Category: Race reports

Posts that contain a report of a recent race or big event

6-12-24 Hour World Time Trial Championships Race Report

24 Hour Time Trial

As has been the case with many people, the last year and a half or so hasn’t gone according to plan for various reasons. After a long year of working through various issues including a chronic injury to both knees, I was finally able to get on my new Specialized Shiv TT bike and start training for an ultra-distance race a few months ago. My training mostly went according to plan, minus a couple of frustrating trips to Borrego Springs for long training rides on the race course that didn’t go well. I tried not to dwell on those setbacks and was able to put in a solid three week training block leading into race week.

It was a bit of a mental challenge going into the race knowing I wouldn’t be able to ride nearly as many miles as I have in the past. I was fairly certain that I could hit 400 miles if everything went smoothly and conditions were favorable. I had a solid crew coming out to help with Rich and Terry Walsh and Pat Hurter. My friends Susan and Tim were also planning to come out on Saturday morning for backup if needed. All of them have either crewed for me in the past or are familiar with the race so I felt very comfortable that they knew how to take care of me.

Overall, I felt pretty calm leading up to the race start. They placed me in the first start wave based on my previous results, but I knew there was no way I was going to be able to keep up with anyone in the group. Despite all my mental preparation knowing this would happen, I still struggled to get into the right headspace for several hours, feeling like I wasn’t living up to everyone’s expectations. It took awhile, but I finally got there and was able to focus on enjoying the race experience and riding for no one but myself.

Lining up at the start with a bunch of people I had no intention of trying to keep up with (like the overall winner Marko Baloh directly in front of me)

As anyone who did the race has already mentioned, the wind was brutal for the first 10-11 hours of the race, and blowing in the typical direction from the west so that we were fighting a headwind up the steady 1-1.5% grade on Borrego Springs Road. In spite of the wind, I was keeping a steady pace and staying on track for my goal of 400 miles. I was also staying on top of my race nutrition and hydration, which seemed to be working really well for me. My plan was to take in a 600 calorie bottle of Spiz every two laps and to take a new water bottle every lap. I knew Rich would give me a hard time if I was handing back Spiz bottles that weren’t empty, so I made sure to finish them off before coming into the pit. It seemed to be working well – my stomach was feeling good and I was surprised to find that I wasn’t really craving any solid food.

I knew that the key to hitting my goal would be to stay on the bike as much as possible while keeping my pace steady. For the first 12 hours, I did a great job of both. I had only stopped for about five minutes for a pitstop and my lap splits were pretty consistent, but the wind had taken a lot out of me. My legs felt decent because they were well trained for this, but the rest of my body was feeling strained from the effort it took to keep the bike upright against the wind. I promised myself a short break at the halfway point and looked forward to getting off the bike for a few minutes and lying down to take some strain off my back and neck. I had asked for a PBJ during my break, but I found that I still wasn’t really wanting to take in any solid food. The only thing that sounded appetizing at all was plain street taco flour tortillas so I ate a few of those while I rested and my crew gave my bike some TLC and Rich worked some of the knots out of my back and neck.

Getting back on the bike, I was a little disappointed to see that I’d just burned about 20 minutes off the bike and my goal was to keep my off the bike time to less than 30 minutes. I figured I could stay on track if I just took one more short break after another six hours, but didn’t make any effort to increase my pace to make up the lost time. I’m not sure I could have if I wanted to anyway. After another hour the sun came up and I looked forward to feeling more awake and a little warmer. Unfortunately, it got a little warmer than I was hoping for within a few hours. But on the plus side, the wind had definitely died down.

I was feeling pretty miserable, but all things considered I was in better shape than I typically am at the halfway point of a 24 hour TT. I had been battling hot foot on and off for a few hours and was occasionally feeling like my legs were on the verge of cramping up, but I was working through everything pretty well. My stomach still seemed to be tolerating the Spiz just fine. I had brought a whole bin filled with fig bars and Clif Z bars and I ate exactly one of each, a few flour tortillas, and a handful of grapes. Other than that it was just Spiz, a few gels, an iced coffee drink, and a few small cans of soda.

Susan and Tim made it out around mid-morning to cheer me on and give my tired crew a little help. It definitely gave me a little boost as well to see them in the pit. I was still on track to hit 400 miles with about six hours to go, but it was really starting to get warm. I really wanted to stick to my plan of staying on the bike, but with about five hours to go I found myself feeling a little disoriented and nauseated. It was early in the lap, so I figured I’d take it easy and see how I felt when I heard from the crew toward the end of the lap and tell them I needed another short break if I still wasn’t feeling so great. I was trying to troubleshoot to figure out what I might need. I wasn’t terribly hungry or thirsty and figured I’d probably just feel more nauseated if I tried to force down more calories or fluid. I decided to come back in for a short break when I got back to the pit. I spent about 15 minutes lying on my back with my feel elevated and an ice sock cooling me down. I knew the 400 mile goal was slipping away from me, but I had also known all along that the conditions might not allow that goal to happen. I was confident that my fitness level combined with the race conditions necessitated more time off the bike than I’d anticipated and I was at peace with that.

A short pit stop to take in some extra fluids between laps towards the end of the race

The break seemed to help me feel a little more comfortable, but I was definitely starting to feel like I was running on fumes. Although the wind had changed direction and was now pushing us up the shallow grade, it was also about 10 degrees warmer on that section of the course so I still dreaded getting onto that stretch of road every lap. After another lap, Rich let me know that they would be switching to the short loop with two hours to go, so I really only had time to do one more long loop. He encouraged me to just take it easy and then come in for a short break again before going out to finish on the short loop, where it wouldn’t be as hot. I took his advice and I think that was by far my slowest time on the long loop, then cooled off for a few more minutes before finishing strong with about five laps on the short loop.

My total for the day was 388.8 miles, a bit shy of my 400 mile goal and even a few miles short of my mileage from my first 24 hour time trial in 2017. Despite that, I’m very happy with both my performance and the outcome. I maintained the speed and effort I had planned for when I was on the bike. I just spent more time off the bike than anticipated, which I feel that the conditions necessitated. I may not be back to my peak race fitness, but I feel like I put together an almost perfectly executed race for where I’m at right now. And it was great to be back at a race again and to see lots of familiar faces. It was a huge emotional boost to hear so many people cheering me on as I rolled through the pit almost every lap.

My crew got my car packed up and got me back to my hotel within about an hour of the race fitness, which was crucial as I only had about 17 hours to rest up and recover for my next event, the 6 hour time trial on Sunday…

6 Hour Time Trial

I registered for the 6-12-24 Hour WTTC about a year and a half ago, as it was supposed to occur in October of 2020 then was cancelled due to the pandemic. It was the first time they were putting on the 6 hour time trial on a separate day and making it possible for someone to race in two events. I decided to go ahead and register for both because it sounded like an interesting challenge. Registration for both events rolled over to this year when the race was cancelled last year, and I decided to go ahead and stay on the roster for both events even though I wasn’t sure earlier this year whether I would even be healthy enough to do the 24 hour event. Leading into the race, I had been feeling pretty good on the bike. I wasn’t sure how it would feel to get back on the bike the day after a 24 hour race, but I was willing to give it a try.

The plan was to prioritize rest, hydrating, refueling, and spending as much time in my Air Relax compression boots as possible between Saturday night and Sunday morning. I took an Epsom salt bath in the hotel room and put the compression boots on while I ate some dinner. After I finished eating, I was struggling to keep my eyes open and it wasn’t comfortable enough to get to sleep with the compression boots on, so I only spent about 15-30 minutes in them. But I did get a pretty solid 6-7 hours of sleep. I think I woke up and ate a snack at some point. I naturally woke up a little earlier than I needed to, so I was able to spent a full hour in the compression boots before leaving to park in the pit area. I got there with plenty of time to get all my gear and nutrition re-organized before the race started at 10:00 am. Aside from a couple of people who were doubling up the 12 and 6 hour events, I was the only one crazy enough to show up for the 6 hour race after finishing the 24 hour. It was an entirely different crowd of people for the 6 hour race. None of them had any idea who I was or that I had just finished racing for 24 hours the previous evening.

I was placed in the first starting wave once again, which felt kind of silly since I had no intention of trying to keep up with anyone in that group. I had made the decision to ride my Cannondale System Six aero road bike with clip on bars rather than the TT bike. I was more concerned about being comfortable than being fast, and it was definitely the right decision. My legs did not feel fantastic as I left the starting line, but it didn’t take too long for them to warm up. I was also feeling a cramping sensation in my right side that lasted for an hour or so. I wasn’t pushing myself hard at all and opted to switch over to the screen on my Garmin that only shows elapsed time, heart rate, and cadence so that I wouldn’t even think about any other data. Because about 95% of my training the last few months has been on my TT bike, it took me almost the entire first lap to remember that I had drops on my road bike, which gave me a whole other position to use.

I carried a water bottle and a Spiz bottle on the bike and figured I would need to stop each lap to refill the water bottle. I was riding self-supported, so it meant taking a couple minutes each lap to ride over to my car. I found myself trying to think about making it through two laps before stopping, but realized there was really no point in killing myself just to save a minute or two. By the end of the first lap, I realized the Spiz was going to get too warm on the bike, so I’d be better off carrying two water bottles and either eating solid food on the bike or chugging from the Spiz bottle between laps. I was riding at such a low intensity I wasn’t sure I’d need that much nutrition anyway. I figured with two water bottles, I could probably go two laps without stopping, but I ended up draining both bottles on the second lap and went back in to refill them again. I also realized that I definitely needed to keep taking in calories even riding at the lower intensity.

After a few hours, I was surprised to find that I was actually feeling really good. I felt like I was able to start increasing my effort just a bit and my heart rate was actually going into Zone 2. I knew I could bonk at any moment so I still wasn’t pushing too hard. When I came in after the fourth lap, I saw some other cyclists coming in from the short loop, so I was glad I wasn’t going to have to make the choice to go back out for a long loop or kill time until they made the switch. I started trying to crunch numbers in my head and wasn’t sure how accurate I was, but was pretty sure I could put in 100 miles before the time limit.

The field for the 6 hour race was pretty small so I didn’t see too many other racers out on the long loop – mainly a few of the faster ones who lapped me on my 3rd or 4th lap. But on the short loop I was starting to pass a bunch of people who looked like they had gone out too hard and were falling apart. It felt surreal to see all these people in salt-soaked kits fighting off cramps while I probably could have been holding a conversation with someone the entire ride and was just starting to get into a groove.

I finished my final lap with less than 10 minutes on the clock and had just hit 100 miles. As I was packing up my car, another racer walked by and sounded annoyed as he made a comment about how I had way too much energy to burn when I flew by him on that last lap and that maybe I should have used that energy earlier in the race. He obviously had no idea what I’d just done and was probably more annoyed about the fact that he had gone out too hard and blown up, so I just let it slide.

Overall, I couldn’t be happier with how things turned out this weekend. I felt as strong as I could have hoped for both events and it was a huge confidence boost that I am going to be able to continue racing ultra distances. As I started my way up the Glass Elevator (Montezuma Valley Road) on my way back home on Monday, I thought about how defeated I had felt the last couple of times I’d made this drive after aborted long training rides. I smiled with satisfaction that I’d faced my demons and put together a great weekend of racing. I haven’t made a firm decision about what my plans will be for 2022, but I definitely think I will be putting at least 2-3 races on my calendar and hope to have a good plan within the next few weeks.

Thanks to everyone for the encouragement and support over the last week. It felt great to know that so many people were cheering me on virtually and to feel so much support at the race itself. I am extremely grateful to Pat, Rich, Terry, Tim, and Susan for working together like a well-oiled machine to keep me on the bike. Thanks as well to my coach Rachel for putting together a training program that got me to the starting line as fit as possible and for talking me through a couple of rough patches during the race. Also, I would never have been able to put in the training that I have in the last few months without the assistance of Paraic at Cyclologic in Scottsdale, AZ in setting up my bike fits so that my knee pain is almost completely eliminated. Thanks once again to The Bike Shop for their support and for keeping my race machines tuned up, to Vertix Ultra for an awesome communication system, and to Randy Ice at Spiz.

24 Hour World Record Attempt

Borrego Springs, CA

November 7-8, 2020

The idea to plan an attempt to break the World Ultracycling Association (WUCA) 24 Hour World Record came to me at some point in the last few months as I realized that there was a very real possibility that the 6-12-24 Hour World Time Trial Championships (WTTC) would be cancelled. After the cancelation of Race Across America in June, my focus had turned to getting myself as fit as possible for the WTTC originally scheduled in early October. When the race was rescheduled for later in October to allow more time for the permits to go through in the midst of the COVID pandemic, I knew I needed to start seriously thinking about a backup plan. After all the work I’d put in this year, I couldn’t bear the thought of watching another “A” race being cancelled and just deciding that racing was done for the year and hoping things would improve in 2021.

