Finally?
Maybe. So Friday right?
Day before. Tent and campsite all set up, met the neighbors saw some friends. Saw Todd, he said that ROBB BAUER was racing. That was exciting. Haven't seen him in a long time.
I eat, drink, but not quite enough and maybe too much water, it was hot. but Eventually I get out for a course preview. Put the gopro on and head out. Feels boring at first. Oddly so but also I know that it will be a good thing as the race progresses.
I've got the new shoes on, the ones I've been wearing, everything feels okay, I'm fresh and ride everything, but BUT there are a two spots that peg me into the red. actually I wonder, I might have even walked on the dirt on the other side of the house above blueberry hill. But only that spot. guess I could check the strava for speed. But anyway Rideable in pre-ride though spiking the HR towards max is not sustainable for the whole race. Whole point for solo is to keep those spikes super low to non-existent. Energy demands are more important to manage than anything else. Cranking the HR to the max once or twice a lap for 24 hours straight is a good way to not make it through.... I mean it is possible but it is also something I wanted to try and avoid. That and seeing as I had no shifting it was kind of a yo-yo effect with some people. I'd walk where they were spinning and catch and pass them on the not quite as steep hills or have to slow down behind them on the single track downhills. No I generally didn't do the flying Colin past people, i'd chill and be patient and pass them when I could. Very different racing on a 4 person team than solo...
Got the lap done and my knee hurt. Like kind of how it had been all week. So I put on my spare shoes, the destroyed ones... knee felt instantly better just riding a few hundred yards around. Guess the new shoes become backup shoes. I still need to work on that cleat position. And put the new ones into service.
There was a lot more climbing. I think i said out loud that if I had had a chance to pre-ride it before the day before I would have tried to sell/give away/bail on the race, that was a lot of elevation, esp on a singlespeed. Super happy about picking the 34-22. And the smaller tires, although the cush core added a lot of weight it was nice on all the rocks out there. That and I had a bit of pressure drift a few times. Felt squirrelly at 17 and really squirrelly at 15.5. Didn't plan on running that low pressure. But honestly that pressure felt perfect on the single track, but terrifying on the double track. But the ToPeak Joe Blow Pro Digital totally crushed it and made dialing it all in perfect... topped up the tires only twice during the race, oddly the last time the pressure was still spot on. maybe the sealant finally found the gap and filled it.
Finished pre-ride, packet pickup was open by then, got my bag, number and figured out how to put it all on. Went around and checked in on ToddP and to see if ROB BAUER had made it (he was trying to get his EV to the charging station at the hotel, he was 200 yards shy of having enough electrons to do so). Todd invited me back for pizza. Lesli and I headed around over to chat with Ronnie and RyanL and headed back. Ate food, relaxed, eventually I headed back to check see if pizza was ready - had a slice (oh man it was so good) laughed and chatted with those guys for a bit then headed back and started settling down. Tried to fall asleep early. Listened to a little more of the book on tape but then just eventually turned that and my phone off and tried to sleep. with the phone off tho I wasn't sure what time it was, other than it felt like I had just laid down. It was dark though and I had to pee. unzip the tent, unzip the rain fly, shuffle over to the porta potty, shuffle back, climb in, zip the rain fly, zip the screen, climb back on the cot and have a sip of water and fall back asleep... only to wake up a few hours (or more, no idea, wish i had not turned the phone off so I would know what time it was) having to pee. It was hot, I drank a ton of water/fluids that night before bed.
This time my legs cramped up and since I can't stand up in the tent it made the exit awkward. As in I didn't fully get the tent door unzipped and tried to straighten up and stand up as I unzipped the rain fly and only managed to trip and fall into the back of my EZ-up tent wall and smash my left knee into the floor pump on the other side. Made a hell of a racket. Woke lesli up in the tent next door. Headed back to the portapotty, but wanted to get some pickle juice to kill this cramp. there were two bikes leaning against the cooler with the grillos in it. I'm like fuck someone's gonna hear the bikes moving and think someone is stealing bikes in the middle of the night. I tried to move them quietly, but I think Lesli also heard that, and got the pickle juice and then climbed back into the tent and slept until the sun was blazing in the valley (about 6:30). I tried using the mask as an eye shield to sleep longer but I couldn't fall back asleep.
