It was only noon, but I was already pressure-cooked and soft, like a holiday pot roast.
And I still had 100 miles to ride.
How’d I get myself into this predicament? Piece of cake: One simple mistake knocked the blocks out during Saturday’s 300K in Spartanburg, S.C.
But this is a tale of recovery. These long rides bring their share of suffering and hardship, but they’re also the acid test for determination and perseverance. And so I lowered the bucket one more time, even when the well had run dry. I eventually found my legs, got back in the game and finished on a high note for one of the more pleasurable brevets of my cycling career.
Branson K and I headed down to Spartanburg on Friday evening. Branson, a first-year randonneur, had completed a qualifying 300K the week before in Morrisville. He was trying to get a bit more experience under his belt in his quest to do Paris Brest Paris.
I’d skipped the Morrisville 300 with a cold. I needed this one for the record books in my own attempt to qualify for PBP.
I played DJ on the drive down from Durham, spinning two disks from my favorite alt.country band, the Backsliders.
We reached the Day’s Inn in Spartanburg, about a quarter mile from the start, late Friday evening. Like true randonneurs, we immediately powered up the TV to the Weather Channel. The cycling gods were smiling on us: 45 at the start to mid 70s in the afternoon, lots of sun, light winds. That wool undershirt I’d packed would remain in the bag. This would be a day for sunscreen, a light vest and arm warmers.
As is often the case before these endurance events, I slept poorly. I had two disturbing dreams; in both I managed to oversleep and miss the start. One sequence involved a rental car -- I think a Buick -- mired window-deep in a muddy swamp.
Apparently, real oversleeping would not be a problem: Branson accidentally set the alarm for 4:30 a.m. -- an hour earlier than we’d planned to get up.
I caught a painfully slow breakfast at a nearby Waffle House -- the cook was distracted by a dozen call-in orders -- then rolled over to the start.
I chatted briefly with RBA Bethany Davison, reliving our respective adventures on the Easter fleche, then said hello to friends from former rides -- Doug from S.C., Paul from Charlotte, Kris from Asheville, Jimmy W., and Caroline on a Serotta equipped with what she called her “big girl gears,” a 53/39 combination. The head count was 16 with a couple notable no-shows, including Jerry and Rich.
Bethany puts on a well-oiled event. We rolled off at 7:01.
Now, about that mistake….
* Mistake #1. Let’s see…what am I forgetting?…. In packing up before heading down to Spartanburg, I installed the Schmidt dynohub wheel on my bike of choice, the Plastic Fantastic Fuji. I typically use the Schmidt wheel to power an E6 light on any ride that might stretch into the night hours.
I overlooked one minor detail when I switched wheels: The computer magnet.
That oversight dawned on me when I spun the front wheel to reset my computer. With no magnet to trigger the sensor, the computer remained dark.
Bottom line: 187 miles of flying without instruments. I would not have the psychological crutch of knowing how fast we were going. I’d also have to be extra vigilant for any solo navigating from the cue sheet.
* Mistake #2. Speed run to the turnaround. Bethany’s course, one of the best I’ve ridden, fell in the shadow of South Carolina’s Appalachian Mountains. We were treated to spectacular views and quiet rural roads as we rolled down one hill and up another all day long.
My bike had not seen daylight or pavement since the April 6 fleche. For the record, I pled a pipe-stopping head cold and the RUSA newsletter deadline. Truth be told, sloth also had a seat at the card table. And so I showed up without any blood in the legs.
The smart recipe would have been an easy warm-up, a moderate pace, then bring it home on the last 20 miles, which are mercifully flat.
I was not prepared for the 19-plus ride time average we posted on the way to the 93-mile turnaround. I knew we were going out fast, but with no computer I had no idea how fast.
Don’t you just love the allegiances that develop as the ride progresses?
For the first two hours, Branson and I fell in with the lead group, which included Jimmy and Kris K. Jimmy is the guy who navigated us home on the High Point 200K.
Kris, who works at Biowheels in Asheville, has Rockabilly Sideburns and Racing Legs. He is delightful riding company, but he is not a man to be trifled with in the hills. Several times he whipped the pace into a froth.