I began looking into the WUCA certification process, which was initially very daunting. Yet the fact that I had already beaten the mileage of Nancy Raposo’s 24 hour solo female record of 439.65 miles, set nearly 30 years ago, when I rode 456 miles at the WTTC in 2018 gave me the confidence to start planning. When the WTTC was officially canceled on September 25, I spoke with my coach Rachel and settled on the date of November 7-8 for the attempt, started communicating with the WUCA to begin the application process, and began recruiting support crew. My original thought was to keep the plan somewhat under the radar, do my best to coordinate the record attempt, and figure that worst case scenario I could just go out and do a self-supported or minimally supported low key 24 hour ride that may or may not go down as an official record. I realized over the next couple of days that the more I talked about it, the more I wanted it to happen, and started blasting my plans across social media. I’d made a big enough deal of it that now I was committed to following through. Within days, I was overwhelmed with the number of people offering to come out and be on my support crew. My friend Dee Mann had offered to help manage the crew to take some of the work off my hands. I was also able to appoint Curtis McPherson, the crew chief from our HooDoo 500 relay team, to be the crew chief, and Mark Weidhase had demonstrated to me that he knew enough about the officiating process to be my head official.

Next up was the task of settling on a course for the record attempt. A lot of factors went into the decision, but ultimately I decided to use the north half of the 18 mile WTTC course to create a 10 mile loop. Having spent many hours on the 18 mile course training and racing, it seemed that the north portion of the course didn’t seem to be impacted by the potentially fierce desert winds and also had less elevation gain/loss. Once the course was surveyed and approved by the WUCA, I just had to spend another month wrapping up my training. I tried to spend as many weekends as I was able to on the course in Borrego Springs, acclimatizing to the dry desert air and getting to know every turn and bump in the road on the 10 mile loop. Looking over my training rides, there really wasn’t any question that I should be able to maintain the 18.31 mph average needed to break the 24 hour record. Unfortunately, as race day approached, the weather forecast appeared to be working against me. I kept hoping the projected wind forecast and possibility of rain might change. When we were 48 hours out and a full wind advisory was in effect projecting 20 mph winds with gusts of up 50 mph and a very real potential for rainstorms, I realized that breaking the record would be much more difficult than I’d originally anticipated, and that it would require all the mental skills I’d be honing this year to stay on my bike for 24 hours.

I made the trip to Borrego Springs on Thursday and checked into my Air BNB rental by myself. Most of my crew planned to arrive Friday afternoon or evening, so I had about 24 hours to relax a bit and get some of the final organizational tasks completed. Once a small group including Mark and Curtis arrived on Friday afternoon we went out for a quick pre-ride of the course to test the communication system (Vertix Ultra between the follow vehicle and myself, and two-way radios for communication between the follow vehicle and the rest of the crew and officials). Rachel made dinner for the crew that was able to arrive on Friday evening. Many of the crew members were meeting for the first time and so far, everyone was getting along amazingly well. I was able to get to sleep early feeling confident that I was physically and mentally prepared for the ride and that my crew had everything else under control.

Jairus and Rob doing some final checks on my bikes while awaiting my arrival at Christmas Circle on Saturday morning

On race morning, I woke up feeling good physically and focused mentally. It was a little nerve-wracking to hear the howling of the wind outside the house as I tried to relax while my crew went through final preparations. Rachel drove me to the start at Christmas Circle shortly before the ride was scheduled to begin at 9:00 am and I could feel the car being battered by the wind and watched dust storms swirling around in the distance. When we pulled up to the start I could see a sign being whipped around. I did at least enjoy the less stressful environment of my own solo ride compared to the frenzied activity happening just before the start of a race with dozens of other cyclists.

I started pedaling away from the start at exactly 9:00 am and braced myself for what I knew could be a very long and frustrating 24 hours. The race plan that I had discussed with Rachel was based on maintaining a steady power output while keeping my heart rate under control, rather than attempting to maintain an average speed. I found myself settling into my race effort very comfortably on the first lap and the wind didn’t seem to be blowing me around too much initially. But I could tell by the time I was halfway around the loop that the wind had affected my speed. When I made the final right turn back towards Christmas Circle I had to ride directly into the wind for the last 1.5 mile of the course. I did my best to stay in the aero bars, put my head down, and keep my effort under control to avoid overexerting myself early on.

A picture taken by my friend Tet in the first several hours of the ride, in between the periods of rain.

The wind seemed to pick up a little over the first several laps, and it was raining on me intermittently. At one point, a gust picked up that almost blew me off the road and caused me to instinctively clip my left shoe out of the pedal. It passed before I had to put my foot down and I was able to stay upright, clip back in, and continue. As miserable as it was, I kept telling myself that I had to keep riding because I would kick myself if I stopped and the weather improved once the storm passed through.

My friend Rob and Dee Mann were in the follow vehicle for the first six hours of the ride, with Mark Mitchell riding along to officiate. We were able to communicate through my Vertix Ultra system, and we could hear each other perfectly despite the winds. They were communicating with Curtis and Mark Weidhase at Christmas Circle via a separate two-way radio so that the crew always knew when I was approaching and were always out and ready to take some pictures and cheer me on as I rode through. As we hit the six hour mark, Mark Weidhase came on over the radio to let me know I had just broken the six hour world record. I had purposefully not bothered to look at any of the records aside from the 24 hour record as I wanted to stay focused on that one number. But I was surprised at the sense of relief I felt upon hearing this news. Knowing that the 24 hour record was far from a slam dunk at this point, I felt like even if I achieved nothing else on this ride, I now had something to show for it.

Rob and Mark keeping me safe in the follow vehicle and using the Vertix Ultra for communication

After about six hours, there was a crew exchange as Nathan took over driving the follow vehicle, Simon took over as the official in the vehicle, and Tina and Rachel took turns riding in the back and getting water and nutrition bottles ready. It was starting to get colder around this time, so I made a very quick stop at Christmas Circle to put on my vest and some arm warmers. Or more accurately, I stopped so that the entire crew could surround me and put all that stuff on much quicker than I would have been able to do it myself. Just before dark, I made another longer stop for a bathroom/hygiene break while the crew checked out the bike and put lights on for the long ride through the night. I believe I also put on a rain jacket and knee warmers as we anticipated another storm coming through.

Understandably, people weren’t pulling their phones out to take pictures while the rain was pouring down. Riding through Christmas Circle after putting on the rain gear for a brief period of time.

Not long after dark, the storm hit and this time the rain was much heavier and colder. At one point, I remember it going through my head that I couldn’t believe the crappy luck I’d had in choosing quite possibly the worst day for this ride. Fortunately, I was able to put a positive spin on it and think about how I would most likely be doing something very similar to this during RAAM next year. I won’t be able to quit then, so I’d better not quit now. I mentioned that to my crew, laughed it off, and kept pedaling.

The rain stopped after a while and I made yet another clothing change to put on a dry jacket and gloves. The winds had finally calmed down but they had done some damage as I’d expected from the beginning. I had my crew asking me for my heart rate and power numbers every hour throughout the ride. For the first 8 hours or so, I was putting out numbers like a machine. There was very little variation in my average power, heart rate, or speed and I felt like I was riding at a fairly comfortable effort. Once I started to get cold and the fatigue set in, the numbers slowly started dropping. I was starting to hit some of the intermediate world record distances and was breaking more records – 200 km, 300 km, and 200 miles. But when we hit 12 hours, I knew I was slightly off pace for the 24 hour record. As my crew got ready for another exchange, I was feeling motivated and promised Rachel that I would keep a steady pace and avoid stopping so I could make up those miles while she was getting some rest before the final stretch.

The crew huddled around for a quick bike change after fixing a flat while I chugged some warm coffee

At some point in the night my front tire went flat. Yet another time I had to shake my head and laugh. I had ridden thousands of miles in the last few months without a single flat and put new tires on my bike a little over a week before the ride. Fortunately, we had already discussed the plan for a flat. The crew jumped out of the car to get my backup bike off the rack, switched out lights and the Garmin, and I was moving again after only losing a minute or so. I had settled on my Trek Speed Concept as my primary bike a couple of weeks before the ride, and the Cannondale System Six aero road bike was my backup. After the hours I’d spent on the Trek, I thought the change might actually feel kind of nice, but I immediately wanted to be back on the Trek. Though I usually love riding the System Six, right at that moment it felt awkward and squirrelly. We had to drop the Trek off as we rode through Christmas Circle on the next lap so the crew could change the flat, and ride another 10 mile loop on the System Six before picking the Trek back up on the next lap. Another 1-2 minutes was spent switching out the bikes while I downed a cup of coffee and I was back on the Trek. The crew noticed an immediate change in my posture and cadence once I got back on the Trek. As Rachel pointed out, at least the unfortunate timing of the flat allowed me the opportunity to realize that I’d definitely made the right choice of bike to use.

As much as I had wanted to stay focused on maintaining my steady effort through the night to make up some miles and push to break the record, I was finding it more and more difficult to maintain the power output. In addition to the fatigue, I was struggling with heartburn and some GI discomfort that made it difficult to maintain the power I’d been pushing earlier on. As I hit the next two distance records of 300 miles and 500 km, I once again broke the world records but also realized that I was too far off pace to hit the 24 hour record distance.

Rob and Dee were in the follow vehicle at this point and offered me two options. I could commit to setting the not yet established 500 mile record and plan to continue riding an extra several hours beyond the planned 24 hours, or stop riding right then given that we knew I wouldn’t be able to break the 24 hour record. I wasn’t happy with either option and asked for Option C. We were about 18 hours into the ride and I had come out here to ride 24 hours. I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if I quit six hours short of my goal, record or not. I really had no desire to stay on my bike for what would likely be an extra 6-7 hours, nor did I want to ask my crew to commit to spending the extra time supporting me when most of them needed to get some rest before driving home and going back to work on Monday. This information was being relayed to me from Curtis and Rachel indirectly, so I asked them to put Rachel in the follow car on the next lap so we could discuss the options. My understanding was that she didn’t want me to put more stress on my body if I wasn’t going to break the record anyway. My counter argument was that I had nothing left to save myself for at this point. All the big things I wanted to do this year had been cancelled. Being unlucky with the weather more than likely cost me the 24 hour record. I needed to finish what I started, regardless of the outcome. I had all these arguments ready to fire at Rachel once she got on the other end of the radio. Fortunately, none of it was necessary. As soon as I told her I wanted to finish the 24 hour ride, she was completely on board and so were the rest of the crew.

I was in a pretty dark place for the next few hours. Even though I’d insisted on staying on the bike, the physical and mental fatigue was definitely setting in. I think I started complaining about how tired I was, but Rachel was pretty adamant that I’d asked to keep riding so now we were committed and they weren’t going to let me stop. The lowest point came around 4:00 am on what I’m now calling “the hotfoot lap”.

About a mile or so into one of my laps, I became more acutely aware of a burning sensation under my right big toe. I started playing with the tension on my BOA laces to see if loosening them helped. Then I went the opposite direction and tightened them up all the way, which didn’t help either. I was barely pushing on the pedals, unleashing a string of F bombs, and complaining about how drastically my power had dropped, while Rachel was yelling at me to stop looking at my numbers. I stopped to take off my shoe covers and put some lidocaine lotion on my foot, but Rachel wouldn’t let me take much of a break. After soft-pedaling through the pain for another mile or two, I decided to put the frustrated energy into my effort on the bike and started pushing my power back up to my original race effort. Whatever the reason I’m not sure, maybe getting my heart rate back up helped get some circulation back to my feet, but it seemed to be helping. I kept this up for about 15 miles before making what I promised would be my last pitstop just after sunrise. While I stood in the bathroom with my crew helping me with my gear, I realized the effort had really taken its toll, as I could barely stand on my own and had to rest my head against the bathroom stall to stay upright.

Heading back out for the last few hours while crew chief Curtis keeps an eye out for traffic on Christmas Circle

I got back on the bike for the final few hours and settled into a less aggressive effort. I just needed to survive another 4-5 loops. If I really focused on my effort, I could keep a pretty decent pace, but it was becoming more difficult. I was in better spirits, but without the carrot of a record to chase, it was tough to keep pushing myself. Part of me was a little disappointed and wondering if I had it in me to put in that strong hour of riding I’d just done, if I could have done that earlier and not fallen so far off the record pace. I tried not to let those thoughts take over, and just focused on the fact that I was getting closer and closer to being done, to being able to get off the bike, celebrate with the crew, take a shower, and get some rest.

