This weekend the family and I drove to Montgomery, New York for the SingleSpeed-A-Palooza race I've been preparing for.A few hours before we left I went to an appointment at Pittsford Performance Care to see Dr. Luckey. He had fixed my knee problems in the past. This time we were able to see that my left leg was not reacting a strongly as my right. This was likely putting extra strain on my right knee as it was trying to compensate. Dr. Luckey made an adjustment and I left hoping it would feel good for a 25 mile ride.
The race was at Stewart State Forest. There were 297 mountain bikers registered and 3 unicyclists: Claude, Robi, and myself. Being the slowest cyclists, we started last. Claude rode a 36er, and Robi and I each rode 29ers. Trail conditions and weather were both perfect.
The race started on a dirt road that would last nearly three miles. We all separated right away. Claude took the lead and continued to gain distance. Robi was maybe 30 seconds ahead of me towards the end of the road. I wasn't pushing too hard, concerned this was going to be a long race.
Minutes into the race the sweeper rode up along side me. This is one of the race marshals that rides last and makes sure no one gets left behind. Yay! I'm the last guy. Haha. Of course we chatted a bunch. If I recall, his name was Rick. It wasn't long before we encountered a group of cyclists standing around, one of them lying on the ground. Rick stopped to help. I continued riding, and soon Rick showed up again. The injured biker had gotten caught up with others in the pack and had a concussion. He didn't know where he was. Scary.
The first dirt road section ended with the course heading into single track. It's kind of cool how I suddenly felt at home. Yeah... that's the stuff. It wasn't long before I caught up to Robi. I passed and he commented that he was feeling dead. Months ago he separated his shoulder and between that and winter, he wasn't able to exercise as much as he had hoped. Going into this race he was concerned about his endurance. I hoped he'd be ok.
I think he was behind me for a while, but it wasn't long before I lost track of him. Soon I heard some big huffing and puffing coming up from behind and wondered if that was him. It turned out to be a mountain biker. I'm sure it was one who stopped for the injured guy. He was ready to pass just as I was heading into a rocky down section. Unfortunately his sudden approach and my indecisiveness to dismount and let him go led me to fall back as I failed to step off properly. I got a nice pedal bite and demonstrated to at least one mountain biker just how much I suck. Haha.The trails were pretty cool. There were many occurrences of these mini rock gardens, about three feet long. It was almost like a wall made of rock had been broken through. Most of the climbs and descents were short, but many were technical, at least for muni. Some sections were smooth and flowy. Most of it could be ridden, but an occasion climb was nearly impossible for me, some just weren't worth remounting for a second go, and some technical downhills just weren't worth the risk during a long race.
At one point I encountered a mountain biker who had stepped off. I passed and we rode in the general vicinity of each other for some time. I told her to just tell me when she wanted to pass, but she was content and suggested I would just end up passing her again. She obviously wasn't the strongest rider. At one point I rode down the most technical section of my day (that I actually rode) with success. She was behind me and I heard a pretty good metal against rock smash. I yelled back and she confirmed she was ok. Yikes. Eventually she passed me and I never caught back up.
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| Another Pint Glass! |
It was probably at about mile 12 that my right knee eventually started hurting like it has been. I think my visit to Dr. Luckey probably got me that far. I may have to see him again, or maybe my IT band still needs time to recover after being fixed. We'll see. Anyway it wasn't bad enough to stop me from continuing.
At mile 15 there was a water station. I opted to refill my CamelBak with water rather than beer, leaving more for the crew. I ate a Stinger Waffle bar and stretched. Rick had stopped to talk with other marshals and showed up when I was about ready to move on. He mentioned to the water station crew that I was the last guy, and so they could pack up. He questioned if I was going to continue or not. I was still ok to ride a bit more, but I wasn't really seeing how I'd make it 10 for miles.
We continued on. I was feeling weaker and my quads were starting to twitch and burn at the first few cranks of any climb causing me to dismount more frequently. Crap... it wasn't looking good. I asked Rick how long it was going to take me to finish at this rate. He confirmed we'd be here a long time. He seemed to be riding more and more ahead of me and waiting. I found myself walking up smaller hills and taking three to five attempts to free mount. I was clearly done.
As soon as I informed Rick, I knew I had made the right choice. All I wanted to do was get out and be done, but we still had a few miles to make that happen. Eventually we hit a dirt road and he told me how to get out, and he continued to sweep the course. It was probably a mile and a half of road before I got back to the start. My GPS said I rode about 18 miles and my cycle computer said 18.8.
There were about 300 mountain bikers in the start/finish area and awards were being given out. I looked around for my people, but my family hadn't returned from an outing and Robi and Claude had not come back yet. I felt like the guy who brings a unicycle to a bike race.
Later it turned out that Robi's marshal had given him bad directions and Robi had to use his GPS to navigate his own way out. Part of that included riding more of the course. He ran out of water, and entered the water station just as the truck with crew and supplies was pulling away. They didn't see him. Once he made it back, he had ridden 18 miles and his voice was raspy. That had to suck.
Eventually Claude showed up the way you're supposed to. He crossed the finish line with a time of 3:55. He looked happy and he probably could have done another 10 miles. Nice! Claude rocks!
It wasn't long before the event started closing down and that was that. I was disappointed to have not finished. It was a long weekend, with a lot of driving and trying to keep the family happy along the way. In hindsight, it probably wasn't worth the trip. I'd rather have just met up with the guys for a few 10 miles fun rides over a few days.
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