With a start time of 6:30 a.m., Sandy and I set sail from Heather Farms Park in Walnut Creek for a day we'd never forget.
I started out feeling really sluggish. Likely due to the "Power Week" of workouts I had endured leading up to Saturday's ride. A brief recap: Last Tuesday was my first time to reach the Junction at Mount Diablo (a goal I had been plotting and aiming for the last few weeks - and with the extra push and encouragement from teammate Chris just a few turns away, I reached the Junction and felt incredibly proud to have made it!).
Wednesday, I did a 70-minute run with Phil ~ 50 minutes of which were at my tempo pace. I really upped the ante by increasing my speed for our 1 mile: 1 minute run/walk intervals - in order to average out to a 9:41 mins/mile pace. One of my run intervals even averaged out to a 9:01 (which Marathon Team 2009 Maria would have never believed). [Run Stats]
Thursday, my legs came through for me again - and helped me to complete a 50-minute hard spin on the bike (with Nate and Phil), followed by a 20-minute road run. By night's end, my legs were feeling like bricks for sure.
I took Friday off to get situated and ready for Saturday's big event. With an ill-timed day of stress at work, I came home late with the plan to stretch out my tired muscles; replenish my supply of Gatorade (I'd already gone through one of those 9-gallon powder tubs); mentally prepare and find my focus to tackle the ride; and host Sandy at my house for the night (so she could avoid a painfully early wake-up call and a long drive to the East Bay from Marin). So instead, we both woke up at the dark hour of 4:30 a.m. Saturday morning.
So. To the story of the ride.
With a new temporary tattoo to sport on the arm [one that meant Dream], I felt ready to take on the beast that was 8,732 vertical feet of climbing and infamous (not to mention, foreboding) hills known to Bay Area cyclists as Grizzly Peak, The 3 Bears, Pig Farm, and Reliez Valley Road - also including Mount Diablo and the steep climbs and descents along Skyline Blvd in Oakland.
By Mile 2 of the ride, we were already on the slow ascent up Mount Diablo. Although it was very familiar territory (and home of our Tuesday night rides), my body just felt tired. Tired, heavy -- like lead (and therefore, hardly iron). It wasn't a huge shock, but more so frustrating and disappointing to me. Sandy had taken off and it would be the last time I'd see her during the ride. I was all by myself to climb and focus.
The first thought that came to me was - why did I work so hard on the workouts this week? And should I have? The thing is -- I did exactly what was on the training calendar. Coach Dave warned us we'd have a tough week, culminating in the Century Ride. But I just couldn't help but question HOW we could put our bodies (particularly our legs) through all those hard runs and bricks and bike rides AND be ready to ride 100 miles (most of which were on hills). I was baffled, behind the pack and anxious. My heart rate wasn't even going up as high as it normally does, before I found myself tired and sweating up the hill.
One cyclist passed me on the way up (just a few turns shy of the Junction) and told me he saw a few others with the same bike jersey behind me. It was the second wave of us ~ the faster cyclists on the Team, who planned to start an hour later. I told this kind stranger, "We've got a long day, so I'm taking it nice and easy for the beginning". He responded, "You've got stronger legs than me!" It's funny; I didn't believe him at the time -- especially as he breezed on past me. But I remembered those words.
I saw Dana taking it nice and slow too, and then caught up to Tiffany, who'd reach the Junction for her first time. It was good to see a few familiar faces and it reminded me I wasn't entirely alone on the ride. I reached the Junction for the second time this week and felt accomplished. Still sluggish, but proud. I took the op to use the clean restroom and stretch out my IT bands (had some slight twinges in my knees). And to my delight, saw Captain Les and Jen when I got back to my bike outside the restroom. We decided to descend the South Side of Diablo together, and it was great to have the company.