Knowing that Mark Weidhase had been on duty officiating since the ride started nearly 24 hours earlier, I’d offered to let him go off duty and just end the official record attempt a few hours early. He refused and insisted on making sure I had an official distance for the 24 hours. In order to have an official distance, I would have to complete whatever lap I was on at the 24 hour mark. As that drew closer and I started doing the math in my head, I realized I would be best off doing a “cool down lap” for my final loop, taking it easy so that the 24 hours would elapse just before I came back around to Christmas Circle. I managed to time it just right, so that I hit the finish at 24 hours, 6 minutes. The wind and rain were about to start back up again, another reason I had no desire to continue riding another six hours. On the plus side, the incoming weather provided a nice rainbow backdrop for some awesome finish pictures.

Mark proudly wrapped me in his American flag for some awesome finish pictures. I found out later on about the sentimental value that flag has for him and am bummed we didn’t get a picture together at the finish.

My takeaway thoughts from the experience:

  1. This was one of the best executed rides or races I’ve ever done, from the mental and physical preparation to the completion of the ride itself. Focusing on the process rather than the outcome that was affected by factors out of my control, the ride was a huge success.
  2. There are only a few things I maybe wish I could go back and do differently, wondering if the outcome would have been different. While it was a big morale boost to learn that I’d set the intermediate records, did that knowledge give me an excuse to dial back my effort when I got fatigued? As I mentioned before, if I was able to start pushing myself again when I got frustrated 19-20 hours in, why couldn’t I have kept that rhythm going hours earlier? If I’d put on rain gear earlier and avoided getting wet and cold, would that have allowed me to keep the steady effort that I’d been pushing all day long? Do I need to continue tweaking my nutrition strategy to avoid the GI discomfort that seemed to be another factor contributing to the decreased effort?
  3. My support crew was absolutely amazing. My officials and crew were 100% committed to keeping me safe and helping me to stay on the bike. Every time I needed to stop for any reason, I had several people surrounding me to make sure I was back on the bike as quickly as possible. Even in the rain, wind, and cold the crew was out cheering me on every time I passed the start/finish at Christmas Circle. It warms my heart when I look back at the pictures and video of the crew and seeing how committed they were to my success. Another consideration that factors into my seeing this ride as a huge success is that everyone on the crew seemed to have a great experience and most of them were thanking me afterward for allowing them to be a part of it. One of the keys to success for an ultracyclist is crew selection and management, and I feel like I’ve really turned a corner on that aspect with this ride.
About half of my crew is represented in this picture at the finish, as several of them were packing things up or preparing breakfast.

Finally, the official numbers and records broken for the ride are as follows (still pending WUCA certification):

  1. Six Hour Timed: 113.11 miles, 18.85 mph
  2. 200 KM: 6 hrs, 35 mins, 56 secs
  3. 300 KM: 10 hrs, 26 mins, 36 secs
  4. 200 Miles: 11 hrs, 15 mins, 05 secs
  5. 300 Miles: 16 hrs, 55 mins, 47 secs
  6. 500 KM: 17 hrs, 33 mins, 18 secs
  7. Official 24 Hour Distance (not a record): 410.88 miles at 17.12 mph

With this ride behind me, I plan to spend at least a few weeks recovering before ramping the training back up for RAAM in June. I’ll need to start focusing on getting my crew together for RAAM and beginning the planning process, and hopefully take advantage of some new achievements on my resume to secure some support for RAAM. Rachel and several of my crew members were talking about “next time” within hours of the 24 hour ride, wanting to go back for another shot at the 24 hour record. I think the plan will be to pick a date in early 2021 that balances optimal weather with optimal timing leading into RAAM and set the 500 Mile and 1000 KM records which have not yet been established. Without a specific time to beat for either record, it would work well as a training ride for RAAM. I would have a shot at breaking the 24 hour record again, but the focus would be on pacing myself for the 1000 KM.

Acknowledgements:

Curtis McPherson, Dee Mann, and Rachel Goyette put in a ton of work leading into the ride making sure the crew was organized into shifts and planning meals. And of course I am always thankful to Rachel for going above and beyond in ensuring that I am adequately prepared both physically and mentally for all of my events.

Mark Weidhase had the officiating down to a science and went above and beyond to ensure my safety during the ride by sweeping debris from the road before and during the ride. He meticulously did all the math to ensure that we had all the numbers correct. Without his encouragement, I probably would have kept things simple by only putting the 24 hour record on my application and wouldn’t have ended up taking six intermediate records. Mark Mitchell and Simon Horton joined him on the officiating crew to keep solid records and ensure my safety at the tricky intersections.

We didn’t have a single dud in the rest of the crew. Everyone was giving 100% even in miserable conditions to make sure I had my best possible ride. Thanks so much to Karen Feld, Beckie Vickers, Russ Sportsman, Rob Mann, Nathan Goyette, Pat Hurter, Thomas and Mary Sol Cassidy, Eric Lewis, Jairus Ciocon, and Tina Parker for giving up their weekend so I could play bikes.

Thanks to everyone else who made the trip out to Borrego to cheer me on at some point. It was awesome to see so many familiar faces out on the course – Lisa, Terry, Tet, Rick, Cori, Jack, Liliana, John, Eric (who made the drive from Corona to Borrego Springs TWICE in less than 24 hours), Joe, Donna, Hannah, Sherry, Adam, Elisabeth and Tom/Gumby. Forgive me if I’ve forgotten anyone else who was out there.

As always, thanks to the Bike Shop of Temecula for their continued support. Both bikes were spruced up and race ready despite their mechanics being slammed with repairs and maintenance. They also took my bikes back in after the ride to clean them up after spending 24 hours in the elements. And thank you to Vertix Ultra for providing me with a reliable communication system that allowed me to easily stay in constant contact with my crew for 24 hours.

HooDoo 500 Relay

After months of races being cancelled or going virtual due to the COVID pandemic, I was really excited to be able to participate in an actual race again at HooDoo 500 last weekend in St. George, Utah. My friends Rob, Dee, Phil, and I had planned much earlier this year to race the challenging 512 mile HooDoo 500 course as a four-person relay team. At the time, I had planned it as something fun to do after finishing RAAM. Then RAAM was cancelled and it just became something fun to do. We came up with the team name “We’re Fine” as a play on my usual slogan of “It’s Fine”, and picked up a couple of crew members to help us out during the race.

While I am familiar with the HooDoo 500 course after doing the race solo last year, this was an entirely new experience for me altogether as I’ve never done a race like this on a relay team. I’m used to jumping on my bike and pacing myself to ride for a really long time. Here I would need to push myself much harder for a shorter period of time, rest and recover while my teammates took some pulls, then jump on the bike and do it all over again. I was a little worried that all the starting and stopping and sitting in a van would make it difficult to pace myself properly. My coach Rachel has been having me work on higher intensity efforts since finishing VRAW back in June, so I went in feeling prepared to put in some work on the short pulls. We also figured this would work well into my training for the 6-12-24 Hour Time Trial World Championships coming up at the end of October (assuming the permits go through and the event doesn’t get canceled).

We had a few virtual meetings on Zoom leading up to the race. Our coaches, Rachel and David, joined forces to help us put together a general strategy for the race – how long we should be taking pulls, how we should try to get some rest at night, etc. We had a meeting to discuss our strategy the week of the race, and another meeting with our crew to finalize all the details. I was a little apprehensive going in as we didn’t seem to have a detailed plan laid out in terms of how we would rotate and what sections of the course we would each be taking, but I had a lot of confidence in our crew chief Curtis, who had extensive knowledge and experience with the course and sounded like he would have no problem taking charge and putting the right people on the course at the right times. Regardless, I was just looking forward to traveling to a race again, seeing a bunch of my ultracyling friends for the first time in months, and having a fun ride with my teammates.

All four of us along with our two crew members made it to St. George on Friday afternoon without incident and got ourselves checked in for the race and settled in at our condo we had rented for the weekend. We had a nice pre-race dinner at the condo then settled in to get some sleep before our 9 am start on Saturday morning. We woke up Saturday morning to cloudy skies and a few sprinkles and wondered if we might get some rain. On the plus side, we didn’t have the triple digit temperatures we had been expecting.

Our full crew and team at race check-in Friday afternoon. Curtis, Dee, Rob, me, Phil, and Megan

We decided to let Phil roll out for the neutral start while the rest of us drove out to the first exchange location about 9 miles away. I was scheduled to take the second pull, and it occurred to me that this meant that I would be the first one riding once the actual racing started, so I was a little nervous about that. There were five teams in the 4x relay division. I waved to my friend Shane Trotter as he flew by just before I took the handoff from Phil. He was on the team “Soaring Coots” and I knew they were going for the course record and that would more than likely be the last I would ever see of him. I wasn’t sure where we would fit in with the rest of the teams, but I was hoping we had a good chance of winning the race for second place.

Our team had spent a few minutes practicing exchanges when we got together for hill repeats on Glendora Mountain Road last month, so I hoped my first handoff would go smoothly. When I saw Phil getting close I started riding and held out my left hand so that he could hand off the GPS tracker (attached to a small spatula with electrical tape). Once he was close enough, he placed the tracker in my hand, I yelled “got it” once I had it in my grasp, he let go, and I placed it in my pocket while trying to accelerate and not collide with Phil as he slowed down to be picked up by Curtis and our van. It all went off without a hitch and I started looking to dial into my steady effort for approximately 25 minutes. I hadn’t kept track of how many teams were ahead of or behind me, but I could see another cyclist trying to catch me in my rear view mirror. Within a few minutes he had dropped back and I didn’t see him again. I passed one other team, and could see another rider a little bit ahead of me for most of my pull. I probably put in a slightly more intense effort than planned in an effort to keep my position, but I tried to keep reminding myself to save my energy for the rest of the race. I was basically about to do a 30 hour interval session.

After about 25 minutes, I saw our van pulled over and Dee waiting to exchange with me. We had another flawless exchange and we got in the van to keep an eye on Dee and get Rob ahead for his pull. I knew I would have about an hour or so before getting back on the bike and knew I should probably take in some fluids and calories, but once again I was in unfamiliar territory and wasn’t sure of the best strategy for fueling. I figured I was best off taking in small amounts shortly after getting off the bike and tried to stick with that strategy for most of the race.

Setting up for a well-timed and efficient exchange of the tracker

Rob took the handoff from Dee and we made our way out of Hurricane, Utah, where Rob tackled the first bit of substantial climbing of the race. He also managed to pass Team 303 Gruppetto and put us solidly in 2nd place. Once I got back on the bike taking a handoff from Phil, 303 Gruppetto was closing in and I could see their rider in my rear view mirror. After a few minutes the storm hit and I spent most of the pull riding in the rain. I tried not to let the sight of the rider behind me force me to push beyond my limits. I kept my effort steady and just hoped that he was pushing himself outside his comfort zone trying to chase me down. I handed off to Dee again and we made our way into Arizona for a short portion of the course before going back across the state line into Utah. We maintained a bit of a lead over 303 Gruppetto as we headed towards the first Time Station in Orderville.

Rob took over just before the Time Station, where the rest of us stopped for a restroom break and to chat with the volunteers. We hadn’t been there long when two frantic texts came through from Rob that he’d had a flat. We all rushed back to the van to get to Rob to help change his tube while putting the next rider on the course. We lost about five minutes getting to him, but I believe we got Phil out on the road before 303 Gruppetto caught us.

As we got closer to Bryce Canyon, we started figuring out our plan for the unsupported zone on the bike trail to the next Time Station. Because the van would need to gas up at the Time Station, and the course flattened out at that point before a long descent, we decided that I would take a long pull and climb up the bike trail then take the descent into Tropic. I knew 303 Gruppetto was not too far behind and am always worried about getting caught on climbs, so I was constantly looking in my mirror to see if anyone was coming up behind me on the bike trail. Once I reached the flat section, I breathed a sigh of relief and started flying across the flat section. Just after exiting the bike trail onto the highway, I saw that I was about to catch up to both of the two solo female racers, Seana Hogan and Tami Kearns. I cheered both of them on as I passed them, just before bombing down the long descent.

Waiting to take the handoff from Phil and start my ride through Bryce Canyon

Once I hooked back up with the team, we started making our way to the third Time Station in Escalante. I was getting ready to ride again when we saw our friend Brook Henderson about to get back on the course. He started four hours before us as he was riding in the Voyager (solo, self-supported) division, and was having a really rough day. He perked up when he saw us, and we got to cheer him on for the next hour or so as we leapfrogged him a few times. It was really cool to be able to see him at that point, as it was the exact spot where he passed me last year and helped me through a rough spot in the race.

