More Mohican

I know it's been over for a while...I just received these photos from my dad.



My favorite memory

Okay. I'm done with Mohican now.

Not much blogging around these parts lately. I think I started 3 posts this week and then I got sidetracked and/or bored and never committed. The Lumberjack took a little more out of me than I would like to admit. To say that it takes me a while to recover is an understatement. I'm a little bit envious of those who got to get out and get a good workout in this weekend. I did get to go out and explore the neighborhood and found some super secret good stuff that I will be adding to one of my loops. I still have one more undercover operation to perform in order to complete the details of this new loop. It may require an early morning, face paint, camouflage and some squatchin. Right up my alley.

Tomorrow, I'm not looking forward to a doctor's appointment. My eyes have been bad lately. Not only does it feel like I'm looking through wax paper sometimes (which is a scary sensation, especially when you have no idea how long it will last), but they hurt. My left one has been especially angry lately. Friday into Saturday I was up most of the night because it hurt. I felt like left eye was trying to escape from my body. I've had uveitis in the past, but I don't remember this much pain and my vision wasn't this poor. It's freaking me out a little to say the least. I'm hoping for some okay news...I don't need good. I'm past good news. I know better at this point in the game. Just an explanation and something to alleviate the issue will suffice.

Lumberjack 100

The rare NUE Women's SS Podium. I broke one of my cardinal rules and was caught in a photo wearing Crocs.

I'm happy to report that the LJ100 is in the books. As rough as it felt while I was out there, my head was on for this one and that was 90% of the battle. Not being an endurance veteran, two weeks is a pretty tall order in between hundreds for me. The LJ was an added bonus. I registered the night after Mohican. If I could do it, I would do it. If I was flarey and not feeling so hot, no biggie. Obviously, I try to take this approach for all of them, but I'd be lying if I said I don't get crushed when I can't do something.  I went into this one with not much stress or anxiety. I figured if I couldn't race I would at least make an excellent pit crew for Jane, Alex, James and Mike.

I actually slept the night before the race which is an oddity for me. We got to the venue and I got in a real warm up. The start is pretty intense, especially on an ss, so I had to make sure my legs were ready. They weren't. They kind of laughed at me and said something along the lines of, "Bitch, you crazy." Yes, my legs get a little ghetto when they're tired. I remember giggling to myself and thinking the day was going to be interesting. If I was starting I was finishing. I was not DNFing another LJ.

I dorked out for this one and broke down and wore a Camelback. I hate them. I only wear them on long rides when I will not have access to fluids. I remember  last year that I dropped a bottle because it was so fast and twisty it was hard to drink. So I sucked it up. Glad I did. The first lap went down okay. There was the usual start craziness. There were some crashes and tacoed wheels in sand that were a little scary to witness. Luckily, I don't think anyone was hurt. I was a little tentative in the sand the first lap, especially seeing a few people bite it. Put me on a wet, rocky, rooty downhill and I'm okay. Ask me to ride a sandy downhill at speed and I'm a wussbag.

Second lap. Well, that's where there were some issues. It got hot fast. I felt a thigh cramp coming on a grinder of a climb at the beginning of the second lap. I haven't felt a cramp all year. Shit. I took a few Sport Legs and chewed on a couple in hopes of staving off the cramps. I backed off a little until I felt they were gone and then attempted to pick it up again. I caught up with a guy on a ss and we rode together for a while and we had a good thing going. I felt some stomach cramps and tried to convince myself that they would go away. They didn't. They got worse. I had to go. It became an emergency. I didn't want to stop because we were flowing together. When you find someone you're groovin' with it's hard to let go. The guy I was riding with said he'd wait for me. I tried to convince my new riding buddy to go on without me and that I was having some, "GI issues". Wink. Wink. He gave me the 'Ewww. That's groddy face', still said he'd wait (I thought for sure that would deter him) but then after pulling over with me and watching me start to strip down with reckless abandon he pedaled on his way in fear and disgust I'm certain. Thank God I had a surplus of baby wipes in my jersey pocket from my trip to the porta-john before the race. I wear bibs so there is a lot that has to happen. It's like a three ring circus. Camelback off, jersey off and hanging on bike that is leaning on tree. The trees aren't really great for hiding at the LJ so I had to jog in a little ways. Fun times. Crisis averted. 

