Kamden said she'd work with me (Yeah!!), and I put new handlebars that weren't an enormous man size on my bike just in time. We rode up with Jon and Kyle, who just got a sweet new road bike and was competing in his first bike race! The three of us (Kam, me and Kyle) went off together, as Cat 4 women and Cat 5 men were starting together. We started the ride, and at the first hill most of the cat 5 men took off. The two girls from Dynamic Physical Therapy that Kam and I wanted to beat stayed back at a slower tempo, and we stayed with their tempo. As Kamden articulated, "In a bike race, it's not about your finishing time but your finishing place". Halfway up the hill I heard a chain drop, and later up Kamden said to me, "I think Kyle dropped his chain!". We lost him that way.
My new handlebars felt great! Cornering was amazing, and the tempo that the Dynamic girls were setting was definitely rideable. We were all working together, and made the first hill. We were on a roller at about mile 20 between the two larger hills when I just started to feel awful. I wondered if I was dehydrated (it was a very hot and brilliantly sunny day) or needed nutrition, so I slowed down, ate my reserve gel and drank almost an entire water bottle. Then I was dropped from the girls a little bit, but not at an unbridgeable distance, and started trying to make the bridge. My knees and feet started screaming. I just felt awful. I heard Greg's voice in my head telling me, "Relax". So I relaxed, but my legs felt so awful. I started moving around on my bike seat, and the bike just felt bad. The urge to rip my feet off my pedals and get off my bike overwhelmed me, and I made myself stay on it with a promise of "18 more miles!", a doable distance, just finish it.
I made it up the steep climb alone, watching the gap grow in front of me, and once I started descending all I could do was stand up and stretch my legs. Once the climb flatted out, I was just sort of riding, sort of stretching, and absolutely feeling uncomfortable. At this point Kyle caught up to me. It turned out his bike was stuck in the big ring! He informed me that making those climbs in the big ring was really a difficult experience. We were at about mile 26 when we met up, and we rode together for the next 10 miles. Part of the time I drafted him on the downhills, stretching my legs out, and tried giving him help in front on the uphills, but probably half the time we were also chatting. It made a lot of sense that he caught up because I know Kyle to be a really strong rider, and the big ring explained why it took him so long which had been confusing me.
At some point I was in front on a climb and my legs were so miserable and my bike felt so awful that I started crying. Kyle asked me if I was okay from the back and I just shook my head in an "I'll get through this and finish" way. At around mile 36 we were climbing and another rider was off his bike stretching his legs. I'd spent the last 16 miles resisting the enormous temptation to rip myself off my bike, and seeing this was worse than someone talking about rivers and waterfalls when you really have to relieve yourself, and I succumbed. I got off my bike, mid hill, and started stretching next to the guy. Kyle just kept going, which was good because I felt at this point I was slowing him down, and also because you can't stop mid hill in your big ring.
I got back on my bike, and I did feel a little better, and it made the rest of the race easier to cruise in. Stacy rolled up to me in the car and asked if I was okay, and I explained that I was fine (I was hydrated, I had nutrition, and I had fitness and energy), my bike just felt awful and I wanted to finish at this easy pace. Every time I rode by marshals or spectators and they started cheering and saying crap like, "You're almost there!", I got so unhappy because that wasn't the issue. The analogy I made in the car was that it was like getting a blister in your running shoes 15 miles into the marathon and finishing anyways, but not wanting to make it worse.
Anyways, apparently there was another girl in the race who Kyle later said we dropped really early on who caught up to me at this end stretch. She never actually passed me (I don't think I would have let her if she tried), and at the finish line she said to me, "You need to work out some strategy with your team!". (WTF?!). When I crossed the finish line, I barely saw the camera but mustered up a grin:
But, I finished. And, as this is my first season of bike racing, my race goal is always to learn something big, and I definitely learned something. I'm going to get the ball rolling to get my bike fit, and I'm going to slowly work on breaking it in.
It turns out Kamden beat those girls and came in 2nd overall HOLLA!! (the girl who won stayed with the cat 5 man pack) so I was thrilled. I cooled down, and stretched, estatic to finally be off my bike. We waited for the podium, and they made the announcement that they were going to start with Cat 4 women. Kamden quickly started working at getting her race number off, and I was helping her, and we had just got it off when they called my name over the loudspeaker. Shit! I was standing there in my sports bra, with my bib shorts around my waist, holding Kamden's race number in my hand. How did this happen? Well, it ended up there were only 6 girls in the field. So I got this glamorous picture of victory:
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| Jackie Libby - THIS is inappropriate. |
So, in the words of Greg Flood, "Never make any major changes on your bike before a race".
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