It wasn't before long that we entered into Danville, and hit some horrible road conditions and potholes the size of craters. I knew they were there (so could anticipate them). What I didn't prepare for was that my Garmin would fly off the handle. Literally - my Garmin (bike computer/hr monitor/accomplice on all my rides) launched from my handlebars, along with the mounting piece that kept it on the bike in the first place! The roads were that bumpy. Once I got my bearings and could pull over to a safe part of the road, I walked my bike back to where I thought it had landed, praying a car didn't drive over it. To my good fortune, I found it in one piece and re-affixed it to my bars. Unfortunately though, I thought I had lost my cycling buddies again.
Not far up the road, I saw Les and Jen again, who had slowed down so I could catch up. It was a really nice gesture and soon, my spirits were back up so I could enjoy the company and move on from the feelings of doubt (from the previous climb) and mild panic (from the flying Garmin incident). Into San Ramon we went, through some interesting parts of Crow Canyon Road. I hadn't realized that the road actually has some elevation to it.
During a climb along the busy street, as I went to shift gears, my pedals locked. LOCKED! I couldn't push my foot forward and was stuck with nowhere to go but down. No room or opportunity to coast since I was going uphill. My reaction time wasn't enough to clip out of the pedals; and my only gut instinct was to avoid falling in whatever way I could. Rather than panic (which wasn't too far off from my psyche, mind you), I instead diverted my bike toward the curb so I could intentionally fall into a bush! Comical now, and even then, amidst the Saturday morning traffic in San Ramon, I'm sure it looked hysterical from a driver's perspective ~ but I was just SO relieved I didn't hit asphalt in that spot. Yet I was still left worried thinking I had just broken my bike somehow. I mean, I couldn't pedal, for goodness' sake!
Les and Jen hadn't noticed this mishap and rode off into the distance. I was alone again. I held back my worries and calmly unclipped from the pedals (after picking myself up from the bush) and walked my bike over to a safer part of the road. I didn't have any kind of phone with me, and had I waited for someone to come, it probably would have taken a good half an hour to forty-five minutes. So I brushed off what nerves I had, and attempted to inspect my bike and see what was up. Turns out, I think the chain must have gotten stuck in between the two rings. I tinkered around a bit on the side of the road and manually shifted the gears and somehow got it to work again! In reality, that whole ordeal probably took all of 4-5 minutes, but it felt like an eternity to me because I couldn't predict how this would turn out.
Got my bearings and had to start on an uphill, but I went for it. Back on the road! Shortly after, I kept my eye out for Alcosta Road. And I completely missed the turn. It's not that I didn't see it, but it was just too busy a street to try and cut across 3-4 lanes of traffic by myself to make a left turn. I would have hated to try and backtrack, so lucky for me, there was a crosswalk at the intersection, which I improvised and used to my advantage. My mind was now telling me, "Maria, today might just not be your day". But before I could even finish the sentence in my head, the iron angel on my shoulder said, "You know what? Today is going to be a long day. Anything can happen, and you just need to put everything that's happened behind you. Just put it behind you and keep moving forward."
Eventually, my solo stint took me to the very first water stop -- at Shannon Park in Dublin, which is a very familiar location to me. I had assumed I'd be the only one straggling in and wasn't even sure if I wanted to stop because I felt I was losing time between feeling tired, moving more slowly and having to deal with the pedal-lock situation. Before I made the turn, good ol' Chris caught up to me. The same teammate who saw me conquer the Junction days before, came up out of nowhere and asked me how I was doing. "Tired," I told him. "And it's not like me to be this tired so early." "Well you look great and you're breathing fine," he said nonchalantly. He said it in a tone that was so no-big-deal and not nearly as HUGE as it was inside my own head. His cool attitude was refreshing, and I was baffled as to how differently he could see my ride than how I saw it. That I was actually doing just fine.
We pulled up at the water stop together and to my surprise, I saw a slew of my teammates there. BK, Rocky, Jim, Carol, Janice, Marina, Melissa, Coach Mike, Coach Simon, Mentor Michelle, and even Cori (who, although injured, was there to support and be in our roving SAG). I was elated! It was then that most of my worrisome feelings from the two hours prior slowly started to melt away, because after seeing my teammates and joining them back on the road (even if I'd lose some along the way), I felt ready to get back out there.