 
I'm convinced the LJ bugs are all escapees from a wicked science experiment. They were nasty. At one point I couldn't fight instinct and took my hand off the handlebar to smack and swat while standing and climbing on an ss. Yes, not a smart move.  Luckily, I didn't fall over like an asshole. I caught my shoulder on tree and was suspended there. I paused there for a moment. Suspended in time. Contemplating my future and then carried on.

At the end of my second lap, Parsons was standing at the top of a gradual climb/false flat (read totally rideable) filming with the promoter. Great. I was off the bike and my left leg had decided to cramp and I was dragging it peg-leg style up the non-incline. I did my best impersonation of a singlespeeder walking her bike up a 'hill'. I pleaded with my leg, "Please move. Please." There was a drag mark behind me in the sand. I remember not being able to feel my left butt cheek for the last few hours of the race.

The third lap I had to take bathroom break #2. After that I was just crossing my fingers that I could make it to the finish without stopping again. I had some really rough patches. There were some dark times, to say the least. I went Chevy Chase Vacation bonkers for a spell:

There is no real recovery at LJ, physically or mentally. You are pretty much on the gas the whole time. It's twisty and turny so there is no zoning out and just mindlessly pedaling. Weaving in and out of trees for hours does take its toll. There's no relaxing on the gravel downhills or sandy double track sections for fear of washing out in gravel or sand. At the end, it started to rain pretty hard which made the sand pack in the tires. That was an extra kick in the ass.

I pulled across the line with a sweet, sweet dirt unibrow:


"I haven't felt my left ass cheek in four hours."

All in all, it went pretty damn well despite the issues. Three hundreds in 7 weeks on my ss. I'm a pretty happy girl.

Hitchhiker

R & R

Some say my last blog was a downer and that I didn't sound excited about my accomplishment of the finish. Let me just clarify that I am absolutely stoked to have finished another hundred. The whole ride home I kept saying to Mike, "I can't believe I finished that. I can't believe it. And I pulled a decent time!" I'm SO excited to have another one under my belt. This has been (and continues to be) one hell of a journey. To not have the food be gone and the finish banner be taken down by the time I got there was just an added cherry on top. I purposely wrote the blog as soon as I could so it had at least a little feel of the real hundred aftermath. I feel the brain omits things a few days later and everything turns out more puppies and unicorns than it actually was. I've had some very successful endurance veteran friends who say they've been known to cry the night after the event from sheer exhaustion and the roller coaster of emotions they went through during the race. The next day they were planning the next trip. I figured I was just a crazy person. Nice to know I'm somewhat normal. The brain has to do some editing or I don't think there would be many repeat customers. The roller coaster is pretty addicting.

I've only really almost fallen asleep at my desk twice this week. After Cohutta I barely made it through the first couple of days of work. I think I may have dozed off/blacked out a little while giving a non-harassment seminar yesterday. Nobody noticed because they are that boring. I'm in HR and I can't stand to sit through them. I can only role play and tell so many jokes and still keep it appropriate. Most of the time I feel I am giving people ideas. Really it comes down to this...don't play grab ass at work and know your audience. But I digress...

Now is probably not a good time to bring this up but since it seems to have gone well I feel it's okay to disclose. We (I) messed with my bike fit a little bit. Obviously, this is something you want to get straightened out before a day on the bike but not much I do really ever makes sense. I'm happy to report that there is no knee pain and no lower back pain. If it didn't hurt after the race and it doesn't hurt now I think it's pretty spot on. New shoes, too. No foot pain. I feel like I won the lottery.

My 'hard' recovery as I like to call it has consisted of a lot of go-go juice

and iced ventis. I don't want to hear how I shouldn't be drinking coffee either. It makes me happy.

I've had so many iced ventis that I'm getting concerned about my economic stability. At least I stopped ordering the trenta. We may not be able to afford the trip to Michigan at this rate. I can't stop.

Michigan. Leaving a week from tomorrow. It felt like a good idea on Sunday once the post-race hormones shifted to the happy side and revised my memory. Right now all I want to do is put on my pjs and lay down. Sounds like a perfect idea.

Mohican

Rank. That's how I would describe myself the morning of Mohican. Rank and surly. I hated life. I didn't want to touch my bike. I woke up at 5 am and felt less than stellar to say the least. I didn't feel great on Friday, but attributed it to being in the car for 9 hours. The thought of being on my bike all day on Saturday really caused some consternation and loathing. I had pretty much already decided when I left the cabin that I was either going to ride to the start and ride right back to the cabin or do the singletrack right up until the point when it dumps onto the bike path and I can ride back to the cabin. There's no way I was riding 100 miles.

