I tried a real taper this time. Like almost every truly amateur athlete right now, I built myself an AI coach and used it for a training plan between my Disney trip the first week of August and Dakota Five-0 (DK50). This included the intention to taper between Short Track Worlds and the big race. Short Track Worlds did awesome at getting rid of my fear of falling and building my confidence at feature riding, but the taper itself was painful. After a day or two my right leg was super tight, huge knots in the thigh, then the back. I tried yoga, massage gun, doing nothing, compression sleeves, arthritis creme. Drove up Friday and that was tough on the body. Did a nice early MTB ride Saturday with the crew, but right leg was still painfully tight. Then in the afternoon went and did a 2 hr hike (Devil’s Bathtub) with the crew followed by another hour on my feet making dinner. I went to bed Saturday night with my whole body aching. I got under 9 but more than 8 hours of sleep but all that standing did the trick because I woke up feeling decent and was 10/10 for readiness.
Drank a Summer Sugar Free Red Bull. Got ready. Ate a Super Stuffed Pop Tart. We went and watched the start of wave 1. Watched wave 2. 7:21a start. Fletcher and my plan was chit chat pace all the way up. So we chatted. Dolly and the kids. Probably some other things. Then we passed a guy sitting on his all electric zero turn radius mower. Lots of jokes about how much his wife is tired of that thing. Then my right foot slipped and my stomach dropped a little. I thought my cleat had come loose. But no, my Crank Bros crankbro’d. Right pedal body removed itself from the spindle. A few pedal strokes in I was reminded this ain’t happening, so I told Fletcher and turned around. (probably 15 seconds)
It took a very short amount of time (less than 2 minutes total) before I was headed downhill talking on the phone with Sara, who was on the trip, but not racing. Sara had Crank Bro mallets that went her bike yesterday, my request was to have her meet me with her bike and tools to change pedals at the first turn of the race. She had just walked into the house. We hung up, I said hi to friends as I was bombing downhill. Some lady in Tacoma was unhappy with my spot on a corner, but she was the one following the race. Shockingly strong push up the last kicker given a broken pedal, back into the spot, took a pic, posted to insta.
Then Sara was there, I reasonably quickly changed the pedals out with only a couple of mistakes. I had kind of thought I’d just start from the bottom, but given where the last wave when I was going down, I decided that getting a ride back up the hill was the move. Popped my bike on the truck. Naturally the guy with the mower was the spot to be. So Sara drove me up. I assumed I was pretty calm, but I did check with Sara after who reports I was very calm. For me, nothing like a crisis to absolutely blank out my mind and lock me in.
Anyway, I hop back on the course about two tenths of a mile from my turnaround spot. I am last on the course, but I’m excited. I passed 4 people before the start of the single track and another one in the first few yards. And then I just worked forward. The HR was pegged at 182, but catching folks allowed me to recover a little bit and pass. Had a bobble that hurt my lats. Put music on at some point and that hit like crazy. Saw friends: Keenan, Abe, Joe (great time riding togher), someone who knows Joel, EOB, Guy. Saw a lady and her daughter screaming at each other. Made some easy passes, made some crazy passes. Kept working.
I’d talked Lesley and the kids into meeting me at Aid Stop 2. So I kept going. At some point near the top I finally had some folks who I passed, pass me back. Not until after I led them around for a mile or two, which was fun. I think the total was 3-4 from start of single track to Aid 2. Finally, I arrive at Aid 2 and while I’m doing amazing on time, I’m a little behind on fuel. I hadn’t really tried my fuel strategy out in full in advance. It was water on the pack, hydration in the bottles, carbs in the flasks. I thought the flasks would work in the pack, but ended up in the jersey pocket. Also had to baby bird water to my big one to get it right. Overall, I did great, but was hurting badly at this point. Em saw me first, I rode to them and sat down on a rock. Got 2 more liters of water, drank 2 8oz cokes, made a double endurolyte fizz bottle, had 3 salt tabs, took 3 advil. Amazing to see the family though, took almost 15 minutes, but headed back out.