After topping off my aero bottle with water and popping a salt tab, I followed Carol, Janice, Marina, Melissa and Tiffany out to Castro Valley. And of course, we were greeted with our next set of climbs. Marina kept a great cadence climbing up the hill, so I took the opportunity to follow her and try to match her rhythm. I moved faster up that hill by following her and surprised myself. Janice, Tiffany and Carol hung back a bit and soon, it was Marina, Melissa and I for the better part of Schaefer Ranch Road. After a mild descent, we came up on a stretch of road that was pancake-flat. As a tail-wind hit, I was thankful for my own second wind. From there to the next water stop, I gunned it for about 5 miles. I got into the aero position and felt like I was flying. I had now been fully warmed up. My warm-up took 3 hours :) But MAN was it worth it! As the girls and I caught up to the water stop by the tennis courts, it was just in time to re-fill my 4-hour bottle with a new batch of electrolyte replacement fluid. This was my first time to carry ziplock bags of fuel (mixed Carbo-Pro and Gatorade powder) with me in my jersey, so I split them up into 2-hour bags (to avoid unnecessary bunching up and lopsidedness). I also carried all my Endurolyte salt tabs (about 30 of them); two packs of Shot Bloks and some spare GUs.
Another potty break (which kept me confident about my hydration) and we were off to hit Redwood Road. Coach Mike joined us and swept the course, riding along with Carol, Tiffany and Janice. I tried my best to hang and stay with Marina and Melissa, as Captain Nick sped off into the distance.
Our East Bay course later took us into the hidden nooks of Oakland and Berkeley, including THE most scenic views of the San Francisco Bay you will ever see, along the appropriately-named Skyline Blvd.
I couldn't soak in the view for too long as we had business to do on the hills. But I pumped my way through, leapfrogging with Marina and Mel. I climbed Grizzly Peak, thinking it was one of the "3 Bears" (misleading) and pulled over for another rest stop tucked away in one of the Oakland Parks. We were now about 6 hours into the ride and Melissa, Marina and I were in awe of how long we had already been out on the road and how much we had climbed. I asked which of the Bears was up next and Melissa politely responded, "Oh we haven't even reached 3 Bears yet! That was GRIZZLY".
A few descents and sharp turns got me to practice more countersteering (by now I was questioning if my brakes were still good). And up a few more pitchy climbs got me working hard and my mind slipping in and out of delirium. It got to the point where I would be wearing thin on the mental front. After I'd approach the top of a hill, I craved to just pull over and take a break. But sure enough, as I'd start to feel that weariness, a water stop would be parked along the side of the road, propelling me to go further and hold off on a solo stop just so I could make it to our volunteers who were waiting for me with open arms and comforting words. One key water stop was where Honoree Laura Warren was posted. Her presence is always so special at our workouts. Not only because she's such a prominent reminder of our Cause and why it's important to keep going even in the tough moments, but because she has one of the kindest and sweetest dispositions I've ever encountered from a water stop "volunteer"! My mind has been a blur on many occasions, arriving at Laura's water stops in the past. And without fail, the woman always makes it a point to fill up my water bottle(s), relieve me of any trash or empty wrappers, and give me the look of "thank you for doing this" that all my negative (or in Saturday's case potentially negative) thoughts just dissipate. I am able to go on. And that was one of the BEST things about this ride in particular. Everytime I felt the onset of anxiety, doubt, fear, worry or exhaustion, I came upon a water stop or a teammate or reminder that helped to break up the ride so that I could carry on and not hit that wall or point of no return that I'd experienced in the past (during rides like Clearlake and the first Tour of the East Bay Alps last month). I saw some real mental growth and progress, in addition to the physical. And it was astounding.
After departing Laura's water stop (and being given a 2x caffeine tangerine PowerBar gel from Coach Dave - which instantly took me out of my 'sleepy state'), Melissa; Marina, Susie and I set sail for Tilden Park, Wildcat Canyon and Inspiration Point. It's remarkable ~ because I've seen many of these places before but not from a cyclist's point of view. I have such an appreciation now for terrain, road conditions, traffic laws :) and the views that give you little peeks and glimpses of the breathtaking scenery and homes tucked away in the hills.