So I got up, had some coffee, ate the muesli, and other food and started getting the pre-race stuff sorted. Making plans with Lesli for sandwiches, bottles, and the like. Sorted out what I'd carry with me (mini-hand pump and plug kit) and generally got ready. Headed to the riders meeting at 10:30, headed over to the start just before noon. Lined up in the back, I'm not a runner, the lap around the pond was going to suck so I just plodded along. Took the gopro along and recorded the lap (haven't looked at the footage yet), should have taken the wahoo with me but no i'm a dummby leave it on the bike sure good idea. Of course it powered down and Lesli only noticed that just as I got there so I waited a few extra seconds for the GPS fix to happen and then we headed out.
There was a MAJOR fuck up with the start loop. we were supposed to go straight, bypassing the narrow bridge and the two moguls. That would have sent us right out on the course and not back past the start for a while. But someone sent us left right into singletrack (tight) then into more technical uphill singletrack (tighter) and basically we walked that because it was too congested. And then were stuck behind slow people on the high bank bermed swoopy downhill stuff.
Back to the start finish - yellow brick road was still closed maybe? or maybe I said NOPE because there was a line of 8 people already on it and I was sketched out by it.
Through the tent, back out on course and starting (for real) the full lap. I did this with one bottle, had pre-hydrated pretty well and felt it would work. It kind of did. I was out of fluid by the time I got back but it was all good. Skipped the bridge again I think, or maybe that was the one time I did ride it. And half way across the bridge tilted and my back wheel slipped and I was like a whisker away from falling in the water. I saved it, but fuck that - scared me even more. I mean I was riding the blueberry hill bridges that were 1/4 the width w/o a problem but they weren't tippy.
There were not many others that skipped the yellow bridge every lap. It added a good 60 seconds per lap. Insignificant but only just barely. Sure over the 15 laps that adds up, should i have sucked it up and ridden it again and overcome my fear? Probably but I didn't. I'm okay with that, I don't have anything to prove.
Second lap, 2 miles in, or so, on one of the bumpy rocky sections I felt a change in the seat, like that should have happened, and then shortly after that i heard and felt something shift majorly. Something broke on the saddle. I stopped and fuck.
Saddle rails snapped totally clean. Not even at the stress riser at the clamp. They snapped about a cm in front. The front half fell out somewhere, lost out there. And while i could put a little weight on the saddle any shifting or bouncing and the saddle came off the rails and I had 4 really sharp pokey bits where a saddle should be. NOT GOOD.
Had to stop three or four times to re-attach the saddle, maybe more. Fortunately the seat clamp mech had held because i was riding w/o tools. Losing those parts would mean no dropper post and that would have REALLY sucked.
But also what sucked was riding 7 miles basically standing up, 2 laps into the race.
THAT and the spare saddle I had was a saddle i have never ridden. One of the ones that came on one of the bikes I've gotten that I have always immediately swapped out for a Concor. It was indeed one of the new concors that broke. Ugh. I guess nearly 2k miles on a hardtail MTB under the butt of a 225 singlespeeder on the rocks and roots of New England is too much for these saddles.
Swapped the new seat on pretty quickly, ate a sandwich (Ham, smoked turkey, cheese, mayo and dijon on whole wheat) drank a bottle, took a bottle, ate a pickle drank a bit of the pickle juice took too more of the Christin/Lindsey flourless cookies and headed back out.
Hmm something isn't right with the saddle. It is too far back, the dropper doesn't go down smoothly. It is too tall, knee doesn't like it.
