Stage 3

"Race results live on Google forever."'

For as bad as my racing was on Saturday, Sunday was worse. To make a long story short, I DNF'd. It was the first time I've ever dropped out of any race. According to Weather Underground, the temperature at the race start was about 95F, with humidity about 50% (so, heat index 105F)!

I felt reasonably recovered after Saturday; I knew I wasn't fresh, but I certainly didn't feel bad. I drank plenty of water prior to the race, and I still went through a warmup (although I did cut it back a bit). I tried to hold back a little at the start. I put in one semi-hard effort at the beginning of the race. Basically the group split very early and I was in the wrong half of the split, so I bridged up to the front group. I didn't feel like that effort put me in too much difficulty.

About 2/3 of the way through the lap, I started feeling really bad. I couldn't develop much power and I wasn't able to focus. Shortly after that I felt a few chills. At that point, I rode at a fairly easy pace and called it quits once I got to the start/finish area. I was convinced (and still am) that I would have crashed badly (or worse) if I'd continued on. I'm disappointed that I DNF'd, but I still think it was probably the right decision.

So, what happened? Probably a combination of racing on Saturday and the heat. We haven't really had many hot days this Spring, so the heat and humidity were a bit of a shock this weekend. On the other hand, a bunch of other people raced both days in the same weather I did. In hindsight, I wonder if I would have been better off drinking some kind of sports drink during the race rather than plain water (or, maybe I should have taken my gel sooner?). I tried sports drink once before during a race and I didn't like it, it sort of congealed in my mouth and then I didn't have any plain water to rinse it out. Maybe I didn't really drink enough water prior to the race, but I think that I did.

Anyway, I'm glad that weekend is behind me. I've got to do a little work on the bike, thanks to the Saturday short track crash: my rear derailleur is broken and my rear wheel is out of true. The next race I'm doing is the Stony Creek Marathon, just three weeks away. Last year, this was a hot one too.