I took a bit of a longer pull out of Escalante while the rest of the team grabbed some food and went on an unsuccessful search for coffee. After that, Rob and I started resting a bit to get ready to tag team Boulder Mountain, the first of two big climbs on the route. We took turns riding 10-15 minutes at a time, and I was shocked at how quickly we tackled the climb compared to my slow grind last year. We were building up a nice lead on 303 Gruppetto but kept crossing paths with their RV leapfrogging us. I bundled up at the summit and rode most of the long descent towards Bicknell, where I was looking forward to seeing my friend Brian at the Time Station and finally getting some coffee.

Unfortunately, we had a miscue at the turn to Bicknell and Phil turned right towards Capitol Reef National Park instead of left. By the time we realized he was off course, it cost us around 20 minutes to get back on track and 303 Gruppetto had taken over 2nd place. We stayed calm and had a good sense of humor and figured it just made the race a little more interesting.

We made it to Bicknell and once again I found no coffee. Rob and I got to spend the next few hours resting in the back of the van while Dee and Phil took turns pulling. I don’t know that I slept much, and it definitely was a little cramped in the back of the van, but at least I got to rest my eyes for awhile. Still, when it was time to get ready to ride again and go out in the cold dark early morning, I wasn’t really feeling it. I think my first pull was a little weak, but I started feeling a little better on the second one. We even had our first glimpse of the 303 Gruppetto RV for the first time in awhile, and not long after that I could see the lights of their rider ahead of me. I was starting to close in on him towards the end of my pull and Curtis asked me if I wanted to catch him first. I had no desire to push myself beyond my comfort level to pass them, so I let Rob take over and he made the pass. Then the pressure was on me to hold the gap. As we got closer to the next Time Station in Panguitch, Curtis let me know I would need to ride through Panguitch and then take a long pull up the steep climb towards Panguitch Lake while the team stopped for gas and ice. We only had a six minute lead at the Time Station and I kept looking behind me to see if they were closing in on me on the climb. I managed to hold them off and was relieved to finally see our van pass me and set up for an exchange. And they had coffee for me!!!

All lit up with reflective gear riding through Panguitch

We started tackling the second of the two big climbs on the route as a team as Phil and Dee woke up and got themselves moving again, and made our way to Duck Creek Village and then the summit at Gooseberry Point at nearly 10,000 feet. Once again, I was amazed how quickly we put the climb behind us after the slow slog I remembered from last year’s solo race. The team let me take the long descent into Cedar City, which I thoroughly enjoyed. We then put Phil on the bike for a long pull while we stopped at the Time Station to get ice. By the time we caught up to Phil, he was struggling and 303 Gruppetto was quickly closing the gap.

I think I hit my lowest point of the race right around that time. I was waiting for my turn to pull again and remember sitting there thinking that I was exhausted and just didn’t care about the race anymore. I felt like there was no way I could get back on my bike and keep working at the same intensity I’d been putting in up to that point. Somehow, I managed to rally by the time I got back on my bike and found that my legs were still willing to work for me. We kept up a strong rotation of 10 minute pulls in the headwinds heading back to St. George and starting building back up a healthy gap. By the time we reached Veyo we knew that barring some disaster, there was no way they could catch us. We decided to ride the final segment through Snow Canyon and back into St. George as a team and took it nice and easy to the finish.

Riding back into St. George to the finish as a team

I have to give a lot of credit to our coaches, David and Rachel, for helping us put together a great racing strategy that worked out well for us. The team we were battling with the entire race seemed to be sticking to a rigid approach of trading off long pulls and it seemed to be exhausting them. Our rotation was much more fluid and our crew chief Curtis did an amazing job of reading our body language and adjusting for the terrain and race situation. With each of us putting in 20 or so pulls, Curtis also had the exhausting job of getting out of the van about 100 times to unrack one bike for the outgoing rider and then racking the bike of the incoming rider. And huge kudos to our driver Megan, who managed to stay awake and behind the wheel for us for the entire 30 hours of our race. It definitely was a huge bonus for us to be able to relax in the van between our pulls without having to take over shifts driving, especially towards the end of the race when we were all exhausted.

Big shoutout to Planet Ultra for managing to put this race on during the crazy times that we’re now living in. I think everyone involved was excited to be at a real live race again. We were still able to have a fun outdoor celebration at the awards breakfast on Monday morning before heading home. I’m really enjoying getting to know the HooDoo course a little better and definitely plan to continue participating in some variation of the course whenever I have the opportunity. I’d love to go back and better my solo result from last year, as I know I could have improved on a lot of things. But I’d also like to try out some of the other race divisions, like the stage race and the self-supported versions of the course.

So I’m back home and back into focused training for the 6-12-24 Hour World Time Trial Championships (WTTC), which has been pushed back to the end of October in hopes that the permits will come through. We’ve also been given the news that support crews will not be allowed at the race, so I’ll have to spend some extra time organizing and strategizing how to minimize my time off the bike while riding self-supported. The hopes I had of coming back after last year’s dismal race and taking my course record back are most likely gone, but I still plan to put it the best possible mileage under the circumstances, and am keeping my fingers crossed that we get to race this year.

Collecting our 2nd place award at the breakfast on Monday morning. Phil was given the “wrong way” award.

Virtual Race Across the West

I’ll do my best to break down twelve days and 950 miles of riding on an indoor trainer into a readable report. Bear with me if it becomes a bit long-winded. I was quite transparent going into the event that I had no intention of racing VRAW to be competitive. I knew it would be difficult to take the week off from work as my company is still short-staffed while recovering from the hit we had taken at the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic. Therefore, the challenge I had set for myself was to complete the 950 miles of VRAW around my 8-5 work schedule and finish within the 12 day cutoff time. Additionally, I had been experiencing some knee pain that had become debilitating on my recent long trainer rides and figured it would not be worth the risk of making that issue worse by attempting to ride 950 miles in one continuous stretch. Apparently I’m not the only one to experience such issues, as we saw one of the top ultracyclists in the world, Marko Baloh, abandon VRAW while in first place about 200 miles from the finish. He made the wise decision to save his knees for some of his upcoming non-virtual events which were a higher priority for him.

Although I did not have the goal of winning VRAW or obtaining a spot on the podium, I was taking the race seriously and had my own personal goals on which to focus. Even though my race was broken down into shorter sessions, I hoped to keep a steady race effort as if I was riding the course continuously. I also hoped to work out my nutrition and hydration strategy to avoid some of the GI and fluid retention issues that I’ve experienced in the past. And finally, I wanted to make sure I put some of my mental training to use by staying positive and working through the inevitable tough spots.

The Routine

In the few days leading up to the start of VRAW, I tried to prep as much as I possibly could to save time during the race. I bought a massive amount of groceries hoping that I wouldn’t need to go back to the store until after the race. I prepped enough meals in advance to get me through most of the twelve days. My bike, trainer, TV, charger cables, fans, water bottles, nutrition, and snacks were all set up at a permanent station in the garage. It wasn’t quite as decked out as a few of the “pain caves” that I saw a few of my fellow racers using, but it worked for me.

My VRAW station

The VRAW “course” consisted of 83 rides on the FulGaz platform which varied in distance from 1.6 miles to 56 miles. The rides were sectioned into eight blocks which consisted of a sequence of 3-5 rides which would be repeated 2-4 times within that block. The rides had to be completed in the given sequence. I had put together a conservative schedule that would allow me to finish within 12 days while allowing enough time for for sleep and recovery so that I would be able to stay focused at work.

My daily routine on work days didn’t change too much throughout the race. I woke up at 3 am just about every day and tried to start pedaling by 4 am. Although I am very much a morning person, I always seem to need at least an hour to get myself moving. I would complete the rides I had planned for the morning, which would typically leave me just enough time to get ready for work. By the second week, I was eating my breakfast while on the bike to fit in extra ride time. I worked from 8-5 Monday-Friday and tried to spend my lunch hour relaxing and taking a power nap if needed. I was typically able to get home from work and get back on the bike by shortly after 5:30 pm. After finishing the rides on my evening schedule, I would eat dinner while using my Air Relax compression boots, wind down, and get to bed as quickly as possible without distractions. Towards the end of the second week, I started using the compression boots for about 15 minutes before my evening ride to help with some of the mild fluid retention I was experiencing. I also started taking an Epsom salt bath immediately after my evening rides, primarily hoping to alleviate the irritation in the saddle region that became progressively worse during the second week.

Looking back over my experience, I found that my VRAW experience can be broken into 3, maybe 3 1/2 distinct chunks of time.

Week 1

The courses for Virtual RAAM, Virtual RAW, and The 60 (a 12 day challenge to ride 60 minutes each day) opened at 6:00 am Pacific Time on Tuesday, June 16. About 200 cyclists representing 29 countries were all able to start riding their respective races at that moment. Because I knew the first segment would take me a little over an hour and I started work at 8:00 am, I opted to wait until after work to ride. It is possible to end a ride early and finish it later, but I wanted to ride at least that first segment all in one session. A big reason for this was because the first segment was the first 20 or so miles of the actual RAW course out of Oceanside, CA. Due to the time constraints in putting this event together, it was not possible to recreate the entire RAW course on the FulGaz platform, but they did get GoPro footage from a cyclist riding the first section of the RAW/RAAM course to at least recreate the race start, which was really cool.

That first Tuesday was not a great day for me. I was feeling a little depressed knowing that in a world without COVID, I would have been starting the real Race Across America that day. It was also a little frustrating to be sitting at work while many of the other racers were already on their bikes. Also, I just simply never feel that great when I don’t get in some form of activity before work. By the time I got on my bike just before 6:00 pm, it had been about 36 hours since I’d had any type of exercise, my legs were feeling heavy and lethargic, and I was just not in a great mood. It was kind of unfortunate, because I really wanted to enjoy riding that first section of the actual RAW route, even if it was virtual.

I was able to hold my goal effort of about 65% on that ride, but it just felt like I was working harder than I was. I tried to just let myself have fun with the ride and enjoy watching the very familiar sights of the actual race route on the TV in front of me, but it never took long to start feeling frustrated again. I was happy to finish off the ride, clean up, and hoped that I’d feel better the next morning.

Fortunately, I felt back to my normal self the next morning and throughout the week. I was holding about a 65% effort on my rides and spending 3.5 to 4.5 hours per day on the bike without feeling completely thrashed. I was tired, but definitely able to function just fine at work. I was quite happy that my knees were feeling pretty good so far. I had turned the trainer difficulty down to 50%, which simply means that the terrain does not feel as steep as it is and I don’t need to mash the pedals to get up steep climbs. The same amount of power is required as when the trainer difficulty is set to 100%. It’s basically the same as putting a larger cassette on the bike. I went into the weekend on track with the schedule I had set for myself, and felt ready to tackle the long weekend hours.

The Weekend

I debated a few options for how to get the weekend rides done while allowing myself to get a bit of a race simulation experience. I opted to sleep in a bit on Saturday to get some extra rest, ride all day, take about a four hour sleep break, then start back up again early Sunday morning.

After sleeping in a bit and spending some time in my compression boots, I finally got around to getting on the bike around 8 am on Saturday morning. I was feeling pretty good and maintaining my 65% effort for a few hours but by mid-day my power started gradually dropping as fatigue set in and I started some of the more difficult rides. I spent most of Saturday afternoon working on the longest ride on the VRAW course, “The Cheaha Challenge”. It took me about 4.5 hours to ride the 56 miles with 7,500 feet of elevation gain. It wasn’t a terribly difficult ride. It just had a lot of small climbs and was a long ride. On the plus side, we actually got a few downhills on that ride. If you read the reports and comments made by almost anyone who did VRAAM or VRAW, you will be sure to hear complaints or comments about the constant climbing without downhills. The 950 miles of VRAW included 83,000 feet of elevation gain (compared to about 50,000 feet on the actual RAW course), and many of the rides were climbs without the descents. It took me until about 9 pm Saturday to finish the rides I had scheduled for myself, and I was averaging between 55-60% intensity. The next ride on the course was a repeat of The Cheaha Challenge, and I couldn’t bring myself to ride that beast again before getting some rest.

I spent 2-3 hours winding down from the ride on Saturday night. I ate dinner, showered, took an Epsom salt bath, used my compression boots, and finally went to sleep around midnight planning to wake up at 4 am to start my Sunday ride. I was attempting to simulate a RAAM sleep break to some degree, but obviously I would skip a few of those steps before going to sleep on RAAM.

My second time through the Cheaha Challenge on Sunday morning was even slower than the first, and my power was down to about 50% or lower. It was a little frustrating, but my main focus was just to stay on the bike and keep making forward progress. I believe I was experiencing difficulty with power output because the saddle area irritation was starting to set in and it was just difficult to sit on the saddle comfortably while climbing. I took a short break around mid-day to change my kit and use my foam roller for a few minutes. I got back on the bike for a few hours of flatter rides and my power was back up to 55-60%. My coach Rachel ran over (and I mean, she literally ran 15 miles from her house) and kept me company for about an hour, so that cheered me up for a bit.