Fix both of those issues on the next lap pit stop, didn't eat a sandwich but drank an extra bottle. Might have taken two bottles that time.
When it was hot i went to two bottles of gatorade endurance per lap. I never drank plan water, not once. When it cooled down i cut back to carrying one. One quart of pickles and juice lasted the whole race, there was nothing left in the container at the end. No juice, no pickles, just some garlic and a grape leaf.
At some point I got tired of the chocolate peanut butter cookies and busted into the fruit snack cache that Lesli brought. I ate a tone of those for three or four laps and then oof sugar belly kicked in and I went back to cookies. I think there was a total of 8 sandwiches eaten. Plus one lap where I ate a roll of ham and cheese only. I did drink a bit of kefir before the race and finished it at some point maybe in the early morning pit laps. Coffee? I packed Liters of cold coffee that i made.
4 big nalgene bottles of it. One bottle a day basically. I never had more than a few swallows of it during the pit stops and I stopped drinking it all together at about 1 am, maybe 2am. Resumed once the sun came up.
I guess at one point the tent blew away and everyone around helped to get it back in place and extra stakes were acquired and the sides were removed. There was a good storm that moved through at one point. We got wet, I rode through the wet then it started to dry out but two laps of riding in wet shorts and the chamois shifted and was started to irritate my inner thigh with a few miles left in the lap.
At that point I did a full wardrobe change, a longer stop but a good one, I actually had to pee a few times, and each time the color stayed lighter than the lemon lime gatorade. Changed into dry good shorts, re-applied some anti-fungal cream just in case, then a good coating of bag balm, got dressed in the dark (naked in the tent except for my ass being lit up by the riders across the pond). Who cares I was not going to try and do that in the tent that I couldn't stand up in.
The lights worked out great. One of the bar, one on the helmet. Swapped a few times, never lost power, wahoo almost made it 24 hours w/o being charged, it still fucked up the GPS track, but thanks to the wheel sensor I recorded all the miles.
I was really looking forward to the highland pipes at sunrise, but that didn't happen this year. It was a bummer. Soon Dave Harris joined me, he had stomach issues in the night and stopped and took a nap, along with most everyone else. Not me. I would come in, stop for 10-15 minutes, eat, take shoes off, drink coffee, pickle juice, change socks, whatnot. Lap after lap.
I also didn't want to know what place I was in. I just wanted to ride my race internally, race against myself. But Syl said he thought I'd do 9 laps, Burke said 11 so I knew i had to do at least 12. And I mentioned that I don't want to know anything about placing till I hit lap 12. And then I only wanted to know how many laps in front of the next person I was.
Chatted with Dave about that one lap and he said it was good but maybe worth looking just to see.
I didn't look and well after lap 12 just about to start 13, I found out I was in 3rd. a few laps up on 4th and one or two laps behind 2nd.
Well shit. Guess I have to keep riding. Or walking. Had some good chats during the 24 hours with other racers, people were always supportive and Colin passed me a bunch and always had something to say, like one time "Hey Geoff, you know what's better than riding 24 hours solo singlespeed? EVERYTHING"
Not a lie.
The rain made the wooden bridges slippery but the SE4 tires gripped them soooooooo well. They might be heavy but they were magic, never wanting for traction. Lots of walking. LOTS of it. Well really only three spots. The long drag up blueberry hill past the house, the singletrack in the woods early and then the final single track that we walked on the screwed up pre-ride.
Wasn't going that much slower than those riding it while i was walking. Slower? yes, not that much.
Got lap 14 done, it was 10:30 or so, when I came through the tent i checkwith the scoring, how many laps had I done (14 had started 15) how many had 4th done (10? but on the 11th) should i go out for another, yes, there's a small chance they could ride fast enough to pass me but if I just did one I easily would lock up 3rd place. I saw it on the printed results and on the screen. Clear as could be. NICE! HOLY SHIT PODIUM!