A long and speedy descent down the Canyon came to a halt at Bear Creek Road, in the town of Orinda. I recognized this area all too well: It was home to 5-6 days of crew practice back at Saint Mary's during my undergrad. I rode by Briones Reservoir but back in 2002 neglected to realize THIS was where the 3 Bears were hiding.
Susie had trailed off and decided to turn back early. Marina had been a few miles up ahead of me; and Melissa and I parted ways back at Tilden so she was behind me by a few miles and it would be the last time I'd have company along for the ride. I was on my own again, and ready to brave the bears. Just in time for the sun to really come out at full force.
I was diligent about my 200-calorie intake per hour, and took in about 3 Endurolytes an hour. When I was sick of the liquid, I moved on to Shot Bloks (and relied on the little boosts of caffeine they gave me). Despite the heat really starting to show itself, I trudged on, confident that my fuel, salt and water would take me as far as I needed and wanted to go.
Coach Dave breezed by in his car screaming, "Kick Papa Bear's ass!" I smiled and it made me happy to know I still HAD the capacity to smile that big and genuine at 7 hours into the ride. Truth be told, I thought I counted 4 bears instead of 3 (as I regaled this story to my brother, he told me that must have been Goldilocks). A little tired and warm, I recovered just fine on the final downhill -- just in time for ANOTHER wonderful water stop that almost seemed like a mirage that magically appeared. And it was my two favorite Ironwifeys: Claudia (Rocky's wife) and Meenu (Chris' wife). They've always got the biggest smiles on their faces and the most encouraging words to say, especially since they too are TNT Alums. I didn't need much from their stop (which was complete with salty ruffled chips, cookies, "Meenu Bars" which are a delicacy on our Team, M&Ms, and much more). I just wanted to pull over, thank them for being there, and top off the ol' aero bottle again. I couldn't resist taking one of the frosted little animal circus cookies (ohhh they are so good!), before wiping the little sweat from my brow and getting ready for the next big climb. Coach Dave was posted up at this stop too and said to get going - to which my response was Alright, bring it! I really felt unstoppable. Naturally, a little tired from the long day of being out under the sun and working away ~ but it was like everything had been aligned again. My nutrition, my physical preparedness to take on the hills, and my mental state were all where they needed to be. It felt like a significantly different ride from 6:30 this morning. If you had told me while I was climbing Diablo that my ride would have taken me here (in all respects of the phrase) and that I was actually PUMPED to climb Pig Farm after Grizzly Peak, Wildcat Canyon and the 3 Bears, I'd have laughed in your face. And now I'm eating my own words, and couldn't be happier.
A little background on Pig Farm: Our team had two rides up this hill this season. And I wouldn't even call it a hill. It's more like a wall of concrete (and I have definitely seen a few of those in my day), with a dip in the middle and then it shoots straight up. I'd heard stories of teammates traumatized by this hill. Some had to physically get off their bikes and walk it. Others found themselves burnt out from trying to take it on. And what's my story, you ask? I've never done it. Circumstantial, I suppose. The first time IronTeam faced it in January, I was still learning how to ride my bike. The second time was part of the Louie Bonpua Tri, where I had a defective shifter and could only ride in my small ring on the bike. I had actually ridden the hill from the other direction (or the 'front side' on the way out to Martinez, and descended the backside, which left ME traumatized by the descent and happy to have made it down in one piece). That should give you a picture of how steep this thing is.
