Here is a video of the start. Here is another photo of the start showing the downed K1 with Arild in the water. You can see me passing on the top right. I didn't know this until recently, but he broke his paddle somehow and that's how he flipped. He swam to shore with his boat, borrowed a paddle and continued on. Here is another photo taken right before the start. I'm on the left of the screen obscured by an orange paddle.
Once the field thinned out and the helter skelter start was behind me, I settled into my best version of good paddling form and rythm. I knew I had gone out pretty fast, estimating my pace at 6mph. Every time I do something like this about ten minutes into it when the pain starts I always ask myself, "Wouldn't it be easier to just stay home and watch TV?" Then I think of the immortal words of my father: "All I want to do is drink beer and smoke cigarettes. But I can't." That's exactly right.
I concentrated on my form and watched the current of the river for the fastest line. I figured we'd be paddling for about an hour, so I started to plot my strategy. One of the guys in front of me, in the other Safari-style boat, I had raced against before and had beaten him by about a minute over a 6.5 mile course. My plan was to stay within 30 yards or so of him and make a move in the last mile and a half to pass him. About 20 minutes into it I saw another K1 over my right shoulder. He was still behind me and not overtaking me. So now I had two goals: to pass the guy in front of me and not get passed by the K1. The river was pretty wide and the water was silty so it was impossible to tell where the deep channels and shallow spots were. In a few spots a line of fast-moving current would develop where the rest of the river got shallow. Oftentimes, this line of current also passes on the outside of a curve, which is the longest course to take. One thing I haven't learned yet is whether it is faster to cut the corner and take the short route or to stay in the current. On one particular bend I tried to cut it and the other two guys near me took the current. The K1 overtook me and the Safari boat put another 20 yards on me. I knew I'd made a mistake, but I also learned to stay in the current. On the shuttle van on the way to the starting line, the guys driving the shuttle, who were also river guides, told us to stay left of every island. This I did and I found fast moving current every time. The tradeoff is that you often have to hug the shore with its overhanging branches if you want to stay in the fastest current.
I tried a couple of times to pull harder and up the stroke rate to catch the two guys in front of me. I was sitting in 6th place and I wanted to pass one more boat. The K1 paddler was looking strong and I could tell he was pulling away, but I seemed to be slowly reeling in the Safari boat. I had passed the guy in the Safari boat in the previous race we'd done together at about the 3/4 mark. I figured that's where I'd pass him again. Just then, I could hear a paddle hitting the water behind me. It was Arild! He'd gotten back in the water after breaking his paddle and flipping and caught me with about a mile and a half to go!
We finally came upon the bridge that the river guides told us meant we were about a half mile from the finish. I was about 20 yards behind the Safari boat and as soon as I passed under the bridge I gave it all I had. There was no way I was going to pass Arild or the other K1, so I was shooting for 6th place. I passed the Safari boat with about 100 yards to go to the finish and pulled my boat onto the shore where a race director was showing us where to stack our boats. I got out of my boat clumsily (the legs don't work so good after paddling for so long). Here's a photo. My stopwatch said 53 minutes. Here's one of me pulling my boat on shore. I call this picture "The Guns of the Navaojorojo."
What I failed to mention was that at the start of the race I knocked my water jug over and all of the water spilled out into the boat. It was sitting behind me so I couldn't see it. I tried to suck on my drink tube and there was nothing. At the time it wasn't too big of a setback, but it would prove to be a big deal later. Normally in these kinds of boats you have a foam molded jug holder. Since I've only had this boat for a short time I haven't had time to rig my jug holder yet.
I ran in the direction the volunteers were telling me to run. I went up the bank to the transition area where my bike was. I intended to bike in my water shoes since they offer pretty good foot protection and they've got aggressive grip on the bottom to stay in the pedals. My pedals were not the clip-in type and I don't have any of those clip-in shoes anyway. I drank as much of my electrolyte drink from the water bottle I had as I could on the way to the bike. I put on my helmet, grabbed the bike and ran it to the edge of the transition area. You weren't allowed to ride the bike in the transition area for safety reasons. I was pretty well spent from paddling so hard, but I figured using different muscles would make a difference. I jumped on the bike and started up the first hill to the road. I had no idea which direction to go so I hoped to stay close enough to bikes ahead of me to follow them. The very first half mile or so was on a flat paved road. I tried to get in a rythm, get a feel for the bike and use the high gears to pick up some speed. Then there was a right turn up a gargantuan hill on a gravel road. I groaned a little bit as I clicked the gears all the way down. There was a photographer at the base of the hill. I made it up about a quarter of the way and stalled. My quads and my lungs were burning like fire and I could barely move. "The pain!" I actually said out loud. I tried to keep putting one foot in front of the other as I walked the bike up the endless hill. The guy in front of me was walking his bike up too, so at least I wasn't alone. I'm serious when I say I could barely move. My legs felt like they were encased in carbonite. Snot was pouring from my nose and I was wheezing. "No way I finish 11 miles of this," I thought to myself. I thought about the humility of finishing last, or worse, dropping out. I finally crested the hill and got back on the bike and tried to start pedaling again.