Kris had his brand new carbon Look out for its maiden voyage. The bike had exactly 29 feet on its odometer -- 29 feet being the distance across Biowheel’s shop floor to Kris’ car.
“I was still adjusting the seat in the parking lot,” Kris joked as we clipped along at a feverish pace. A New England transplant, Kris recounted the painful joys of Saunders Whittlsey’s famously impenetrable dirt road randonnée.
* Mistake #3. Nor any drop to drink. The Holly Springs control fell at mile 55. Call it pilot error, but I did not replenish my water bottles there, thinking I was good for the final 30 miles. Wrong. As we got rolling again, I realized I had only one bottle left.
Branson and I, who’d dropped off the pace for a pit stop in Marietta, caught up with the front group about 8 miles after the control. They’d suffered a crash when a rider’s seatpost binder snapped. He collected two other riders when he went down. Two would have to be sagged in.
We continued on and the front group swept us up on Shady Grove Road, one of the hillier sections on the course. Kris and a guy in a Yoo-Hoo jersey amped up the pace as we neared the turnaround. Call it Battle Rattle. Rather than drop off and ride alone, I did my best to hang in there.
My legs eventually burst into flames and radioed out a five-alarm distress call. I lost contact with the group about three miles from the control.
By the time I got in at 12:20 or so, my water bottles were dry. Me, too. A classic case of dehydration.
I hunkered down at a McDonalds and tried to collect my wits. When Kris and Branson came to get me, I looked the boys square in the eye: “I’ve been sick for the last week,” I told them, “and if you don’t like that excuse, I got a couple more where that came from.”
Kris smiled from sideburn to sideburn. He’d obviously heard that kind of sandbagging before.
Kris and Branson and Jimmy attempted to gather me up for the ride in. Nothing doing. I was dragging up even the smallest ramps. I drifted back, back, back. When Branson turned around at a stop sign, I waved him on. It was time for some solitary suffering.
For the next hour I crawled along, coasting down any grade that offered even the slightest gravity assist. It was a dark hour. The mental clouds loomed on an otherwise cloudless day. But I’d faced this crisis before, and I was confident I could pedal through it.
I stayed on top of the water while I waited for my legs to return, and I scaled back my ambition to stretches of 1.8 miles, 2.8 miles, 2.5 miles, clicking off the mileage at each and every turn and resetting my mental odometer. Little by little I chopped away, each turn of the crank taking another bite out of the 187-mile oak that I was trying to bring down.
Clifton, one of the riders caught up in the day’s earlier crash, passed me on Little Eastatoee Road. “We’re two-thirds of the way through,” he said. Clifton was obviously counting the miles too. He waited for me at the turn on to Highway 11 and together we made the 5-mile run to the Mobil station that served as a control on the outbound leg. I made certain that this time it was also a water stop.
Jimmy was waiting there. He’d lost contact with Kris and Branson coming through the hills. Yoo-Hoo jersey was there, too. He looked stung and was sitting on the gas pump island. He’d apparently not eaten on the way out and was now paying the price.
Jimmy, Clifton and I left together -- and I gratefully lost contact with them a half-mile up the road.
For the rest of the day, I enjoyed the freedom of a solo ride, setting my own pace, working at a comfortable output, stopping for a few pictures, ducking into a country store for another refill on water, watching the afternoon hues play off the distant mountains.
I exchanged a quick hello with two teens on a dirt bike. They slowed on their way up the road, wanting to know if I was having a good time. Why, yes I was. It was a cosmic postcard afternoon.
For a fleeting instant my internal planets lined up and my bike took me to a place that wasn’t on the cue sheet.
I rolled in at 7:30, meeting my goal of finishing in the daylight. Branson and Kris finished at 6:37 p.m., about five minutes behind Doug, who did much of the ride on 2 gears, thanks to a frayed shifter cable. Phenomenal times for all of them. Jimmy and Clifton were also in, and for the next hour, we soaked up the blood orange sun, drank double fudge Yoo-Hoos and Branson’s Belgian beer.
The war stories exhausted, Branson and I loaded the bikes on the roof, put Hank III’s “Straight to Hell” on the box and headed home.
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