The weather seemed to follow my fortunes. What had started out as the brightest of early spring days had sunk into an overcast gloom in the afternoon. While I finished my snack at the optional checkpoint, the rest of my crew set off ahead. I knew they had good intentions of meeting me at the next checkpoint, but I also knew that my pace wasn’t going to be fast enough for it to be worth their wait.
When I was finally ready, I set out up the road, completely alone again, but determined to simply do what I could and make it to the finish. It wasn’t a race any more, at least for me, it was just a contest of survival. And somehow, I found the shift in mindset, and the solitude, oddly soothing.
I had just started to enjoy this new-found freedom when I rounded a corner and saw the road before me sweep upward. A lot. Until it disappeared into the trees. The little cheery warmth I had felt just moments earlier was immediately extinguished. I pedaled until the grade became too much, and then took to trudging up the gravel. Up and up I went, the hill getting steeper, my legs getting tighter. I was now limping, favoring my left leg, which had decided it had the worse end of the deal. The effort was actually leaving me short of breath, and I found myself having to stop and breathe with increasing frequency.
The climb became so steep that the road switched back on itself. Twice. Every time I thought I could see the top, it seemed to turn and rise a bit more. I slowed further still. I felt like I was doing a thousand reps of one-legged squats. I started breaking the hill into 30 second sections; walk for 30, rest for 30, repeat. I heard voices. Real ones. That must be the top! I rounded another corner and looked up, and sure enough, there was a small cluster of riders, and the SAG wagon! I pushed and grunted the rest of the way to the top, laid down my bike and slumped to the ground.
I was beat. Or very nearly so. The guys in the SAG wagon asked me if I was okay, and I told them I was fighting cramps. He offered me electrolytes, but I pointed to the half-empty bottle in the cage on my bike and said I was good. In a strange way, that reset my mind. I was still going, still well-provisioned, and I still had my bike. What was more, the guy told me that this was the biggest hill in the area, and I’d just come up it. I was exhausted enough that I had to hear him explain that I got to go down the other side before it fully registered with me. I had been trudging up for nearly a mile, and that meant that at least the next mile would be down.
The SAG wagon guys took off, to go play superhero for the next beaten and discouraged rider. I stayed another couple minutes, pounding my fists on my quads to get them to relax, and sipping electrolytes. Then without even really thinking about it, I pulled my pack back on, threw a leg over my bike, and started off down the hill.
To be continued…