The course had dozens of turns that I saw on the course map. I was worried that I would get off track, but everything was very well marked with fluorescent surveyor's tape and fluorescent painted arrows on the ground. I never missed a turn. The course wound around the side of a large hill, up and down along gravel roads and what appeared to be narrow hiking trails in the grass. There were other difficult hills where I stalled and had to walk the bike up with my quads burning again, but nothing as bad as that first hill. I was being passed by other riders every couple of minutes now. The lead that I'd built in the paddling section was evaporating. One guy rode by, looked back and said with a concerned look, "Dude! You need to raise your seat up! You're going to burn out your quads!" I knew jack about cycling, so he was probably right. I'd borrowed the bike from Robo and it was in pretty bad shape. I'd spent several hours tuning it up - repacking the bearings, greasing the chain, putting new brake pads on and making adjustments, but the seat post was frozen and I couldn't move it. The guy right about one thing - I was burning out my quads.
Steadily, I made my way through the course. There were a couple of terrifying downhills through ruts and loose gravel where I really picked up speed. One slip and I was going over the handlebars and getting road rash, or worse. At one point, the trail went through a section of tall grass, then trees and brush. There was a hole cut in the brush that was the exact size and shape of a rider on a bike that you had to go through and then make a sharp right turn to avoid a tree. "Bastards," I thought as I ducked through the hole. The course flattened out and eventually I made it back to the transition area. Volunteers were directing me to go down the hill to the transition area, but I didn't have any idea where to go. I was afraid that they thought I was a relay team or something and that I was really supposed to have stayed up on the road. I rode to where a group of racers was standing waiting on their teammates and stopped. I asked the volunteer, "I thought we had to do two laps." "You do," she said, "you have to walk your bike through the transition area and get back on the bike on the other side." I would have known this if I wouldn't have missed the pre-race meeting.
I trotted my bike through and got back on. The second lap wasn't eventful and seemed to go by faster. I still got passed numerous times, got crushed by the first hill and cussed as I went through the hole in the brush. But I made it. Next, the run.
I threw my bike down next to my beach towel and took my helmet off. I sat down to change shoes. Man it felt good to sit. I put my socks and running shoes on as fast as I could. I took a long swig from my water bottle and jogged off. I tore open a GU and downed it as I went through the transition area.
I was pretty disappointed by my performance on the bike. I had anticipated doing poorly, since I didn't have the best equipment and I didn't train that much, but it was worse than I thought it was going to be. Originally I thought I'd be able to make up some time during the run, but that was before I'd done two solid hours of hard exercise. My legs were tight as I tried to run. I was not moving very fast and I got passed in the first half mile. Eventually I loosened up a bit and had a decent pace over most of the flat part of the course. But then it went off road and got hilly. The hills were killers. The trail wound around through brush and trees and was actually very pretty. The last mile or so was in the cooler forest and dense undergrowth by the river's edge. I liked this part of the course the best since it was cooler running in the shade and the dirt was soft to run on. I made my first lap and ran through a different part of the transition area directed by the race volunteers. I saw dozens of water bottles stacked on a table in the transition area and I really needed some fluid, but I wasn't sure if they were staged there by racers and were owned or if they were community bottles. Again, if I would have been at the pre-race meeting I would have known this.
I got back on the road and that's where my quads started cramping up. At that point I knew I was pretty dehydrated. I had at least 3 miles to go until the finish and I was worried that if the cramping got worse that I was going to have to drop out. There were a few houses along the road and I started thinking about whether the race rules prohibited me from getting a drink from a water hose at one of the houses. Most of the houses looked like no one was home. At a couple of the houses there were people working or piddling around outside. I was tempted to either steal a swig of water from one of the deserted houses or ask the people in the yard if I could have a drink from their's. I looked behind me and another runner was coming up behind. My pride and fear of violating the rules got the better of me and I decided to pass on the water and try to gut it out. I did have to stop and walk a little in the hopes the cramps would go away. I knew it was just a matter of time before they seized up for good, so I knew I had to be careful. I even thought about drinking from the river or a mud puddle, but I never really seriously considered it.
I kept at it and gradually chewed up the course. The cramps would come back and I'd have to walk for a bit. But eventually I made it to the shaded section of the course that I liked and I knew I was going to make it. I came through the finish line at 2:53:00. Here are the final results. I was 7th in my division; not sure where I came out overall.
I started hydrating just about as soon as I came across the line and the cramps went away. Looking back, having my water jug leak in the boat was costly. As I plan for next year, I know I've got to get the bike set up better and train on it more and on hills. I think I can pretty easily shave 10-15 minutes off my time. I've also got to get to the starting line in time to set my stuff up better, relax a little and attend the pre-race meeting. It was painful, but still fun and I'm glad I did it. I think it was good cross training for the Safari, which was really the point for me. It is the last non-paddling event I'm going to do before the Safari too.
Next races are the Safari Prelim and the Barrier to the Bay races.
Post dammit.
Posted by: Snake Diggity | May 05, 2008 at 05:38 PM