In my last blog posting, I mentioned the fact that I have been working diligently on my fundraising for CAF. Needless to say, this is almost like a second job. I’ve been staying up late, getting up early (to listen to the Scott and BR Show), and visiting the downtown businesses for auction items during my lunch hour or before and after work. You may be asking, wow, when does he find time to train? Well, that’s the problem.Since I have been busy fundraising, I have been neglecting my weekly training schedule. Because it was a recovery week anyway, I figured that I could use Sunday’s ride as a springboard and get back on track and ramp up with the rest of the QMDC crew and XX1090 Scott and BR radio contestants. Unfortunately, other factors came into play this week that severely limited my ability to ramp up in time for Sunday’s ride.
I decided to hold another fundraiser Friday at my company. I blended fresh smoothies during the lunch hour for everyone. I made 88 smoothies that consisted of frozen berries, yogurt, orange juice, and bananas. I must say, they were pretty awesome. Then on Saturday, we celebrated our daughter’s 4th birthday party. It was a great time and I spent my day outside at the park playing with a bunch of kids hyped up on cupcakes, cake, and juice boxes. If only you could harness all of that energy.
Since we were making cupcakes for my daughter’s birthday party, we decided to make some extras to sell at a bake sale during our neighborhood walkabout in order to help raise awareness and money for the Challenged Athletes Foundation. The South Park Walkabout is where the local businesses open their doors to their neighbors and invite everyone in for music, food, and good fun. During the week I also went around to South Park businesses to get gift certificates or products to put in a raffle basket. I raffled off the basket during the bake sale and it was a pretty good success. I would like to thank the following businesses for their donations that helped raise over $200 for CAF.Grants Marketplace, Ginseng Yoga, The Daily Scoop on Juniper, Champagne Taste, Pixie Salon, South Bark Dog Wash, Mazara’s Trattoria, Plum Pottery, Citizen Video, Clarity Soap & Candles, Laila Salon, Pista Palace Bike Shop, and Icing on the Cake.
By the time Sunday rolled around, I was thoroughly wiped out, but still looking forward to the ride called “Kitchen Creek” in Pine Valley. It is my friend’s favorite ride and since he loves to climb, I knew I was in for some serious pain. Because Pine Valley is about an hour east of downtown San Diego, I had to get up pretty early and head out at dawn. Unfortunately, I overestimated the drive and wound up in Pine Valley at about 6:07am, with a 7am start time. Bummer. I keep thinking about what I could have done with that extra half-hour of sleep.
Soon, others started to arrive and we all settled in to our usual and customary habits of pre-ride prep. After getting geared up and ready to roll, Jim Carbaugh (last year's contest winner)gathered all of the Scott and BR radio contestants around for the Bike Pump Immunity Challenge. This has typically been a test where we are asked a series of questions about the Scott and BR Show or the Challenged Athletes Foundation. Then the contestant that answers the most questions correctly gets the pump for a week and has the obligation to add something to it.
This week was a little different. Jim told us that we were going to be doing a track stand in which each rider would have to stay balanced on their bike in one spot and whoever could do in the longest, would win this week’s challenge. Some of the riders had never done a track stand before, so I showed them how to do one. After balancing for a little while, I guess everyone decided that I could do it pretty well and no one challenged me for the pump, so I won. It will be fun to add my touch to the Immunity Pump and I already have a few ideas in mind.
When they called for everyone to get in their groups, I remembered that I had made a promise to myself to try and hang with Group 1 as long as I could, knowing that I could always drop back down to Group 2 if I needed to. Little did I know at that time that I would drop a little further than just Group 2. When everyone was ready, we were off.
The beginning of the ride heads east on Old Highway 80 out of Pine Valley to Sunrise Highway. Dale and Fred in the handcycles headed left and we headed right, to the famous “Kitchen Creek” loop. Kitchen Creek is an old fire access road that is well paved, but closed to traffic. After about a couple miles on the main road, you soon pass a locked gate that leads you to a secluded section of road that climbs up Mount Laguna with 3,500+ feet of elevation. About a mile before this section is where I was dropped by Group 1. I bonked pretty hard.
Basically from this point on, I was in survival mode. My body was shutting down and my legs just didn’t want to pedal any longer. I couldn’t just quit so I kept on going. I was sucking down water like a fish and it was at this point that I realized that during the previous day, I hadn’t drunken any water all day except for some coke, tea, and coffee (all caffeinated beverages which speeds up dehydration). This coupled with no training all week led me to feeling pretty depleted of everything I needed to tackle this grueling ride.
I finally pedaled my way up to the top of Kitchen Creek and met the Sag Wagon (WOW). Dan was there offering us his usual good cheer, food, and water. I really needed a lot of food and was able to choke down a few pretzels and part of a food bar. I also ate an apple in just a few bites. Then I was off again with some of the Group 2 riders.
I suddenly found myself slipping off the back of this group but was able to catch up to them at the local store at the top of Sunrise Highway. I bumped into a friend of a friend, Frank, who was wearing a polka dot jersey. We exchanged a few words before I suddenly had to excuse myself and fall behind again. Once you bonk, you can’t really recover. All you can do is hang on and keep a steady pace and pray that the ride will end soon.
Luckily, there was a rider in back of me, so I decided to wait and hopefully work together with him the rest of the ride. It was Mike Henderson. He had his helmet camera on and if he got any video of me, you can probably see the pain written all over my face. Mike and I hung together for the rest of the ride. It was the longest ride of my life.
Mike is a great guy to talk to and we soon found ourselves exchanging stories. I learned that he was in the Army which is where he met his wife of 23 years. He has traveled all over the world and has a down to earth quality about him. Suddenly, the ride didn’t seem to be so long and we soon found ourselves whipping through the twisty turns of Highway 79 and then on to old highway 80 towards Pine Valley. It was here that I started cramping due to dehydration and lack of proper nutrition. Mike was a trooper and stayed with me all the way back to the finish area. Thanks Mike.
Once back at my car, I quickly dumped water on my head, sucked down another bottle of water, changed into clean clothes, and then headed into the diner for some serious food. Unfortunately, the place was packed, so Kevin and I decided to head to a local taco shop on the way back to San Diego. I had to get back so my wife could work on a consulting project, and since the taco shop was on the way back home, we stopped for a quick bite. I found this little (now expanded) taco shop several years ago when mountain biking in Cuyamaca. The people there are always nice, the service is fast, and the food is awesome. Kevin started busting out his Spanish and soon had the girl behind the counter laughing. I didn’t even know that he spoke Spanish.
After eating as fast as I could, I headed back home to hopefully recover from the ride and watch the kids so my wife could work on a project she had. I felt pretty bad the rest of the day but finally started to feel better towards the evening time. Next week should be interesting because we have more hill training with some Torrey Pines hill repeats. I hope I recover in time.
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