After finishing the flatter block, I had a few hilly rides that I planned to finish before the end of the day. My power output was back down to around 50% on the climbs due to the saddle discomfort. As I started the second of the three rides, I realized it was going to be at least 8 pm by the time I finished and was contemplating whether I would be better off trying to make up the last ride on Monday. About halfway through the second ride, my rear derailleur cable blew out and I had to spend time changing bikes. By the time I finally got the second ride done, I had spent over 13 hours on the bike on Sunday and 24 hours over the course of the weekend, so I decided to play catch up during the week.

Completely drained after 13 hours on the trainer and a bike change, with the knowledge that I only had about a six hour break before starting another arduous week of work and pedaling.

Week 2

On Monday, I managed to make up the ride I missed on Sunday by spending almost six hours on the bike before and after work. That was probably the roughest I felt throughout VRAW, stumbling around at work like a zombie all day. But I realized that if I stuck to the conservative schedule I’d been following, I would put myself in a position to have an even longer Saturday ride on the final day before the VRAW cutoff on Sunday morning. I started advancing my schedule to get ahead, preferring to put in more miles during the week to avoid another long day on the trainer on Saturday. Rachel came over again on Monday after work (in her car this time) to pick up the bike in need of service and also brought me an awesome dinner.

Even though I was spending more time riding the second week, it was at a much lower intensity than the first week (mostly around 55%) so I felt like I was actually recovering throughout the week. I wasn’t feeling sore or terribly fatigued, and by the end of the week I was able to start increasing my power again. I was amazed that my knees were actually feeling better than they did before I started VRAW. The only discomfort I was experiencing was in the saddle region, as I mentioned earlier. This primarily affected my power output on the climbing rides, but I was able to adjust my position and cadence more easily on the flatter rides to work around the discomfort. Also, many of the climbs had a constantly changing gradient, requiring me to shift gears every few seconds, which just became fatiguing both mentally and physically. As soon as I would shift gears and adjust to a 6% gradient, it would suddenly jump up to 10% and I would have to shift and adjust again.

On Friday morning, my legs were feeling stronger again and my power was back up to about 60% for a couple of easier rides. After my morning ride, I figured I had about nine hours of ride time left to finish the race. My plan was to eat a light meal after work before getting on the bike, then pull an all-nighter to finish it off.

The first two rides were difficult climbs, then the remainder of the course was pretty flat. I struggled again through the two climbs as I had the night before. My overall feeling was pretty crappy by the time I got done with them, so I decided to take a two hour sleep break before taking on the final stretch. It was not easy dragging myself out of bed and back onto the bike, but once I started pedaling I felt great. I was able to bring my power back up to 60% or higher for most of the final block of rides, and powered through the last six hours or so with hardly any breaks. It felt great to be able to push myself again and see my heart rate higher than it had been in a few days. During the last hour I was even starting to feel my legs on the verge of cramping up.

During the last 10-15 of the ride, I went live on Facebook so that several friends were able to watch me finish the race and send some encouraging comments. It was definitely an odd feeling to cross a “virtual finish line” while sitting on a trainer in a garage by myself. I managed to get it all done by 7:30 am on Saturday, almost a full day ahead of the cutoff, and leaving myself most of the weekend to rest and recover before going back to work.

Finally a genuine smile after finishing VRAW and knowing I could climb off the trainer for good.

Mental Miles

Anthony Gordon, the creator of this sadistic event, used the tagline “mental miles” in reference to its goal of creating awareness that regular exercise is one of the most important elements of a healthy mental health profile. The tagline just happened to be an appropriate description of the course for anyone who opted to take on this challenge.

Most sporting events, and most certainly ultracycling, require a solid mental strategy for success. Even more so in a virtual ultracycling event in which one has the ability to jump off the bike at any moment and have immediate access to a shower, food, and bed. Then there’s the monotony of sitting in a garage for hours on end without any air movement or ability to coast or recover on downhills. How does one continually convince oneself to stay on the bike for all those miles?

I spent the majority of my weekday mornings in the winter training indoors the last two years, and would often listen to podcasts and occasionally audiobooks. For longer trainer rides, I occasionally watched movies. My goal isn’t to completely distract myself, as I do want to stay focused on my ride, but it does help to have some background noise and entertainment. I did listen to a few podcasts during VRAW, but I eventually found that movies and documentaries were a little more helpful. As I promised at some point, I’ll give a rundown of what I was watching throughout VRAW (to the best of my recollection).

I really enjoyed catching up with the live RAAM show that George Thomas and Rick Boethling recorded each morning throughout the twelve days of VRAAM. On weekdays I was working during the live recording so I would start my evening ride watching the recording from the morning. I didn’t typically have time to stay caught up on social media throughout the day, so it was nice to get a quick recap of what was going on in each virtual race and to hear from several folks in the ultracycling world. I even got to make a quick appearance myself while I was riding on the weekend! It was really cool to see ultracycling racers and fans from all over the world coming together virtually to follow these events and continue the tradition of following RAAM each year as best we could.

I believe the first movie I watched was Top Gun in honor of Phil Fox, who took 2nd place overall in VRAW and was the first American finisher. I noticed that he referenced the movie several times in his social media posts and when he appeared on the live show, so it got me thinking it was time to watch that classic again. And it was situation-appropriate as the movie is set near the RAAM start in Oceanside, CA. I believe I watched Top Gun during my first Friday morning ride, and was surprised at how well it kept me entertained, so I planned to keep finding more stuff to watch over the weekend.

On the first Saturday, I found myself going through all the RAAM documentaries I could find. Even though I’d seen almost all of them at least once or twice, I still found them to be motivating. I watched all of Anthony Gordon’s movies (More Than Miles, 3089, and RAAM Bam Thank You Mam). I also watched Race Across America, Godspeed, The Longest Journey, and Bicycle Dreams. Most of these can be found on Amazon Prime Video. I believe I also fit the classic cycling film Breaking Away in on Saturday before wrapping up.

For some reason, I’m drawing a blank as to what I was watching on Sunday. Even though it was my longest day on the bike, I don’t believe I watched many movies, if any. I think I listened to some podcasts, appeared on the live show, and had Rachel keeping me company for at least an hour.

During the second week, I watched the movie Patton one morning simply because it was a movie I’d been meaning to watch for awhile. While I am rarely able to sit through an entire movie off the bike without getting distracted, I was finding them much easier to watch when I was on the trainer in need of distraction. The next few days I switched to sports-themed movies for inspiration and watched Rudy and A League of Their Own.

For my final stretch of riding on Friday night into Saturday, I found myself going through a bunch of documentaries on Amazon Prime Video related to sports and endurance. These included Fully Charged, Shackleton’s Captain, Boston, The Ultimate Triathlon, Touch the Wall, and a Bille Jean King documentary. The documentary about the Boston Marathon was probably my favorite of the bunch.

Nutrition and Hydration Strategy

As I mentioned above, one of my personal goals in doing this event was to dial in some nutrition and hydration strategies to carry into my future training and races. Over the last few decades, the industry of sports nutrition and hydration has been very successful in marketing to endurance athletes. The importance of staying ahead on hydration and never allowing glycogen stores to be depleted has been drilled into our heads. For those of you who have participated in endurance events lasting several hours or longer, how many times have you experienced GI distress that has prevented you from performing at your best? It could be as severe as a crippling bout of diarrhea, or simply an upset stomach that prevents you from maintaining your race effort. In ultracycling, fluid retention seems to be a very common problem. I experienced pretty severe edema on two occasions last year – first during my weeklong pre-ride of the RAW course and then during and after racing RAW. Additionally, I’ve experienced milder issues with edema, fluid retention, and GI distress during both indoor and outdoor long rides and have been trying to isolate the cause and find a solution. Combining some reading and research with my own personal experience, I’m convinced that I’ve more often than not been overhydrating and taking in way too many of those electrolytes that we’ve been told are so important, especially when I’m working at a lower intensity. One of my goals with VRAW was to take the opportunity of doing a long event in a low-stress, low-consequence environment to pay more attention to my physical sensations to guide me in my fueling and hydration. Additionally, with so much time spent off the bike in comparison to other races, I was careful to stick to clean nutrition between sessions and tracked my nutrition as closely as possible.

For hydration, I used primarily water and only occasionally supplemented with electrolytes when I was working at a higher intensity. I drank when I was thirsty and didn’t obsess over staying hydrated while I was at work and between sessions on the trainer. I was pleased that I only noticed some mild fluid retention on a few occasions throughout the race, and it was typically at the end of the day when I got home from work. During the second week, I tried cutting back on my salt intake and that seemed to help. I’m still trying to find the right balance when riding outdoors and taking different temperatures into consideration, but I feel like I’ve made some progress.

For nutrition, my goal was to stick to a low carb regimen off the bike and to limit my intake of sugar. I’ve used so many sports nutrition products loaded with sugar over the years and just find that they’re inflammatory and cause me to crash if I don’t keep taking in more sugar, which leads to GI issues on longer workouts and races. I instead used foods and products with carbohydrates in the form of starches rather than sugars. As I mentioned, I did my best to track all of my nutrition on and off the bike for the entire twelve days. The ratio and amount of carbs was a little higher on the days I spent more time on the bike, but I took in a daily average of 170 g of carbs, 122 g net carbs, 40 g sugar, and my average macronutrient ratios were 17% carbs, 18% protein, and 65% fat. I consumed an average of about 3,800 calories per day. Looking back over the data, I realize I probably could have balanced that out a little better by eating a little more the first week and a little less the second week. I’m not sure I have an accurate measure of how many calories I burned, but I’m about 10 pounds lighter than when I started VRAW, so obviously I burned more than I ate. I never felt depleted of energy either during the rides or while I was at work (aside from the one day that I mentioned after the weekend long rides).

I still need to work on fueling and hydration for events in which I will be on the bike continuously, but this seemed to work really well for me. My key takeaway from this was that nutrition and hydration needs are going to be different for everyone, and will change for each person in different environments. It’s important to experiment to figure out what works for you.

Post-Race Wrap-Up

My official finish time was 10 days, 13 hours, 47 minutes, and 29 seconds, which obviously included many hours spent off the bike. My total time in the saddle was 70 hours, 44 minutes, and 48 seconds for an average speed of 13.4 mph.

There were both pros and cons to participating in this virtual version of an ultracycling event. The costs and logistics of a virtual event are obviously much simpler than with an actual race, which led to a large number of people from all over the world being able to participate in both VRAW and The 60. There were only a handful of people interested in taking on the entire VRAAM course, and I tip my hat to those who managed to continue riding for all 12 days, whether they were official finishers or not. Aside from the need to keep my race area well ventilated, there was no need to worry about adverse weather conditions. With the exception of my long weekend rides, most of my riding was done early in the morning while it was still cool or after work as it was cooling back down. The virtual event also created an environment with a lot less anxiety and sense of urgency than an actual race, at least the way I was doing it.

On the downside, without that stress and urgency of the real event, it was a little tougher to stay motivated for a virtual race. It also would have been nice to have a virtual version of the actual RAW course as opposed to a long list of random rides strung together, but I can appreciate that this event was put together out of necessity in a very short period of time and applaud the efforts of Anthony Gordon, Revolve 24, and FulGaz for the work they put into the race. And finally, while a bike saddle is never going to feel terribly comfortable after riding on actual pavement for several days straight, it’s even worse when those hours are spent on a trainer. You have to pedal almost constantly so it’s difficult to coast to alleviate pressure. You can’t move the bike like you can on the road to change the muscle groups you’re using. The lack of air movement makes it impossible to keep the saddle area dry so I feel like saddle sores were more of an issue than they would have been in an event on the road.

Overall, I’m very happy that I went ahead and participated in VRAW and am excited about what I got out of the experience. I was able to gain some insight in my nutrition and hydration needs as described above. The physical and mental stresses involved were certainly different from racing RAAM, but I felt like I was giving myself at least some degree of a simulation of the fatigue of RAAM by stretching the miles of RAW over the RAAM timeframe while working full-time. I would have liked to have been able to keep my effort level a little more consistent, but I was pleased to find that I was still feeling pretty decent by the end of the twelve days. I took off some unnecessary weight and rode myself into a level of fitness that I hope to maintain for some events that will hopefully be able to go on later in the year.

So that wraps up a pretty detailed account of my VRAW experience. Thank you for reading it if you made it this far. And thank you to everyone for their encouraging messages and comments on my daily updates. For some reason, it was surprising to me how many people realized the challenge I was taking on by doing this race around my full-time work schedule. I certainly underestimated myself how grueling it would be when I signed on.

