Hard Labor

I did the work.  Really, I did.  I had practiced my hydration and feeding during 4 and 5 hour rides.  I had kept my heart rate in the prescribed zones.  I had put in the hours.  Not once did I experience a cramp.

The Race

I got up at 4:00 am, filled the bottles, slathered on chamois cream, and hit the road to Gainesville. They had gotten a huge storm the night before so I didn't want to look at the radar.  Even when it started raining as I got to Tallahassee, I resisted the urge to look.  I was going regardless and worrying about the weather wasn't going to help.

When I got to San Felasco the volunteer at the gate said the road going in was under water but "you shouldn't have any trouble", yea, I had just washed my truck the day before, so of course the road was muddy.  "This trail drains well" I told my self.  "No problem!"

I set up the tent next to the Swift Cycles group and waited to for The Kid to show up.  Dr. S-works had picked up a mysterious malady while he was in Canada and had bailed on me.  This makes twice. As it all turned out he made the smart call.

There wasn't a cloud in the sky and the humidity was off the charts.  I was sweating just getting the tent up.  We had decided to do the race solo since I was really here to test my preparation.  So we lined up in the corral for the .25 run to get to the bikes.  Hmmmm, a 1/4 mile run in bike shoes, in 90 degree heat.  Not quite what I had expected.

Laps

To say the first lap was a zoo would be an understatement.  People crashed, bikes flew into me, riders just stopped in the middle of the trail for no reason.  Still I watched my HR monitor and kept it as chill as possible.  The course was 8.7 miles per lap so we had planned on 6 laps to get our goal of 50 miles.  It as a little slick in spots but mostly in good shape.  The first 2 laps were ridiculously easy.  The Kid and I were just talking and pedaling, I was feeling pretty froggy.  Riders passed me, I passed riders, laps went by, I was enjoying the ride.

At the beginning of lap 5 a rather large lady stopped at the base of the first hard climb, effectively blocking the whole trail.  I resisted the urge to say something and dismounted.  As soon as I got back on the bike and hit the pedals the cramp monster jumped on me.  "You've got to be kidding!" I said. So I stopped (off the trail) and downed the first mustard packet.  

I don't know whether you know this or not but straight mustard on a 98 degree day is not the most pleasant thing to gulp down.  It gets on the water bottle so you get to taste it for the next few swigs. Still, the cramps let up.

Until they didn't.  So packet number 2 goes down, but not quite as easily as number one did.  By this time nausea had set in.  Dehydrated?  Mustard?  A combo is my best guess.

And it went down hill from there.  Not the trail mind you but my race.  With cramps firing at any time and my stomach in bad shape, I rode the last lap at a survival pace.  I had stopped having fun.

Finished

Once we got done it took a half hour to get cooled down enough so we could load the tent.  Even The Kid was suffering. In the end we finished in under 5 hours but it wasn't what I had hoped for.  

Anyhoo, my take on all this is I just went too hard for the conditions, and PB+J is not the food to eat in that type of situation, gels were all I could get down.  I'm going to try another type of mix that has a higher content of sodium.  Plus I just need to stretch more.

This showed me that I don't go as hard during training as I do in a race situation.  Lil Ball had been telling me that but I normally ignore him.  On the plus side I got to spend a day on the bike with The Kid and see some familiar faces from the XC races.

I couldn't eat anything until I got a smoothie back in Tallahassee.  After that I started feeling better. But getting out of bed the next morning was an experience.