On 27 Aug I competed in the 4th race in the Chainbuster endurance series. I raced the expert 6 hr solo category. These races get a pretty large turnout, with many folks racing on teams (2-3 riders mixed and same gender). There is also a 9 hr category...and all racers start together! As a consequence the first 15 minutes or so is always a sprint to avoid the clog of riders when the trail turns to singletrack. It does string things out, but seems crazy when you are maxed out in the very beginning of such a long race. I started well and felt great for the first two hours--chasing and being chased by a couple of friends who race against me in the GSC series but were racing different categories at this race. I also was only a couple minutes behind the guy leading my category. Looking at my heartrate monitor for the first time (oops!), I realized that even feeling good, I needed to throttle back or I'd never make it--it had been awhile since I'd done a 6 hr race, and my mindset (and ego) were still in 2-4 hr race duration mode. A combination of it becoming very hot, and getting behind on hydration caused me to start really suffering and thus having to slow even more. Next, my rear tire got very squishy. I made it back to the pits on 10 psi, couldn't find a leak (I run tubeless w/sealant), so pumped it up and went--that worked for about 1.5 laps and then got even worse. After stopping to inflate the tire on the trail, I started to think about putting tube in, but finally the leak really manifested itself as sealant began to spew out. By stopping and facing the leak downward, I got it sealed and rolled on. About 4.5 hours into the race I began to feel a little more energetic, and picked up the pace and finished pretty strong although my arms were very sore (bumpy trail) by then. I finished a pretty far behind first place managing to hold second place with 7 laps (about 61 miles), and well ahead of 3rd place who completed 6 laps.
No comments:
Post a Comment