Not Quite Retired Triathlete

I’m fairly certain that I shocked a lot of friends when I started talking about participating in the virtual race (VR) series that Ironman put together in the last month as a way to motivate triathletes to continue training despite their races being canceled or postponed. They’ve been rotating between half-iron distance, international distance, and sprint distance events, with the swim being replaced by a run that presumably would take the average triathlete the same amount of time to complete as the swim for that distance. This weekend they got to the sprint distance, which is a 1.5 km run, 20 km bike, and 5 km run. Each leg of the event can be completed in any order and at any time during the three day window of Friday through Sunday.

So what possessed me to sign up for my first multisport event since Ironman Wisconsin in September 2018? Two weeks ago, I received the news that RAAM 2020 was canceled. A few hours later, I was given the news that I was being placed on temporary furlough from the job I’ve held for the last 14 years. Suddenly the two things keeping me busy for nearly every waking moment of my life were removed and I’ve been grasping at anything to stay focused and motivated. Last week it was a virtual Everest that nearly killed me. This week I decided to take it a little easier on myself and do a short duathlon.

Given that I haven’t gone on any kind of a purposeful run since I crossed the finish line of Ironman Wisconsin on September 9, 2018, I went out for a few easy 30 minute jogs once my legs had recovered from the vEverest. My goal was to keep my heart rate aerobic rather than to gain any kind of speed. Oh, and I also started some new exercises to work on the knee issues I’ve been having. By Wednesday or Thursday, my feet, ankles, and quads were so sore that I was limping up and down the stairs. I wanted to do my “race” in the proper sequence and all at once in the true spirit of a multisport event and decided to get it done on Friday because it was such a short event and I’m accustomed to doing my long workouts on the weekends (not that it really matters right now, but some habits die hard). It probably would have been beneficial to wait an extra day to let my legs recover a bit, but I’d made my plan and couldn’t bring myself to break it.

I decided to have a little fun with my pre-race preparation, getting out my old Tri-It Together kit and running cap. I could have done the bike ride on the road with my TT bike, but opted to do it on Zwift instead. I even made sure to equip my avatar with the highest rated aerodynamic time trial bike and wheels that I had access to at my Level 29 on Zwift.

The start window for the event was at 11 am Pacific time Friday and I’m a morning person, so I planned to start as close to that time as possible. I got started around 11:30 and headed out for my 1.5 km run. My legs were still sore and hurting, but I was able to run a little faster than the aerobic pace I’d been keeping all week. Because transition times aren’t recorded, I took my time switching over to my bike gear and got started on a nice flat 20 km time trial. I was definitely able to push myself harder on the bike than I could on the run, but my legs were still heavy and I couldn’t even hold my theoretical threshold power (theoretical because I haven’t successfully completed a FTP test in about a year now). But I definitely laid it all out there, maybe even went a little too hard to set myself up for a decent run. I don’t know. I’ve never properly trained for a sprint distance triathlon. And I figured I hadn’t trained for the run so it would just be a matter of surviving it anyway.

My legs were protesting as soon as I started the 5 km run. I did the best I could to focus on good form and posture rather than allow myself to get sloppy. It took a few minutes for my heart rate to calm down after the intense bike ride, then I tried to settled back into my aerobic pace, which quickly became much slower than the pace I’d been running all week due to the fatigue. I was less than halfway done when the side stitch started up. It was like everything I’ve ever hated about running was coming back to me all at once. Even though there was no time limit on the virtual race, I wanted to complete the run without resorting to walking so I kept going.

I completed the run/bike/run in 1 hour, 20 minutes, 50 seconds, not including the transition times and made sure my data was uploaded to the Ironman VR site. I think they post results once everyone has uploaded their races, but given that everyone is running and riding a different course in different conditions, I really don’t care about the standings. It just felt good to do something a little different and to have a project for the week. And Ironman even reposted my picture to their Facebook feed!

They rotate back around to the half-iron distance next weekend and I am nowhere near ready to run a half marathon (plus the 5 km run before the bike) so I’ll pass on that. Depending on what happens with my employment situation in the next two weeks, I might jump back in to do the international distance (3 km run, 40 km ride, 10 km run). Now that Rachel knows I’m (sort of) willing to run, she thinks it’s a good idea to keep running 2-3 times a week anyway. Awesome…

The upside to being (hopefully temporarily) unemployed is that I’ve been able to spend more time riding outdoors (solo, of course) and the weather has been much nicer over the last week. I’ll take advantage of that for as long as I possibly can, although it should start to warm up enough to ride comfortably in the early mornings soon anyway. I do already have another project in the works for next weekend and should be posting some details on that in the next day or so.

Joshua Tree Double Century

This was supposed to be a report on the Solvang Century. The ride organizers were unfortunately forced to cancel the event on very short notice when Santa Barbara County made the same decision as nearly every other county on Thursday evening to ban public gatherings of more than 250 people. I definitely feel for both the athletes and race directors affected by all of this. I know that race directors are left in an almost no-win position in making decisions regarding future events. Even though a bike race, running race, triathlon, etc., seems trivial in comparison to a worldwide pandemic, I as much as anyone can understand how frustrating it would be to throw so many resources into an “A race” just to have it canceled. At the moment, Race Across America has not been canceled, but I have prepared myself for the possibility that it might happen. My initial reaction is that I would be completely devastated after the time, effort, and resources that I and many others have invested in training, planning, and preparation for RAAM. For now, I’m accepting that RAAM may happen and it may not, but there isn’t anything I can do to affect what happens. I will assume the race is still on and continue to train and fundraise and prepare for the race with my crew until we find out otherwise. If the worst happens and the race is canceled, I will plan to do RAAM in 2021 and hope to find some other options to capitalize on the fitness I’ve been building over the last couple of months.

Back to the race report. Once word broke that the Solvang Century was canceled, I needed to come up with a backup plan for my training for the weekend. It only took a few minutes to remember that the Joshua Tree Double Century was happening, and that it was a much smaller event that would not be subject to the ban on public gatherings. There were less than 100 cyclists registered for the event, and there isn’t even a mass start, so it’s unlikely that there were ever more than 20-30 people associated with the event in the same place at the same time.

Fortunately, I had used my few hours of available vacation time to take Friday afternoon off, so I had time to prep for the ride and get to sleep early. I managed to get a decent night’s sleep in despite waking up at 2:00 am to make the two hour drive out to 29 Palms. I checked in and started the ride solo at 5:15 am, heading west out of town toward the north entrance to Joshua Tree National Park. I did this event two years ago, but the park would not issue permits for the ride to go through that year, so the route went around the park instead. I was looking forward to finally being able to ride through and see some of the park, as I’ve never had a chance to visit before. Fortunately, it wasn’t terribly cold and it looked like the rain would stay away, but the wind was really picking up as I started my ride.

The bulk of the 9,000 or so feet of climbing for the ride took place within the park. The route made its way up to the highest point of the course at Keys View at mile 35. Even though the sun had come out, the higher elevation and wind chill had left me unpleasantly cold and numb. I was trying to minimize my time off the bike anyway, so I rolled right through the viewpoint area with just a quick stop to admire the view of San Jacinto and San Gorgonio and the valley floor before continuing on and hoping to warm back up. It seemed that I had caught up with the bulk of the riders who had started earlier than me at that point as they were hanging out and enjoying the view and the ride’s first rest stop. It was a whole lot of downhill from there to the next rest stop, where I made a quick stop to top off my Camelbak, replenish one of my bottles of Spiz, and grab a small bag of trail mix just in case I needed a few extra calories later on. From there, I tackled the only other substantial climb on the ride to get back out of the park and eventually to the lunch stop, where I again just rolled by before jumping back on I-10 toward Desert Center.

After about 13 miles of nervously riding on the shoulder of the freeway and occasionally navigating a minefield of debris from shredded tires, I was relieved to know the traffic would be pretty minimal for the remaining 80 miles of the ride. I made another quick stop at the next rest stop to top off the Camelbak again and get one more Spiz bottle filled up, and found out there were just a few cyclists out there in front of me. I think I managed to pass most of them, several of them as they were changing flat tires, while only a couple of the super fast guys who started the ride later than me caught up and passed me. I’d been keeping a great pace and minimizing my stopped time, and thought I might pull off another sub-12 hour finish despite this being the toughest double I’ve done this year. Unfortunately I had to contend with either crosswinds or headwinds for most of the last 30-40 miles of the ride. I tried to stay in the aero bars as much as possible and keep my foot on the gas despite the fatigue, and am very happy with the effort I was able to put out. For the first time in awhile, I consumed every calorie I’d brought with me, so I was thankful that I’d picked up that bag of trail mix at the rest stop earlier. I ended up with an elapsed time of just over 12 hours at 12:07 when I finally rolled into the finish at Rodeway Inn. It was a bit of a heartbreaker to realize at mile 193 that the finish was just on the other side of the hill that I’d been staring at for the last 5-10 miles. It was just a little more irritating to have to drive a full mile into a headwind past where I’d parked my car earlier in the morning at Motel 6.

I was greeted by Anny Beck at the finish, and within 10-15 minutes several others had started to roll in as well. I spent a few minutes catching up with my friends Mark and TJ before heading back to my car so I could start the long drive back home. Driving to and from the ride all in one day did make for a very long day, but it saved me a little money on hotel expenses and it spared me the extra work of booking someplace to stay at the last minute and packing for an overnight trip.

I’m bummed that the Solvang Century didn’t happen this year. It’s such a great ride and event that has been around for a long time and that so many cyclists were looking forward to riding. But it was nice that a very suitable backup plan was readily available. I have no idea what restrictions and quarantines the near future will bring, but for now I will continue practicing my own form of social distancing and hope for the best.

Southern Inyo Double Double Century

This weekend was an opportunity to not only get in a good block of training for RAAM with back to back rides of nearly 200 miles each, but to practice riding in a sleep deprived state. And more training in the wind…

Because I will be using all of my accrued time off to do RAAM, I have no choice but to work in some long training rides and events without taking time off from work. There will be no opportunity for a weeklong “training camp” like I did to pre-ride the RAW course last year, so my long ride training will have to fit into blocks on the weekends. So my weekend started with a three hour drive to Ridgecrest after work on Friday night, checking into the host motel just before 10 pm. My support crew, Steve and Laurie Horton, had arrived hours earlier and had already turned in for the night so they would be rested for the long day on Saturday. I quickly unloaded the bikes and whatever I needed in the room and tried to get to sleep as quickly as possible. The plan was to meet Steve and Laurie for a quick briefing at 4 am so I could start riding by 5 am.

The alarm app on my phone had a possibly user-caused mishap so that I slept about 30 minutes longer than I intended. It worked out fine as I still was able to check in and meet Steve and Laurie on time, then let them finish prepping the car while I finished getting ready. I was relieved to find out that the event had no official timing, which meant I could just focus on my training pace without any external pressure, aside from wanting to finish quickly enough to have plenty of rest before Sunday’s ride. We hit the road just after 5 am. I had chosen to ride my Cannondale SystemSix, an aero road bike that worked great for the long straight roads with a bit of climbing.

I was feeling pretty decent after a couple days of taking it easy so I made good time and starting gradually passing a lot of the riders who had started a little earlier. I got to say hi to a few of my friends along the way, including a fun back and forth with my friend and future Hoodoo 500 relay teammate Rob Mann on his fixie. It’s always entertaining watching his legs spin at a crazy fast cadence on descents.

A massive tailwind pushed us down a fast descent back towards Ridgecrest, where I had to check my speed to avoid hitting more than 55 mph. Fortunately it was a straight road that was well paved, but I couldn’t stop thinking about the consequences of a poorly timed tire blowout at that speed. Once I hit the bottom of the descent and made a left turn, I realized why the descent was so fast when that tailwind turned into a nasty crosswind that made it a difficult slog back to the motel for the lunch stop. I was trying to keep stopped time to a minimum, so I only spent a few minutes at the motel before heading back out.

Another nice tailwind pushed me up to Olancha, where I dreaded turning around to face the wind for the 55 miles back to Ridgecrest. The headwind was brutal for the first 5 miles or so of climbing, but after that it was mostly a descent back to the finish. When I finally turned off Highway 395 into Brown Road, it felt like such a relief to be out of the wind and it was an easy 18 miles back to town. I was one of the first few finishers and was able to enjoy the nice spread put out by the Adobo Velo Duarte chapter before getting some rest and some time in my Air Relax boots to recover for Sunday’s ride.

After a somewhat decent night’s sleep that was cut an hour short by the time change, I met Steve and Laurie again at 4 am. They worked on prepping the car again while I finished getting ready and checked out of my room. The smaller group riding on Sunday had apparently decided to start at 5 am rather than 4 am so I got about a 10 minute head start by leaving at about 4:50. I had opted for my Trek Speed Concept (time trial bike) for Sunday’s ride as the course profile looked like there were plenty of long flat straightaways.

