Bike Sebring 12/24 UltraCycling Race
Not sure why I signed up for this madness last weekend in Sebring, but here's my rather long ride report.
The day started out VERY cold, especially since we thought we were heading to sunny Florida for a warm ride. 30-something degrees at the 6:30am start. My boyfriend Ken’s plan was for 200 miles, mine was 300 miles – both in the 24-hour event. I only knew one other woman signed up for the 24 hours, except for Julie, another team member who is in another league altogether, as she was attempting to qualify for RAAM, and had to make 400 miles, without the benefit of drafting. The rest of the Sorella team was up for 12-hours, with a variety of goals.
We started out all together, and did three laps on the racetrack while the sun rose. With the Sorella women, assorted husbands and boyfriends, and a few others, we probably had about a dozen people in our pack. Out on the century route, we established a fast-paced double pace line. Because they all knew I was planning to ride all night, they kept me very sheltered – with short or non-existent pulls. Ken shouldn’t have taken pulls either, but he did great, although that’s probably what hurt him later in the day. We only had one stop at about 50 miles. The route took us through miles of orange groves on a fairly flat route, with only gentle rollers. Unfortunately, a bunch of random folks got in the pack, and if you happened to get behind them, the yo-yoing accordion effect was really tiring. With about 5 miles left in the century, Ken and I stopped for a short break to shed layers and grab food. Even with those stops, we still ended up with the fastest century I’ve ever done – 5.5 hours!
After the century, we started the 12-mile loops. Ken and I did some on our own, some with some other Sorellas, and they were all great at protecting us on the headwind leg of the loop. We would do a loop, take a break, and get some food, liquids, potty breaks, and rest. It was a great loop that started out tough with a stretch into the wind along a busy stretch of road, but then went back into the orange groves around a lake, and then finished with a fast flat section with a tailwind. That section made you feel like Lance flying along, which made it easy to head back out for another loop.
We finished the last loop just after 6pm, and we were split up from the 12-hour riders, as they routed Ken and me onto the racetrack, where we would spend the rest of the night doing 3.7 mile loops on the racetrack. We wanted to get in one lap in daylight, so we could get a feel for the course. It was great in the light, and we ran into the course marshals laying out blinkies down the middle of the racetrack. They said that as long as you stayed close to the blinkies, you would stay on the track – they were pretty sparse, but good enough, we thought. It was dark when we finished that first lap, and here starts our mistakes. We didn’t have our warm clothes, food, or lights, so while we had great friends who were going to bring the car over, we just were standing around, getting colder and hungrier, and unable to ride. We lost about an hour right there. Just silly rookie mistakes. We should have asked someone to have the car over there earlier. Didn’t think it through -- newbie mistake.
We both had really marginal lights, but it was okay for a while. We would do three laps, stop for drinks, bathroom breaks, whatever. We stopped for a long dinner break too. Out on the course, things were okay, but the blinkies marking the course were dying rapidly. A few probably had their batteries die; a few probably got run over and became road kill. With our poor lights, it became a real challenge just staying on the track. Twice we went off-roading because the blinkie marking the turn was gone, and twice we ran over dead blinkies. Not great. When both of my ‘better’ lights finally died, we tried to use the lights that someone had lent us. Unfortunately, we thought they only had handlebar mounts, and wouldn’t fit our over-sized bars. Of course, we found out in the morning that there were helmet mounts for the lights, but we didn’t know that. It was really hard to ride when you can only see about 2 feet in front of you. Ken’s light was practically useless (a camping headlamp strapped to his handlebars) and drafting in the dark is just not a good idea! At that point, there were probably about 20 or 30 folks still on the racetrack, but spread out over the 3.7 miles, so you couldn’t count on someone to stay with to use their light. And, the route was twisty enough that you couldn’t just aim for a rider’s lights or the next visible blinkie, because there could be a twist in the course between you and the light. Later, I finally got to know where all the turns were, but it was still nice to be able to see where you’re going.
We ended up with a mess of dead batteries that were taking too long to recharge, the two of us who were too cold to want to stop to eat properly, and just stubborn discussions about what to do.
After each break, it took me about half a lap to stop shivering, and my last toe-warmers gave up around midnight. We just didn’t have a good plan. I know we didn't eat nearly enough, because I was just really hungry most of the time -- again, not willing to stop for long because I would get too chilled. The light situation was just so frustrating, because we both felt great, and to quit for something as silly as not being able to see was just not going to happen. We would argue about going out with the marginal lights, and I just was so worried because I talked Ken into this madness, and if he got hurt, I could never forgive myself. Ken wouldn’t stop until I did, and I was worried that he was too sleepy. We finally took out a light that was almost recharged and went back out and when that light ran out again at around 4:45am, we decided enough was enough, although everything physically felt great. No leg aches, bottom felt great – surprisingly, our arms were the only things that were starting to tighten up. We ended up with 257.7 miles, and stopped right before the rain started. Compared to any other ride I’ve done, I’m pretty impressed.
Total saddle time was 15 hours 41 minutes, average speed 16.4, and official mileage was 257.7. I'm thrilled. I thought it was very interesting that just one year ago, to the day, I did the Tundra Time Trial. My average speed for that 10-mile route was about 17mph. One year later, I held that for at least 200 miles.
