This is part three in a five part series, I have written about my experience with training, racing and the adventures of 24 Hours in the Old Pueblo in 2023.
Part 3 The Race-Saturday
The best thing about 24 Hours in the Old Pueblo is the start time. It starts at noon. This means I can sleep in AND eat a huge breakfast with plenty of time to drink my morning coffee and to chill and relax. I carbed up with rice, sweet potatoes and had some eggs for protein.
As I was eating my breakfast the prerace nerves started to settle in. My prerace nerves around 24 hours is always the same, just get through the first lap and then settle into your pace and groove out for the race. I always get a bit nervous about making it through the bitches on the first lap.
The bitches is a series of 4 or 5 rollers, that you can really catch a lot of speed on going down and then some steep pitches up. There’s a few that have some kickers, so if you hit them just right you will definitely catch some air. Its a rutted out jeep trail so you either want to take the line either to the left or the right of the road. On the first lap because of the congestion, you are pretty committed to one side the entire. There’s always crashes here on the first lap.
After finishing breakfast brother and I got the table set up outside for quick exchanges between laps. We went through nutrition and lap plans one last time.
Then it was time to walk down to the start. At 11:00am you have to check in and receive your race “baton” which you show in the exchange tent each time you come for a lap. After checking in for the race. Brother and I made our way over to figure out where he would be handing me my bike.
Handing me my bike? Why yes, because racing your bike for 24 hours isn’t enough, there is a ¼ mile Les Mans run start to get to your bike, then grab it it and be on your way.
Then it’s the quarter mile walk up to the start of the run. And then stand and wait for 20 minutes until the start. I had a little bit different strategy this year then I had in the past. The last two year I started more toward the back with a slow jog. Last year I got caught up on the first lap in the singletrack in a Congo line of riders. I didn’t want that to happen again, so I was going to go out faster and a bit more aggressive. Which meant start near the front of the run start and run as fast as I could to my bike. Then go as fast as I could to get a proper line going into the bitches.
Standing around waiting for the start of the race as everyone lines up, the prerace vibes are magical and exciting and energetic. I instantly forget my nerves and am caught up in the magic of the 24 HOP. There’s at least 5 drones flying above us in the air. I found a friend the Bay Area and we chatted it up until the race was ready to start.
“BANG! Bang!” The shotgun went off and shortly I find myself running. Instantly, I’m like “Wow, this is hard, why is running so hard. I can’t see where the run ends because it’s just a mass of people for the entire time. I’m trying to look for the white tent so I can see the end in sight for the run. But I can’t see the tent. “Damn I am out of running shape, it shouldn’t be this hard”
“Oh look there’s a guy in a cat speedo! Haha that must be fun to ride a mountain bike in a speedo. I don’t remember running being this hard last year. Was that because I was jogging last year?” All of a sudden I realize I’m amidst the mass of the bike handoffs. I never saw the white tent but I guess I made it. I flag my brother down as I run towards him and he hands me my bike.
Once I get my bike the crowd funnels and things slow down for a good three minutes before I can actually hop on my bike and get to pedaling. Brother caught a great video of the entire start.
Once things open up and I’m able to get into my race pace, I see one of my friends on the side of the road cheering me on, I wave and yell out “Hi” to her. She’s on a 5 man relay team.
Ok focus on getting to and over the bitches. I glance down quickly at my bike computer and notice the power isn’t picking up. I had calibrated the power meter earlier in the morning and it was working just fine. Strange, well I can’t mess with it now. We’ll deal with that later. When I get to the bitches I find that there’s actually great spacing between riders and there’s no chaos or bunching up that I had seen in the past. This is great! Smooth sailing over the bitches.
We quickly get to singletrack and again there’s no congestion, and I’m able to settle into my own pace immediately. Wow, how did I get so lucky, is it just that I got far enough in front there isn’t any congestion. OR what if I’m all the way in the back? Maybe I was really slow and all the racers are in front of me. Regardless it makes for a great first lap and I’m in my groove much earlier then anticipated.