I looked ahead and tried to anticipate when I'd approach the infamous Pig Farm hill. Just as I started inspecting my Garmin data and determining when to take my next salt tablet, I started to feel a little ascend and my legs started to work. "Hm, a 'surprise' hill possibly, before the BIG one?" It was a steep little bugger and my heart rate spiked up to a 168, but I just thought to myself to keep pushing up that hill. No matter what. A little reprieve and another big push (which was reminiscent of basically the whole ride; I'd climb and enjoy the little flattER sections and let-ups where I could, then brace myself for the next one). I could then see the hill leveled out and my heart rate slowly came down again. Phew! I thought. That was a bit of a toughie, but if I can do that, I can certainly do Pig Farm. Now where is it? Just as I had collected my bearings atop that hill, I saw a farm to the right side of the road. "PIGS FOR SALE", it read. Oh. My. Gosh. I just climbed up Pig Farm and didn't even realize it. There was a car coming up behind me with some loud, upbeat music playing. I smiled and thought it was a SAG car and whoever was in it was celebrating with me. Turns out, it wasn't anyone I knew ~ but the timing worked out perfectly because from where I stood, there was certainly reason to celebrate.
Down the roads I went, speeding up and hangin' in the big ring all the way through to some residential roads tucked away in Pleasant Hill. A long stretch of the road was very familiar to me as I rode it during the Louie Tri and I even recalled the parts of the road and little sidestreets I'd have to stop at to fuel, since back then I couldn't eat and drink on the bike.
Little did I know, I was headed for a place called "Reliez Valley Road". To add insult to injury, it was actually harder than Pig Farm. And I have a feeling, the majority of the Team didn't really see it coming either. I huffed and puffed and spiked to 164 bpm again climbing the hill. And when I got a chance to normalize my breathing again, it was just enough to let out a laugh. What else you got for us, Coaches??, I smiled to myself. This was just about the toughest, hilliest course -- nevermind the fact that it was 100 miles long. And we were just greeted with hill after hill after hill. After hill. Again, the fact that I could still smile and my humor was very much intact was a GOOD sign.
Headed to Olympic Blvd in Walnut Creek (more familiar territory) I was in the mindset I was now home-free. My Garmin read over 9 hours and 30 minutes of elapsed time out on the road and the rest would be all gravy. I was ready to make the turn from Pleasant Hill Road to Olympic when I saw another water stop peeking out from the right side of the road. It was IronTeam alums Mike T and Tami (both of which have finished Ironman Louisville). Hi! I said. I'm just a few turns away, right? Yep, said Mike D. You've got a small handful of turns, another hill and then it'll take you back to Heather Farms. I'm going to pretend I didn't just hear that. Another hill? Mike reassured me that it was nothing compared to everything I'd already climbed. But the mere mention of the word almost set me off my rocker. Tami also chimed in, saying all the hill training we're lucky to have in the Bay Area is going to come in really handy for the Louisville rollers. Once again, I found myself teetering awfully close to the point of Tourette's, but rather than let myself go there (and thanks to these specially strategically-placed water stops), I had ZERO encounters with my dark place. Woohoo!!
Bound for Tice Valley Rd, i.e. the last of the 'climbs', I was soon back on Ygnacio Valley Rd and oh-so close to the park I had seen over 10 hours ago. I could taste it, I was so close. Onto the Canal Trail I went ~ again, the site of my Brenda Donato 5K PR! I hauled ass like there was no tomorrow. According to my Garmin, that last section had me going at a speed of 17-19 mph on the final stretch. Again, I was a woman determined.
Before I knew it, I was back at the parking lot, pulling in quietly and before anyone could really notice. It was then that I recalled the words of that cyclist about ninety miles ago. He said I had stronger legs than him. Now, whether or not that's a factual statement I'm not so sure. But to go from where I had started to how far I had reached and how much I had accomplished in over 9 hours on the bike and over 10 hours out on the bike course in total ~ I was without doubt or even a question in my mind that my legs, as well as my body, mind and will were much stronger and powerful after all.
***
Week #35 Workout Summary:
Swim: 0 hours and 0 minutes
Bike: 12 hours and 0 minutes
Run: 1 hours and 30 minutes
Core/Strength: 0 hours and 30 minutes
Total Workout: 14 hours and 0 minutes
YOU are a phenomenal woman, indeed! Congrats, M Dot. xoxo- Iron Mel
ReplyDeletewho hoo! Great writeup!
ReplyDelete