And it was time to descend, so I did for a while. Talked with some folks. Was reminded that while my climbing was crazy strong on the day, I have a ways to go on descending. Walked a few really steep kickers. Kept eating and drinking. Then it was Aid Station 3. Another 8oz Coke, another bottle with Endurolyte Fizz. Aid station 3 to Bacon station is just 2 miles with 800 ft of vertical. But I did really good and climbed strongly. When there was a 1/4 of a mile and 200 vertical ft left to go, I was okay hiking most of that. Off and on to climb 12/13 into the bacon station. Almost fell over getting onto my bike at one point. It was like that. Calves screamed after a walking section here too. Bacon station had nothing but beer so I keep moving after eating the bacon I failed to grab with my mouth.
VERY technical descent to follow. Humorously grumpy interaction with a person from Omaha who was mad at my lack of skills, passed me, then promptly crashed. Never saw him again. Then I was on the fire road climb. I thought I crushed it, although the numbers don’t realllly back that up. (220W for 14:40). At some point, I begin to believe that I can finish in sub 7 hours which was my pre race goal. The fuel plan worked, I am feeling great. Nothing but descending (ish) left. So I let it go. Take the passes I can. Push the little climbs. Rip through the rock gardens. Then I start to feel some rear wheel drift. So I stop to just add air, set the pump to 24 psi and run it for what feels like a super long time. Then back at it. My hands hurt, but my feet were actually pretty descent most of the day. Ears popping provides small joy. But I’m begging for the single track to be done. FINALLY get to the part we reconned on Saturday on foot so I know I’m almost done. Then I’m out and back on the road. Push all the way down. Finish my water. I dream of 500w for 30 seconds on the kicker, instead I get lil spasms on the inside of my thigh. Whatever, we’re almost done, make the turn onto the finishing straight, looking around and then someone is sprinting against me. It takes 789w for 13 seconds but I win the sprint to finish ahead of him. I said “Not today” as I passed him. Summed up my day. In the best possible way. 6 hours 54 minutes 52 seconds.
Mack was standing after the finish line for a high five. Em was in the finishing straight to cheer. They want lemonade, I need water. No ice at the lemonade place, so I down another coke, full bottle of water. Then I’m finally ready to go play in the creek with the girls. We do that for who knows how long, post race glow is fantastic. I’m so thrilled to have beat my goal time. Stomach is bubbling, but the fuel plan worked. I still have energy to hang with the family and friends. Final on-bike fuel stats are ~510g of carbs, 6.1L of fluids, 6000mg of sodium. My clockwise best time is now 6h54m52, my counterclockwise best time is now 6hr54m43. I’m already plotting how to lower those. Why can’t I go sub 6hrs?
Ultimately, I think I was passed back (on the trail) by 4 people (sneaker dads, pink jersey guy who clearly had something go very wrong, white jersey old guy who rode when I walked). There were a small handful who passed me who I passed back as well. Overall, the stats would indicate I passed 242 people. This was an insane mental boost. I was the strongest climber I was riding with ALL day. I was stronger hiking, I was stronger riding. It also kept my pacing early in check. I’d force myself to let my HR leave Z4 before attempting the pass. I also very rarely had folks on my wheel. This kept my anxiety way down. I wasn’t worried about mistakes, I wasn’t worried about being good or bad, didn’t have to break my rhythm to let someone through. Also, not riding with Fletcher meant I was purely on my own pace the entire time and no interpersonal considerations needed. The numbers indicate I lost 33 minutes on the pedal situation, but I don’t think I can just assume I’d have finished 33 minutes faster. This is mostly because I never blew up in the first half of the race and never once battled myself mentally. There is some element of needing to go into the race in the right mentality that was uncovered here that I need to spend some time working on. Music helped too and shocks style headphones may be in my future. The other piece is that starting further back might be the right approach for me. Finally, the fact that this race topped out at 6k must have helped me a ton. I felt great all day.
Final thought: I keep feeling deeply satisfied with how it all went. I was so on, I was so within myself, I felt so strong. I want to do that ride again. I want to feel that way on every ride.
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