It wasn’t quite as windy on Sunday, but it was definitely colder. I had dressed for the 37 degrees in Ridgecrest and felt comfortable for the first hour or so, but the temperature quickly plummeted to as low as 27 degrees as I started heading north. I probably should have stopped to get warmer gloves or hand warmers and toe covers out of the car, but I’m too stubborn at times and just wanted to keep moving.

After a couple of hours, I was hitting my lowest point of the weekend. My hands and feet were in pain from the cold. It was still dark and I was feeling the effects of the fatigue and probably calorie deficit as well. I stopped for a few minutes to pee and drank a Starbucks double shot, which helped revive me a bit. I just needed the sun to come out to help me wake up and get a bit warmer. I finally felt more comfortable by the time we got to Olancha and turned towards Death Valley.

I continued to feel a little stronger making my way to the highest point on the course at the boundary of Death Valley National Park. I was about halfway done and thought the second half would be a walk (or ride) in the park, but the cold and climbing had taken its toll, and I still had some wind to face on the way back.

I got to enjoy a nice long descent to Lone Pine with an amazing view of the Sierras and Mount Whitney, and eventually the Alabama Hills. Once we turned back onto Highway 395, the mental battle to stay focused began. The fatigue had built up, I was starting to feel a little uncomfortable, and it was tempting to ease off and just phone in the rest of the ride. But I kept reminding myself of what I was training for and thought about the fatigue that I’ll have to push through in just a few short months. I kept my head down in the wind and smiled at Steve and Laurie as they faithfully cheered me on every time we leapfrogged one another.

After Olancha, it was the same route back to Ridgecrest as Saturday’s ride. The wind on the way back on Highway 395 wasn’t as bad, but I also didn’t get the relief of being out of the wind when I turned off towards the finish. In fact, I had to fight about 8 miles of headwind before the final turn back to town. With my awesome support crew, I managed to finish the ride with less than 20 minutes of stopped time, and was the first one to check in at the motel. With a three hour drive home to look forward to, I quickly packed up and left town.

Overall, I’m very pleased with how the weekend worked out. I got in a good block of almost 400 miles, some practice using the new Vertix Ultra communication system, Steve and Laurie got some solid crewing experience, and I was able to work through some tough external and internal battles to finish strong.

I got home around 10 pm Sunday, spun out the legs on my trainer for an hour before work on Monday, then spent Monday after work in my Air Relax boots while doing a phone interview. Hence, the slightly delayed ride/race report, which I’m tapping out on my phone while sitting on the trainer again.

Thanks so much to Hugh Murphy for putting on a great two day event. The support on the ride looked fantastic, although I didn’t need to use the rest stops. I’m also very grateful to Steve and Laurie for spending their weekend following me around on my bike and taking the opportunity to get the crewing experience before RAAM. I have so much confidence in my support crew right now and it’s a great feeling.

It’ll be a bit of a recovery week as I head out to the Solvang Century on Saturday. Ninety-nine days until RAAM and I’m feeling great about how everything is coming together.

Camino Real Double Century

For the fourth time in five years, I made my way out to Irvine early Saturday morning for the Camino Real Double Century, the first double of the year on the California Triple Crown calendar. I’ve found myself adding this to my schedule almost every year because it’s an easy drive from home and a good opportunity to get in an early season long ride. I also have a bit of a sentimental attachment to the event, as it was the first double century I ever did back in 2016. It’s been fun to see how I improve every year based on how I’m feeling at certain points in the route and how each year I make it a bit further before it gets dark (despite starting an hour later the last two years).

This was also my first event since the tough race at the 24 Hour TT in Borrego Springs a few months ago. Even though I wasn’t treating this as a race per se, I was hoping to get in a decent ride to build some confidence. It was a little nerve-wracking watching the weather forecast all week. It was beautiful and sunny all week long right up to Saturday morning. At the beginning of the week, the forecast called for some morning showers, but by Friday it was showing a full-blown storm watch. The ride organizers were offering an option for cyclists to ride self-supported on Sunday instead of Saturday, but I figured I might as well battle the conditions. After all, I won’t have the option of rescheduling Race Across America on an alternate day, will I?

I started with the 6:30 am group of maybe 15 cyclists, as everyone else had started earlier in the morning. They ask the “fast people” to start a little later, and I’m still getting used to being part of that group. We had very nice weather at the beginning of the ride, so nice that I was hoping that just maybe that forecast had been wrong and we’d have a nice sunny day after all. I got detached from most of the group when they ran a red light a few miles in, then spent an hour or so riding and chatting with my friend Rob DeCou riding his recumbent bike. Rob finished solo RAAM on the recumbent in 2016 and is currently training for a ridiculous event called Uberman in October. This consists of a 21 mile swim from Catalina Island to Palos Verdes, a 400 mile bike ride to Death Valley, then finishing off with the 135 mile Badwater ultramarathon route to Whitney Portal.

Around mile 35 I made my way into Dana Point and the skies opened up and a torrential downpour started. I flew through the first “mini rest stop” as I didn’t need anything and certainly didn’t need to stand around in the rain. I waved at the volunteers as I passed and kept heading south toward San Clemente. While the weather had been nice, I was doing a pretty good job of keeping a steady effort. Once the rain started, I heard Rachel’s voice in my head reminding me to just focus on keeping the rubber side down. This is not the time to risk a crash that could potentially end my RAAM aspirations. By the time I reached the San Onofre rest stop where my friends (and Hoodoo 500 relay teammates) Robert and Dee Mann were volunteering, there was a short break in the downpour so I stopped for a few minutes to top off my water and eat a quick snack. By the time I got onto the 5 Freeway to head south (yes, you read that correctly), it was raining again, but not quite as heavily. It let up by the time I got to Oceanside and stayed dry for a couple more hours. Heading east into Bonsall, I was covering some of the first miles of the RAAM route and couldn’t help imagining myself riding the same roads a few months from now. I had to do a little climbing through Bonsall and Fallbrook before hammering the flat roads back toward San Onofre, with another brief but heavy downpour hitting me on Highway 76 and the bike trail back to Oceanside.

About half of the climbing on the route is in the last 50 miles, and I knew it was coming. There was one cyclist in front of me who never got too far ahead, so he became a rabbit I found myself chasing. As I mentioned earlier, I often gauge my progress at this event by my timing at certain points of the route. I remembered climbing Antonio Parkway in the dark the first year I did the ride, but now it was only about 4:00 pm and I had started the ride an hour later in the morning. I realized that if I kept riding a strong pace, I might be able to finish before 6:30 pm and break the 12 hour barrier for the first time. I’ve been close on a couple of double century events in the past, but it would never occur to me how close I was until after I’d finished. This became my new carrot to chase after, especially once I passed the other cyclist who I believe had stopped to put on a jacket. I knew I didn’t need to stop at the last rest stop and that there was still some climbing left, but that there was also a good chunk of downhill to make up some time. I had hoped the rain was done, but the skies got dark again and I got a little more rain as I made my way up Live Oak Canyon and Santiago Canyon. Fortunately, I also got a nice tailwind pushing me back toward Irvine, and my legs were fatigued but still able to produce power. I knew I was going to cut it close, but was still definitely capable of beating 12 hours. Infuriatingly, I’m pretty sure I hit every single red light on the final 2.5 mile stretch of Sand Canyon back to the start/finish. As I checked in at the finish, I was told that I had indeed beat 12 hours and was the first female to finish.

I spent the next hour or so having a nice dinner with some of the other racers and volunteers. Mark Gibson, another solo RAAM finisher, was happy to offer lots of advice from his experience. Checking the official results this morning, I was pleased to see that my official finish time is 11:55:30, 1st place female, and 3rd place overall. It was definitely a nice way to start the season and build some confidence as training for RAAM continues to ramp up.

6-12-24 Hour World Time Trial Championships 2019

Even though I didn’t truly end up “racing” this event, it was a race and I definitely have a lot to say about it and feel like it might be therapeutic to get my thoughts organized and out there. I’ll apologize in advance for geeking out just a bit with data and metrics, but I know some people are interested in that and hopefully it helps explain a bit why my day went the way it did.

I never did get around to writing a pre-race blog to talk about my extensive preparation, but anyone who has seen my training or who I’ve spoken to about the race in the last few weeks knows that I was ready to crush this race. My setback at Hoodoo 500 in August was a bit of a wake-up call. I came back from that trip and immediately started a strict nutrition regimen, dropped all the weight I’d put on since RAW and then some, and felt healthier than I had in months. I started a meditation practice to help with my mental preparation and went into race week confident that I could handle whatever stressors might arise. And of course, I spent plenty of time putting in the actual work of pedaling my bike. Almost every weekend was a double dose of 6, 8, 12 hour sessions of flat and constant pedaling along the Santa Ana River Trail or on the actual race circuit in Borrego Springs at race pace or higher. I was hitting my targets on almost every single workout and feeling strong.

My coach Rachel and I had a strategy all lined up for how to pace myself for 24 hours. I was confident that I knew what pace I could hold for most of the race and even have some gas left in the tank if I needed to push harder in the last few hours like I did last year. My nutrition strategy was solid and I had a detailed plan laid out for my crew to follow during the race.

Going back to my off the bike nutrition regimen, after Hoodoo 500 I spent two solid months on a low carb diet. Aside from my long training days, I was probably down to 50-60 grams of carbs per day and very little sugar. For race week, I started adding some carbs back in, mostly in the form of potatoes, vegetables, and sprouted grains. One of my mistakes may have been made in the critical 24 hours prior to the race when I started taking in more refined carbs like pretzels and pasta. I had almost completely eliminated grains from my diet, so the sudden addition of those foods may have been a migraine trigger.

I knew something was off when I woke up on Friday morning and looked at my sleep and heart rate metrics. For the last year, I’ve been using the Oura ring to track various performance metrics. With the work on training and nutrition I’d put in over the last two months, my resting heart rate had been fairly consistently in the low 40’s while my heart rate variability was typically between 90-100 ms or higher. Every morning that week until Friday, these numbers were on point, I was getting great sleep, and my “readiness score” was telling me to go for it. Friday morning, my resting heart rate had gone up to 51 bpm and my heart rate variability was down to 47 ms. My sleep had been decent but not great. Whether this was brought on by the change in nutrition or just a signal that something else was going on in my body I’m just not sure.

It’s also been very common for pre-race stress to trigger migraines as well. I spent most of the day before Race Across the West puking or lying down somewhere to recover between meetings and appearances.

Additionally, around the time I started feeling my headache starting up on Friday afternoon before the race, I was also noticing a little upper respiratory irritation, so my sinuses could have also been a trigger. Or it could have been a combination of everything. Whatever it might have been, I was a little concerned by the time I was warming up for the race start that the headache did not seem to be responding to my medication like it usually does. I texted Rachel to let her know and when my crew member Cal asked me how I was feeling I went ahead and let him know as well.

As the race started, I found myself very quickly dropped by the entire first wave of elite racers. I wasn’t too concerned at first because I was keeping my power right where I wanted it and figured everyone else was going out fast. I tried to block out the pain in my head and focus on riding my bike. It was too early in the race to not be enjoying myself. Twenty four hours earlier I’d been out on the course for a shakeout ride and it felt awesome. It was frustrating to be feeling so crappy so soon.

The plan was for my friend/crew member Lisa to call me towards the end of each lap to record my power and heart rate metrics for the lap and to plan for any exchanges needed at the end of the lap. I let her know I still wasn’t feeling great. My power was a little higher than I had planned but my heart rate was still under control. My headache continued to worsen during the second lap and it was becoming more difficult to keep my power up, although my heart rate still wasn’t going up. If anything, it was going down. I’m still not sure how to explain this phenomenon, but after putting in thousands of miles this year, I’ve learned that it’s a sign of pretty serious fatigue when my heart rate just refuses to increase. I made an unscheduled pit stop after the second lap to add some warm clothes earlier than anticipated and use the restroom. I also took a second dose of my migraine medication hoping it would help, but it’s usually not a good sign when I have to go that route.

I continued to suffer through the third lap, trying to hold my pace and hoping things would get better. As I rolled into the pit, I decided to get off the bike and see if warming up and lying down in the RV might help shake the headache. After about 20 minutes, my crew coaxed me back onto the bike, hoping I would feel better once I started riding again. It didn’t work. It felt like the headache might be getting slightly better, but my legs were protesting with every pedal stroke. I was basically riding at a coffee ride effort and hating every minute of it. This is not how I was supposed to feel 3-4 hours into an “A” race. It just didn’t make sense putting myself through another 20 hours of suffering. I got off the bike at the end of the fourth lap again and went back into the RV. I was fairly certain at that point that I wouldn’t be getting back on. I think we decided to go back to the house I’d rented after an hour or two so we could all be more comfortable and get some rest, then reassess in the morning. My head was still throbbing as I tried to go to sleep and I took a third dose of my medication, which is more than I’m supposed to take in a 24 hour period.