So I stopped at the pits, cleaned up, put sunscreen on, put clean kit on, re-applied the bagbalm and took a shit (all in the portapoty) hey baby wipes are SUPER KEY btw. Also alcohol wipes do a really good job of removing blue lizard sunscreen.
I put the GoPro on the helmet, loaded up with waterbottles and headed out for the final lap. It was the same as the rest of them. Colin went flying by, the BikeregShare coffee team was full of encouragement and support the rest of the people out there were awesome.
Made it back around and slowed down and timed it so that I was the first one to cross the line after the cannon went off.
Got cleaned up, ate food, put sunscreen back on, washed my hair with one of Austin's big water jugs (felt awesome) and we prepared for awards ceremony at 2pm. Lesli had gone to get my car from the remote parking lot, and we had started to sort things around.
Headed over to awards. It was getting exciting. Solo Singlespeed (YES) First place, (the fast bicycling mag sponsored dude who had been leading the whole time) Second place ( a skinny kid from VT riding a super light tall geared SSMTB) and then Third Place DAVE HARRIS... wait... what the fuck?
I was sitting with all the other singlespeeders. Dave was in 5th, Shawn was 4th and I was 3rd, we all looked around that was fucking wrong, Dave didn't know what to do so he just went up, told them it was wrong, they carried on w/o flinching. It sucked, it was rough.
Of course I finished the race and had found the wifi and the first text was from Solobreak telling me about the death of Evan.
So it was all somewhat in perspective but still sucked.
Before the results were over they seemed to recognize the mistake and fixed it and called me up. Alone, gave me a medal (I gave them back Daves that he had given me) but the moment was gone.
It is okay. But still stings a little.
I packed, organized and all the rest after, lesli headed home (unwisely) neither of us had slept since 6:30 the morning before... I got things sorted, ate more food, chatted with John as he packed up, then with everything sorted and buttoned down walked over and hung out with the Clark Brothers racing team, had a few slices of pizza, eventually wandered back to the tent, laid down (for the first time since early Saturday morning) and tried to fall asleep... my back was sore but nothing else was too bad.
Eventually maybe 9pm I fell asleep... got up to pee once... sun came up, drank coffee, ate food, slowly packed up. planned to wait until the beer store opened (it was erroneously listed as opening at 10 - it was open before that) but also waiting for the morning coffee to do the thing and then use the portapotty one last time. But they came to clean them up and haul them away before I could take a shit.
Oh well.
So I left, headed home, stopped to get beer as thank you for those who loaned me the lights, stopped for a bathroom break. Then stopped at Hooksett rest area (where I thought i had lost my wallet 2 hours earlier when I stopped for the bathroom - that was 10 minutes of fucking panic - not enough gas to get home or back to where i stopped to look for it - but i found it and all was okay).
Made it home, slept like shit because I was still a little sore and tired, went to work and well the rest you know eh?
There were a bunch of other little stories, like stopping in the night to help someone look for their inflator in the dark.
But I think that's kind of the whole big picture.
It worked. Surprisingly well. The planning was good, lucky with the campsite, super lucky to have Lesli there to help, hydration was awesome, never cramped once, food was good, hungry a few times and lots of variety that I didn't even dip into but was there in case my stomach shifted.
The bike worked, but the fork needs servicing and the dropper post might be trashed. But the chainlube was awesome (finish line cross country lube mixed up ala GeWilli style)
And I finished 3rd, and I'm pretty stoked with that. I also left a lot out there. If I hadn't stopped for so long every single lap I could have gotten at least 4 more laps in, something for next time eh?
Okay - i'm gonna wrap this up, it is hot up here and the laptop is really hot.
ask questions... i'll try and go over this later and see what I might have missed and add to follow up posts.
I have NOT ridden the MTB since, although it was just last weekend so that's not surprising. Need to get the Top Fuel back together, need to sort out the seat post there. probably swap droppers to be honest.
But not right now. maybe a good project for the week. or friday.
heddwch
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