Sunday 8/30/09 rides

[channlluv]

Owlice, where are you again? South Florida, yes? I just left my mom's house a couple of weeks ago. She's in Palm Coast, just north of Daytona. I rode through the swamp there, too, but never saw anything more interesting than an egret.

My ride report. First, it's Fire Season here, so all of you reporting a little Fall nip in the air, I'm jealous. It's hot and dry and a tad smoky at times because of fires up in the LA area.

I rode 30 miles today, my longest ride ever! Unfortunately it was in the middle of the day and even though the weather only predicted low 90s, I think it got a bit higher. I drank three bottles of water, one of those had 8oz of Concord grade juice added, and ate a chocolate chip Cliff Bar, but I really had to push to finish the last three miles. I was getting loopy.

By the time I reached my car, I had just enough in me to get the back door open (it's a Rav4), lean my bike against it, and collapse into the spot where I usually park the bike. Everything went yellow. I lay there for several minutes then sat up and drank the little bit of water I had left, but I have a gallon of water I keep in the back of the car for radiator emergencies, and I doused my legs, arms and head with it. It cooled me off quite a bit, but I still couldn't stand. My bike fell over and I just let it lay there for a minute before I got up and stood it back up, then fell back into the car because everything went yellow again. "Is this bonking?" I wondered.

After a few minutes, I tried to sit up and the motion knocked the bike over again. I tried to catch it and got hit in the face with the handlebars. I thought I'd broken my nose for a second. I leaned it up again, poured more water over my head, getting my torso wet, too, and lay back down. Thank God there was an occasional cool breeze.

Several minutes later I gathered the strength to take my front tire off and get the bike in the car. I practically fell into the driver's seat, though, so I sat there for a few more minutes with the air on high, listening to NPR.

I waited for my head to clear and then I drove home, stopping off at the Goodwill depository on the way to donate some bags of clothes. While I was waiting there in line (they've got guys who pick your stuff up out of the car for you), I called D*H and asked him to fix me some of his electrolyte drink. My words were a little slurry. I told him I'd ridden 30 miles in 3 hours and burned 152 calories. "I mean, 1152 cal..calries." Something like that. I sounded drunk.

I got home okay, although in retrospect I probably shouldn't have been driving myself. I could barely catch my breath, my skin was red and hot to the touch, and when I drank the electrolyte stuff, it made my stomach cramp.

I got a cool shower and lay down for a while, then took my blood pressure. My doctor has me monitoring it because I'm on medication for high blood pressure, so I have one of those digital cuffs to use at home. My left arm was 77/38, with a 98 heart rate. My right arm was 69/29, with a 100 heart rate. This was at 3:20 this afternoon, about 20 minutes after I'd gotten home.

I called my mom, a retired RN, and she fussed at me (as D*H had done) about going that far in the heat and why didn't I take some electrolyte drink with me and what was I thinking, that I could have killed myself all for a bit of exercise, it's just not worth it even though she knows I feel like I have a lot to prove here...it went on for several minutes. She finally told me to go eat something salty or get myself to the hospital for an IV drip, so D*H offered to take me to Red Lobster, since it is also air conditioned. (Our house isn't, and lying half-naked in front of a fan wasn't doing much to cool me off.)

So we went to Red Lobster and I got all-you-can-eat teriyaki shrimp with wild rice and those Cheddar Bay biscuits that I normally never eat because they're so darn salty. D*H said I probably negated any weight loss that might have resulted from the bike ride, but that my salt levels had to have been replenished. I sure felt better after the meal and my blood pressure is up to 98/56 now, with a 91 heart rate.

So, lesson learned. Get some electrolyte powder of my own and use it for all long rides, heat or not. I told him I'd never had anything like this happen to me before, and that I didn't think I needed that electrolyte powder because it's for real athletes. He said I needed it anytime I'm going to be sweating a lot. Okay, now I know.

But still, I went 30 miles today, and I'm pretty proud of that. My knees don't even hurt much.

Roxy