I woke up around 6:00 am feeling a little better, dragged myself out of bed to make some coffee after awhile, and assembled my crew to make a decision. We decided to pack everything up and head back to the RV to eat breakfast and figure out what we wanted to do. As Lisa was driving me back to the race, I remember thinking to myself (and maybe out loud as well) that although I’d logically thought through what a bummer it was that things had turned out the way they did, I knew that emotionally it still hadn’t set in. I really didn’t want this setback to send me into a downward spiral and disrupt my preparation for RAAM. I knew that the best way to salvage the situation was get back on my bike and ride out the rest of the race.

I started making my way back to my car in the pit area and saw my friend Rob Mann and told him what had happened. When I told him I thought I might go ahead and get back on the bike, he smiled and told me he thought that was a good idea. Rather than wait for the breakfast being prepared at the RV, I scarfed down a couple of Pop Tarts and an iced coffee at my car and started getting my bike and gear ready. Now I was in a hurry to get back out there. I got dressed in the RV and started planning the rest of the day with the crew. Let’s just pretend we’re starting all over at Lap #1 again. I’ll take it easy on the first lap, see how I feel, and go from there.

As soon as I started pedaling the bike, I felt like myself again. My plan had been to just spend the last eight hours at my planned race pace effort, but I couldn’t hold back. I was riding at 5-10% higher intensity than planned and my heart rate was responding the way it was supposed to, but without getting too high. This is how I was supposed to feel 16 hours ago!

I continued around the race circuit clocking faster laps than I had on any of my training rides and was feeling amazing. I was flying by most of the other racers on the course, trying to cheer on the people I knew, and getting lots of encouragement. My crew continued to support me as if I was still in contention to win, and got me in and out of the pit in seconds with whatever I needed.

I made the switch to the 4.8 mile short loop with just over an hour left in the race. I figured that was enough to get in four laps, but I felt good enough to increase my pace like I had been on so many of my training rides, and I finished the first lap in under 13 minutes. I might have enough time for five laps! Now my heart rate was getting closer to my threshold or even higher, but it didn’t matter anymore. There’s no reason to save energy anymore. I kept finishing the laps in under 13 minutes and knew it was going to be close as I started my fifth lap. Christie Tracy cheered me on as I passed her at the end of the fourth lap, knowing I was trying to squeeze in one more lap purely out of defiance. I left every ounce of energy I had on the course and finished with about a minute to spare! I’d put in 167 miles in just over eight hours and about 240 miles over the entire 24 hours.

I know the stats will never reflect the work I did for that final eight hours, but it let me know (and anyone who saw me riding) that I was fully prepared to do something special out there. My body just wasn’t ready until it was too late. That thought could haunt me for days, weeks, or months, but I’m trying to let that go. Fortunately, all the mental preparation that I put in for the race itself has instead prepared me to deal with this setback and move on. Race Across America is eight months away and there’s some work to be done.

My crew just before the race – Randy, Lisa, Terry from my RAW crew, Linda, Marilyn, Mary, and Cal
Quick photo op with last year’s female podium – Seana Hogan, Meaghan Hackinen, and myself. With Meaghan going on to win the race and set a new course record, it’s now a photo of three world champions and course record holders.
Not sure if I was getting on or off the bike at this point, but this was when things were spiraling in the wrong direction.
This definitely qualifies as one of the times I need to remind myself that “it’s fine”.
Smiling for eight hours straight once I got back on my bike
Very close to vomiting after the effort I put in over the last hour, but always happy to see my good friends Dee and Rob Mann (who are world champions in the two-person 12 hour fixed gear division!)
Hugs all around for my crew who did a solid job of keeping me on the bike as much I could take

Hoodoo 500 Race Report

August 24-25, 2019

I signed up for Hoodoo 500 months ago during the early bird registration period, having heard great things about the event and how it would be a good ride to prepare for Race Across America (RAAM). Several people had told me it was a beautiful course, but also warned me how difficult it was.

My crew for Hoodoo 500 consisted of my crew chief Randy Horton, his wife Marilyn, and my coach Rachel. We drove out to St. George on Friday, getting into town with just enough time to check in, drive the last section of the course, attend the pre-race meeting, and grab some dinner and last minute supplies before going to sleep.

I spent the first 100 miles or so of the ride feeling pretty decent. Not particularly strong, as we were gradually climbing to about 7,000 feet, and I felt like I was being dropped by the rest of the field. I had to focus on holding a steady pace rather than push myself too hard trying to keep up. Having won the last two big events I’ve raced, it was tough to shake the pressure to have another big result. My training this year centered around Race Across the West as my “A” race. Hoodoo 500 was always supposed to be a training race to prepare for RAAM.

Over the next 100 miles we made our way past Bryce Canyon towards Escalante and I was starting to get passed by some of the relay teams. I was also continually leapfrogging a few of the other solo racers. Somewhere near Escalante, I think I finally came to terms with the fact that I was not in my wheelhouse, I had not trained to win this race, and I needed to be okay just treating it as a training race. I briefly felt a little better, but I was about to start riding through the night and the course was about to get really tough.

I started the climb to Boulder and recall feeling relatively decent during the first part of the night. The terrain was very similar to the climbing I struggled with during the second night of RAW. One of the problems we had during RAW was that our communication system had failed and I didn’t have the benefit of the crew in the follow vehicle being able to interact with me to keep me awake and encouraged. This time, we were using a new comm system made by Vertix Global that worked flawlessly. Rachel took over the headset and was able to keep me pedaling.

One of my errors going into this event was that I didn’t have enough time to study the route and make notes about the climbs. Rachel was unable to answer questions I had about how much further I had to climb with the limited information available to her during the race. I took a short break after reaching Boulder about halfway up the climb and found myself starting to feel very much like I did that second night of RAW. Once I sat in the car to take a break, I could barely keep my eyes open and just wanted to go to sleep. I had to force myself to get back on the bike and get moving again. The climb was starting to feel very similar to the climb out of Camp Verde in RAW, and it was just about as long. I thought about how that climb had been my nemesis on that route and I made a commitment to finish the climb without stopping, which got tougher and tougher as it kept going. I had definitely reached a point where my pace was ridiculously slow, but it was still forward movement. I finally got to the summit and we made our way down the hill and over to the next Time Station in Bicknell, where the TS captain had much needed coffee waiting for us.

Making my way toward Panguitch, I thought I had a long section of flat road ahead of me before the next big climb. Unfortunately, I was hit with several miles of headwind in the early hours of the morning that slowed my pace to a crawl. The crew got me a nice breakfast in Panguitch and I headed out to tackle the last really big climb toward Cedar Breaks. The heat started to ramp up right around the time the climbing did, and I was back in survival mode. It was taking every ounce of mental and physical energy I had to keep turning the pedals. I was trying to determine if I had made the mistake of not taking in enough food, electrolytes, water, or all of the above so I tried increasing my intake of everything to rectify the issue. I think it really just came down to having wasted too much energy getting frustrated in the earlier miles of the race.

As I started the final section of the climb, the crew started giving me some information on my competition. I really hadn’t been asking any questions at that point. Quite honestly, I think I was afraid to hear the answer, and I just didn’t want to feel any pressure to chase anyone down or hold anyone off. At some point I was told that I was gaining on Seana Hogan. I wasn’t sure how that was possible given how horrible I was feeling and how slow I was climbing, but I definitely didn’t feel any motivation at that point to try to bridge the gap. The last few miles of the climb just felt brutal. I had reached a point where the climbing had tapered off and it felt like there should have been a summit, but the road just continued for what seemed like forever on more of a false flat. I finally mustered a smile when I passed the real summit and started descending toward Cedar City.

I generally enjoy descending, but at this point everything was so uncomfortable that it really was not much fun trying to handle a bike on a long steep descent with wind blowing me around on the road. There was a stoplight on the way down for road construction that we had been warned about, and I was actually thankful to have a little break from the downhill for a few minutes.

My uncle Brian just happened to be in Cedar City for the weekend dropping my cousin Luke off to start college at Southern Utah University, so they were both waiting to greet me at the Time Station in town. We were able to spend a few minutes visiting while we prepped for the very real possibility of being on the road after dark, then I headed out to finish off the last 80 miles.

Once again, my mistake of not studying the course came back to haunt me. I was under the false impression that the miles back from Cedar City would be easy, but there was actually some significant climbing left before hitting the long descent into St. George. My pace again slowed to a crawl as I just didn’t have any motivation to push myself. I was passed by two of the male solo racers, but just couldn’t bring myself to care. The thought of quitting never entered my head, but my crew had to put up with a lot of complaining during those miles. I tried to avoid stopping unless I really needed something. At that point, I was struggling to keep my bike under control while reaching for my water bottle so I didn’t even want to bother eating or drinking.

I was constantly trying to tell myself that the battle I was fighting was more mental than physical. I’ve reached this level of pain and fatigue before and have been able to push through. Even if I had no desire to chase down or hold off other racers, this was still an opportunity to train myself to work through the pain. I finally convinced myself to stop feeling defeated and to find the pace that I could maintain through the final miles. I was going to finish hours outside what I had thought was a fairly conservative goal, but I was going to finish.

Within the first mile of the long descent back to St. George, I had two deer almost run across the road in front of me. It freaked me out as I knew another racer had been hit by a deer the night before. My crew tried to protect me by staying just far enough in front of me so that I wouldn’t be seen as drafting, but they had a hard time perceiving how far back I was and they were making me more nervous than the deer. I finally waved at them to keep going and kept my speed reasonable so I could keep an eye out for more deer and have time to react.

I had to ride the final 13 miles to the finish unsupported while my crew went ahead. It was almost all downhill, but I was completely spent and the miles just seemed to drag on forever. Then I kind of blanked on the last few turns and forgot how to get back to the hotel. Besides my crew, there were a few other racers waiting to greet me at the finish. While I’d had more than a few emotional moments out on the race course, I was so completely spent by the time I made it to the finish line that my finish was pretty stoic and anti-climactic.

Despite all the frustration I experienced out on the course, I’m happy that I added the race to my schedule for the year. I definitely learned some lessons out there that I hope I can remember when I hit some tough patches on RAAM next year. And I learned a bit more about myself and what I need to work on – dealing with pressure and frustration more constructively being one of the big ones.

Many congratulations to the other racers who performed so well out there. It was great seeing so many racers and crews being supportive of everyone out on the course. It was a beautiful and challenging ride that I hope to do again in a couple of years or so. I am definitely planning to take notes so I can be more prepared next time around.

Next up is the 24 Hour solo World Time Trial Championships in Borrego Springs November 1-2, where I will be defending my 2018 championship and course record of 456 miles. My training will ramp back up and consist of lots of long flat miles, and a lot of it will probably be “secret training” that won’t appear on Strava.

My friend Rob and me at the start. Rob finished the 300 mile Stage Race in two days on a fixie!

Getting ready to grab a new water bottle from the crew

Heading onto the bike path near Bryce Canyon

I was desperately trying anything to revive myself on the Cedar Breaks climb. I believe I chugged the pickle juice, said “this is disgusting”, then chugged it again.

Happy to see my uncle Brian and cousin Luke in Cedar City. The race director commented that we had one of the best ever name signs for our vehicle (and best crew shirts 😐).

On the podium with Heather Poskevich (1st) and Seana Hogan (2nd). Heather was the first solo finisher male or female and had the fastest ever finish time for a female.

Bonus story for anyone who reads this far. My journey into ultracycling started after my friend Paul Cornish was killed while riding his bike in Oceanside, CA on August 31, 2017. Paul set the transcontinental world record in 1973 in 13 days, 5 hours, 20 minutes. I am almost never seen without my blue wristband with Paul’s name on it. His name is on all my bikes and the back of my jersey next to his quote “Bicycles have no walls”. Paul was definitely one of a kind. One of his many trademarks was his habit of putting his hand on a fellow cyclist’s back during a ride, either as a greeting or to help push them up a climb. Just over 12 hours into the race, I was frustrated about several things, I was starting the long climb to the top of Boulder Mountain, and it was getting dark. Another racer had just passed me and Randy let me know that another cyclist was coming as well. I suddenly felt a hand on my back and looked over to see my friend Brook Henderson, who was on a 4-person relay team. He stayed with me for a minute or so and encouraged me before taking off. It wasn’t until hours later as I finished the climb that I appreciated the significance of that small gesture. It was like Paul had made a quick appearance to cheer me up and give me a little push up the climb.