it started hurting in the same spot as the left.
Damn it! Damn it all! When in the hell am I going to find another 200km brevet? In freaking Germany? I was shaking a bit with frustration and sadness when I pulled into the halfway point. I knew that I had to pull out of the race but I felt so fine! I'd finished the first half a full hour ahead of when I'd thought I would, and I was on track to finish the course with 2.5 - 3 hours to spare. I'd met good, compatible riding buddies who asked interesting questions about my bike and I was feeling so fast and competent and it would have been a triumphant lunchlet with David had it not been for all of the freaking PAIN.
But at the same time, the last thing I want is to be so needlessly macho that I work on through an injury and cause myself permanent harm. That would be counterproductive and shamefully stupid. Continuing on the course, even if I could finish the race with sufficient Advil and willpower, would be a big fat "MAKE YOURSELF AT HOME" sign for the tendinitis.
I called Rob on the cell phone and made him tell me what I needed to hear. He did. Just like David, he said, "hey! kick ass that you were so speedy this morning, but you should definitely pull out now when you're still happy and ahead". We talked for maybe 10 minutes, and he gave me good advice like sage older brothers are supposed to do. I walked over to see Jim the event organizer dude who asked about my ankle before I even said anything; apparently, people were very concerned for me, which was way sweet.
So I pulled out, registering a big DNF for the day. I finished half the ride, 100km, by noon, on zero preparation and three hours of good sleep. I rediscovered the joy of smooth unbroken pavement and the feeling of working with your bike to become a beautiful coherent machine (cyborg?) floating over the roads. In short, I had a great ride and stopped myself before I took it too far.
I know I did the right thing. I'm even happy I did the right thing. I'm still a bit sad, though, at the thought that I might not have a chance to do the BMB ride at all this year. I may have to save it up for next year and ride in Paris-Brest-Paris, which would hardly be a hardship. I'm also worried that I won't be able to do any significant exercise at all for a month. I wonder if skating would be OK -- after all, the boot holds your ankle firmly in place so there's no stress due to flexing. I'll give it a shot when the hurt goes away again. But certainly no running, no leg weightlifting, and no biking until further notice.
So, like, sigh.