I got to the start late because of all my flip flopping and bitching and moaning, so that put me way at the back of the start. Not like I need or have the right to be anywhere near the front, but the start at Mohican can really suck if you're too far off the rear. By the time you get to the top of the starting hill and get to the end of farm road you are met with a huge bottleneck of riders, clipped out, waiting to get into singletrack. It's no fun. It also did not improve my experience. Inch by inch in the singletrack I wanted to quit more. Within the first 20 minutes I had pulled over, decided that I was going to ride out backwards and go back. I had  told my brother and all of his friends that I was calling it. I waited and waited and didn't see a way out backwards because of the traffic coming at me so I jumped back in line and moved forward. Slowly. Really slowly. Being bunged up on a ss in flowy singletrack is no fun and takes a toll because I waste so much energy track standing, pedaling, track standing, pushing, waiting....riders were falling everywhere and clogging the flow. Once again, this did not add to my Mohican experience. Usually, I can work through these things and laugh about it or the mere thought of finishing drives me. Wasn't happening. I felt sickly hot and weak. I kept plugging away and told myself  that I can quit at Aid Station One. I saw Sandie and she gave me a pep talk and encouraged me not to quit. I rode a little more. I rode to Aid Station 1, paused, looked around for my family, saw no one, clipped back in and kept pedaling. I didn't even take fluids, as I really didn't plan on being out there much longer.

I glanced at my top tube and really thought hard what Batman would do. He would quit, go back to the Batcave, have Albert fix him a snack, play with some gadgets and regroup. Right? Flash forward a a mile or two and I came upon my brother, who had just crashed. I gave him shit for crashing and we jabbered back and forth for a bit and we rode together. I jumped ahead of him and he told me if I take the right at the hike a bike I will end up at the cabin. So tempting. I took the left and trudged up the hill. Ended up riding with my brother for a while. I ran out of fluids and he gave me an extra bottle until we made it to the next aid station. At Aid Station 2 I caught up with Shoogs from Something Wicked Events.  The next aid station my brother turned off at the 100k loop. I decided my fate. I was still struggling. My dad, niece and nephew were there. My niece was trying to push me to the 100k because I think she was worried I didn't feel well. She also was worried that she didn't see Mike and was certain he had quit or something tragic and/or spectacular had happened to him in the woods. I took the 100 mile route up the steep grassy hill. My dad took pictures of me walking up it. I will surely savor burn delete those. I just kept plugging away and watched the miles tick away until my computer died/came back to life/then died again. I have to thank Shoogs because he kept me going the rest of the race.

At one point, we went through a ropes course and people were zip lining through the woods. I was bugging out at first because I couldn't figure out what was happening.  They looked like they were having a lot more fun than me.

Can we talk about the wedding? Some rutters (southeast Ohio term, but I'm pretty sure you can grasp the meaning) had attempted to close the covered bridge on the rail trail for a wedding. They were trying to divert the race. The goon guarding the bridge would not let anyone pass. I heard later he even tried to grab one girl's bike because she tried to cross. There was a pack of us and we were not riding around. We finally got through, congratulated the scary, platinum, heavily cleavage-tattooed bride and were on our way. I'm confident in saying there was no permit for that. That was the Redneck Mafia at it's finest hour.

Made it through the last couple of stops and then saw the family at the last one before I went into the final single track. No need to stop. Just waved and pedaled through. The final piece of singletrack flowed. Relief came when I crossed the final bridge and knew the end was just around the corner. Crossed the line and still can't believe I sucked it up and finished. Working through demons that appear during the race is one thing, having them ride with you all day is quite another. Despite my issues of the day (both real and imagined), I still pulled a better time than expected. I have Charlie to thank for that.

Hopefully, my attitude will have had an overhaul for the next one: Lumberjack. That's right. Somehow I got talked into it (it didn't take much) and in 2 weeks I'll be doing this again. It's a tall order for my body so I need to stay well the next two weeks and get it together or it's gonna be another miserable day in the saddle. After last year, I'm looking for redemption. As I write this I'm getting excited to go back to MI and give it another whirl. This is a good thing.