How do you race a 24 race? You may ask. Well I break it down into 3 races. The first portion of daylight 6.5 hours, the second the night hours, and lastly the next day of daylight. My strategy is to go hard on the first 6.5 hours, as I naturally slow down in the dark and the night becomes an adequate pacer for me for 24hrs as I can never really go pass my limits in the dark, as visibility just slows me down. So the goal is to pound the first 5 laps out. 5 laps before 7pm. I’ll pit quickly after lap 2 to pick up bottles and then after lap 4 a quick pit for a bottle, bike lights, and knee and arm warmers.
About 8 miles in I go for a pass on the singletrack. ” YIKES OUCH”. All of a sudden I have a sharp sensation of 1000 needles piercing my hand and my arm. Looking down, I realize I’m been attacked by the infamous cholla cactus. I barely brushed up against it, or so I thought, but from the looks of it it appears I punched it and came out with a hand and arm full of cacti and needles. I shake my arm to try to rid of any cacti and needles I can loosen. The big pieces come off my gloved hand.
“Ouch” I hear the guy yell behind me. I hope he’s only commenting on my cholla encounter and not that I incidentally flung cacti back onto him. Sorry.
My whole hand and arm feel like I’ve been stung by a swarm of bees. It feels like my arm is swelling. Geez, are the cacti poisonous too? Why does it feel like so much stinging and burning. Unfortunately, I have to leave the pieces that are stuck in my forearm, until I get to the back side of the course where there’s a bit of a climb and the pace slows a bit. I’m able to pick all but one quarter size chunk of cacti from my arm, it looks like the needles have been pushed in a good inch into my arm. I’ll have to someone in the transition tent pull it out for me, I think and leave it be.
Meanwhile, my power meter is still not picking up. Hmmm, probably just batteries. I’ll have to let my brother know.
I fly by brother and the RV on the first lap yelling I’ll need a battery on the next lap hoping he’d have it out ready to go. Hmmm, I’m not sure he caught that I went by so quickly trying to communicate what I needed.
As I approach the dismount line for the tent. I ask the volunteer to take the cacti out for me. He seemed hesitant, I was persistent that he quickly do so. Just do it! He yanked it out. Free at last!!!!
I look down at my lap time. 1:20. Perfect that’s right where I wanted to be. Four minutes faster then last year this pace will easily get me 5 laps by 7pm. I fly by another lap, I try to mess with my power meter on my Garmin but still no luck. I see a friend at the Whiskey tree and shout to her to please tell my brother I need a cr2032 battery, that way he should know what I need when I pull in.
He got the message. I pull in and he said he figured it was my power meter battery. He quickly changes the battery and I do a quick bottle exchange and run into the RV for quick pee break.
Back out and still right on time. But NO power meter. WTF. What is happening. Ok honestly, it’s not that big of deal. I really don’t need the power meter for this course. But it would help just for me to glance at the amount of effort I am putting down. It only matters for a few more laps anyway, cause I can’t really see the power numbers at night anyway. It’s irritating but I’m not going to let this get me any any sort of upheaval about the race or my performance.
Oh shoot, I’m out on the 3rd lap and realize I forgot to pick up my earbud, I wanted to start listening to some podcasts. Oh well, I’ll get it when I stop for my lights, I can manage 2 more laps with my own brain for entertainment.
The next 2 laps (3 and 4) go swimmingly. EXCEPT for the bitches. On both laps they are stopping riders, there were rescue vehicles and personnel on the course. On the third lap there’s a guy secured to a back board. His face is all bloodied. It’s kind of one of those things you don’t want to look but you do anyway. Well that, and we had to get off our bike and walk through the area, so I wasn’t going fast enough not to look.
Same thing on the fourth lap were asked to dismount and walk past the scene of the crash. This time it’s a girl in the middle of the fire road, she’s sitting up and looks a less injured then the last guy, but is still being attended to by the medics. What a bummer, the bitches were honestly in the best shape I had seen them, at this rate I should have taken the bypass it would have been quicker with the stops and walking. I hope the injured riders fair well.
