2001 Assault on Mt. Mitchell Report Page 2
E-mail Adam
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| Several of the
riders standing near me were talking about how George had just
come back from Europe in the last couple of days where he had a
very successful few races, winning two of them. As he walked
around, I was utterly amazed at how tall and thin he was. He
was about 6'3" tall with a very thin build. He did not have
the HUGE bulking leg muscles one would expect to see. The Start: As we all stood straddling our bikes at the starting line, they had a little prayer, which I thought was a little unusual. I guess SC is a pretty religious place. Promptly at 6:30am the ride began. My plan was to try to stick with the main group for as long as possible until they got too fast and dropped me. I wanted to save as much energy for the climbing. Realistically, I figured I might be with the group for about 40 miles at most. Then it would be a solo effort to -- and up -- the mountains. I was also a bit scared that I would get too caught up in the excitement and go too hard in the beginning and not have anything left for the part I actually liked most… climbing. I tried not to worry and just went with the flow. In any bike ride or race, a large group of riders that ride close together is known as a peleton. I'm sure in French it means something, but I was never big on French. Riding in the peleton is like being on a huge freight train. It winds and whisks its way down the road as a single giant undulating form. The peleton has tremendous momentum as it rolls though the countryside and around sharp turns. Individualism in the peleton is dangerous in this tightly packed group. Stopping and slowing this single entity is very difficult and each person has to be very alert to all activity around them. If one person does not pay attention and follow the group, they could cause a catastrophe that would domino to the many riders that follow. In our peleton, you would occasionally hear riders shouting out warnings to those around them, "slowing", "stopping", "gravel", "rocks", and "hole". As we rode through the rolling hills I could see the front of the peleton about a quarter to a half-mile ahead being strung along by a police motorcycle escort. Our peleton would generally be two or three riders wide taking up only the right hand lane on the desolate roads of North and South Carolina. Sometimes, however, the half mile length of our peleton would compact itself down to half its size as riders got antsy and occupied the on coming lane of traffic making us 6 riders wide. Inevitably, you would hear slightly panicked shouts of, "CAR UP". The peleton would then slow down and stretch back out as we all shuffled back to make a more elongated form, fitting back into our one lane. I felt like I was on a freight train that was not going to stop for anything. For the first few miles, I was afraid of loosing the group so I kept my legs on notice to spring forward with a burst of speed to catch up if it appeared I were being "dropped." As a result my heart rate was a lot higher than I would expect as the adrenaline ran through me. My senses were always at a heightened state of alert and I think this made me more tired than the pedaling. We passed things that I recognized from two years ago, although this time they seemed to come and go a lot more quickly than the last. Looking down at my speedometer it was obvious why; we were averaging 24 mph in the first 20 miles alone. On flat sections we would cruise at about 30 mph. I saw a few people stop to pee as we rolled along and I knew that if it took them too long they would not be catching back up to this train. All of a sudden it dawned on me that I too would eventually have to stop to pee, and I if I did, that would be the end of my free ride. I always drink a lot on rides and as a result I stop a lot on rides. Right then I decided not to drink too much to delay any stops for as long as possible. In the beginning of the ride, my stomach had a small pain in it. I started to worry that it might become a bigger problem towards the end. It eventually went away and I felt fine. I started the ride with four Cliff bars and I would finish the ride with them. I ended up getting my calories from a flask of yummy Vanilla Bean flavored Gu. I ended up taking about 500-600 calories out of this. I just could not stomach anything more. In the end not eating worked out O.K., because I never really did feel out of energy. I also took 4 salt tablets over the course of the ride. At about mile 45 we rode uphill at a place called Bill's Mountain. The short steep hills here caused the peleton to shrink as several riders could not keep up with the group. At each successive hill in the ride, the peleton got smaller and smaller as riders dropped off the rear. People who stopped to pee were also left behind. As the miles pilled up, the peleton shrank. My bladder started to request relief but I did not want to get off the train and be left behind. I decided it would be a good time to stop and pee when we got to the steep climbing at about mile 80. At that point the peleton would likely be reduced to individual riders climbing for their own survival. |