8 x 8

Just over a week ago I decided that I would test my skills in a 6 hour mountain bike marathon in Dalton, MA. Another fabulous event put on by my team, North Atlantic Velo. It was a chilly weekend, sunny and unseasonably cool in the 60’s, but perfect riding weather. We landed at the race venue the day before to help mark the course. Backtracking one section of the race course, I went down the wrong trail and did a very elegant endo. Stopping my front wheel cold against a buoyant log across the trail I flew over the handle bars and landed with a quiet thud. It was the most noiseless crash ever – the only sound was my shoes clicking out of my pedals.

The next morning I reluctantly hauled myself out of bed for a tasty breakfast and then off to the race venue. This was my first experience of not being freaked out about having enough time to go through my pre-race preparation fidgeting like a baseball player up to bat between pitches. We arrived just under an hour before the start. After getting my race number, I procrastinated getting ready. With 15 minutes before the start, I ran back to the car to put my uniform on and rode my bike to the start line. That was my warm-up.

A 6 hour mountain bike marathon is a little different than the regular cross country races. Instead of competing for the fastest time with a defined set of laps, it is how many laps you can complete in 6 hours. We were told at the start line that if we did not complete our lap by 3:30 pm, that lap would not count.

A mass start with all the Pro/Experts, I rolled off the line like I was going to the coffee shop. I was not in a hurry. It was going to be a long day and I needed to pace myself. In my head I was thinking that I would only have to complete 6 laps, since the race I competed in at this location earlier in the summer I rode 4 laps in just under four hours. A couple of laps into the race and the official announced to me that I had completed 2 laps in an hour and a half. Whaaaat?!?? I thought I was going slow. This cannot be true! My calculations concluded that I was probably up for 8 laps at my pace…..noooooooooooo!

Toward the end of my fifth lap a part of the trail was becoming precariously washed out on narrow spine just before a technical jaunt over a stump. I clipped out my left foot trying to gain some traction, but I was too far down in the silty washed out sand that I could not reach my leg to stable ground. I proceeded to fall backwards down the hill into the sticks and leaves scraping the entire line of my right shin bone. Other than a couple of bruises and some snake bite cog marks, I was OK. (Later, I would find out that Steve would have a matching wound putting his foot through a bridge. The poor fellow!) I jumped back on my bike and tried to regain ground on the racers ahead of me, but once the adrenaline wore off, I was toast.

Lap six and seven were close to death marches. The demons were leaking into my head with, “Why am I doing this?” I felt sick to my stomach and I was getting a dehydration headache. I kept pushing water and juice. Each lap I had grabbed new bottle and ate something, but my stomach was not digesting the gels and half of Clif Bar Stacy had so kindly held out for me while Steve managed my bottle handoffs. Coming through the start/finish zone after my sixth lap, I clanged my left hand on one of the rebar posts as I cut the turn too close. OW! In the midst of my increasing delirium, Steve made me pull off in the feed zone to eat solid food. A banana and half a peanut butter and jelly sandwich settled in my stomach nicely.

During lap seven I was fantasizing that I would not have enough time to do another lap because I would not finish before the cut-off time. Then these two junior kids rolled up behind me. One of them asked if anyone had any paper towels. Who carries paper towels on a ride? He lamented to his friend that he could do one more lap, but he had to poop. Lovely. I told him to look around, the forest has lots of leaves, bio-degradable too!

I rolled through the start/finish and asked the officials, “What time is it?” They replied, “It’s 2:28.” Whaaaat! I rode up to the feed zone and grabbed another banana and discussed it with Steve. “Your slowest laps have not been longer than 50 minutes,” he said. “So I have time to do another one?” I asked hoping to burn more minutes with the conversation and not have to go back out. “Yup,” he said. “Ok, I can do another one.” There is no crying in biking. And off I went thinking, “If I am doing this, it better, *&^*in’ count!”

Finishing my eighth and final lap with under 10 minutes to spare and in 2nd place I completed 8 eight mile laps. I leaned my bike down to get off it because I could not lift my leg over the top tube. I was exhausted. My body ached. I walked around like an old Labrador retriever until we got in the car for our three hour trip home.