At the end of the fourth lap I’m starting to feel more fatigued then I think I should. It’s all in my head I’m sure, but this is where a glance a power meter number would be nice. Am I going to hard? I shouldn’t be, my pacing seems to be right where I need it to be. Am I not going hard enough because the fatigue is all in my head. IDK!?!
I pull in after lap 5. I get off the bike and I’m like “wow I’m sore”, and I’m hobbling a bit because my right hip is paining me. Must have been from the run. Brother takes the bike, lubes the chain, puts bike lights on. I’m getting some extra liquids. Sit down to put arm and leg warmers on. Switch helmets, glasses. We have to fiddle with the power cord of the helmet light as I’m so tall I don’t seem to have enough slack to sit comfortably in my pocket. A friend who’s documenting the pit stop for us, has the brilliant idea of putting the battery in the back of my sports bra, that works seemingly well. This time I remember to grab my earbud.
I tell brother I’m taking the bypass now and my lap time may slow a bit based on how my body is feeling at the moment. I say I’m just going to play a podcast and chill for a lap. Hey-that wasn’t part of the race plan. I’m supposed to stay focused and get those first 5 laps in quickly. What’s happening to my brain?
I don’t even get to the exchange tent to go out for my 5th lap and my earbud falls out of my ear. WTF. I don’t go back for it. I should have, it would have taken all of 30 seconds. Now I’m stranded on another lap with my own brain again and I lost an earbud. I’m out on the 5th lap and I’m hating the glasses I put on, they’re constricting my peripheral vision, they’re supposed to help protect my eyes but I’m not digging them, even though these were the same glasses I wore all of last years 24HOP.
Also my “new” helmet with my light on it feels so heavy and cumbersome, I like my other helmet so much better, I never notice the weight difference until you compare the two with riding back to back laps. Well, suck it up buttercup your in for a long night. I do end up ditching the glasses and tucking them into the jersey, I prefer to see more. I’ll get a different pair when I come in for the next lap.
Then something happens to my body on this lap. It feels like every minute it is disintegrating more and more. It can’t be by nutrition I was on track getting ~90g carb an hour. Its starting to get dark about ½ through the lap I turn my lights on. What is wrong with me why does it feel like I am going so slow? Why does my body hurt so much? All of a sudden all the fun I was having goes out the window. I’m climbing up high point, less then 2 miles from my pit stop and I’m thinking this is not fun. I can’t continue through the night at this pace and feeling the way I am.
Something deep down inside of me is telling me “this is not a low point in your race” something is not right. For whatever reason I don’t have the mental prowess to fight the feeling I’m having, I feel like I’m being beaten down. My whole body is aching. This is not like me.
One of the solo singlespeed women passes me and I’m able to keep on her wheel for a bit. We chat, she encourages me to stop and eat dinner on my next lap. Real food can do wonders. Then after she goes on ahead of me I have another guy behind me and we chat for a while. He encourages me to pull in for a short nap. I concede and tell him I think I may do so. I’m here to have fun and race my bike. Not suffer through an entire night of cold dark and fighting my body.
I rolled into the RV and I got off my bike. I can’t remember what I said to my brother. But it was something along the lines of, “I don’t think I can go back out there” or “everything hurts” he looked at me and tried to encourage me to continue on. “Your right on track,” he encourages. Somehow we found ourselves sitting the the RV and him looking at me and I vividly remember him asking me several times what I wanted to do. Again I don’t remember exactly what I said, but it was along the lines of: eat and sleep and that I thought I needed to give up contending for any result.
I know I said this before but my whole body hurt. I don’t know if you can feel your body going into rhabdo but that’s how I describe it, every muscle fiber in my body hurt.
Brother made me a great dinner of chicken quesadillas. The food did not make me anymore motivated to get back out. I ate and proceeded to put my pajamas on and lay down.
To be continued…
Fueled By TheFeed.
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