600k - DNF and a decision

The final PBP qualifier was held on Saturday, May 30. This is a 600k ride - 371 km on day 1 and 233k on day2. Day 2 has 100km of serious, steep, unrelenting hills at the end.

Up at 4:20 AM, breakfast, and then I drove over to the old Paper Zone on 1st and Holgate, arriving around 5:30 AM for a 6:00 AM start.  Parked next to the fence by the tracks.  That's my big white van, and you can see Starbucks HQ in the background:

The weather was a bit overcast but promised to burn off to a nice day.

As soon as we took off up Holgate, we found a train blocking the road.  A dozen riders (including myself) too a U turn, went up 1st Ave, over the tracks at Edgar Martinez way by the new stadium, and then back down 4th to continue on Holgate.  This had one consequence of adding two "bonus" kilometers to the ride on the GPS, so that none of my numbers were matching the cue sheet any more.

At any rate, up steep Holgate, onto the Mountains to Sound greenway, over I-90, across Mercer Island, and down the Coal Creek rollers.

I was still hanging with a faster group, and when we hit a huge descent I took off, meaning to put my new "momentum preservation skills" to use on the uphill side.  As I started to head up I heard yelling behind me, and realized that I had missed the turn to May Valley Road.  By the time I reversed direction and made the turn, the group was about 500 meters ahead.  I stood on the pedals and managed to catch up.

At this point, I'm feeling good.  Feeling frisky.  Maintaining a good pace, and not worrying too much about it one way or the other.

Riding on, and then south to Enumclaw, views of Mount Rainier started to dominate the landscape.
Here's the first peek-a-boo view - see if you can pick out the snowy peak (might need to click on the picture to enlarge).

After hitting 410 west of Enumclaw, we had our first control at Buckley.  I was still feeling pretty good.  I had such a negative experience with food on the 400 I decided to switch to "regular food" and brought some cookies, boiled eggs, and boiled potatoes in a bag with some ice in a tub.  Here I found my tub had leaked into the bag holding everything but the water was contained, and eggs and potatoes are waterproof.  No harm done.  I ate one of the potatoes and it went down nicely.

Back on the road to Eatonville.  Still pretty flat, with moderate rollers.  50k later, we are in Eatonville.  Mt. Rainier still dominating the landscape.

From Eatonville, the road tilts up - there's a long climb out of town - the start of it is visible in the picture above.  10 miles later, I was in Ashford, the last services before Mt. Rainier National park.  I stopped for some water and a Starbucks Bottled Frappuccino.   While I drank it, I had a nice visit with the store owner, who was examining my bike and all the things on it - he said he was working on a "Rail trail" bike.  I told him about the front light, back light, pump, tires - and why I thought they were good to have.  He wrote down all the model names on his hand, and later on a piece of paper. We talked while I downed the Starbucks.

Then off to Skate Creek road.  This is a moderate pitch climb about 10 miles long.

The road is alternately straight and curving.  Here's one of the straight parts:


 On one side of the road is a deep dark forest and on the other side are great views of Mt. Rainier:

After climbing for what felt like forever, we were treated to a speed descent over pavement of varied quality.  Occasional bumps and holes as well as pure gravel repairs needed a high degree of alertness.  The road finally ended at Packwood, our next control.

In Packwood, I met up with a few riders, had a 6" turkey sub that was really good, and then got back on the road. Now we were heading east, right into a rather stiff headwind.  Yeah, we're going in the other direction that flag is blowing.

I was riding alone at this point, and stopped here and there for a picture.  I want to eat at this place sometime:

As I swung around later to get a picture of a flower bed in the middle of nowhere, a group of 8 cyclists came up the road - our riders in a paceline.  I forgot about the picture and joined up.  Each person was taking a 2-3 minute "pull" at the front and then rotating to the back.  This way, only one of 8 riders had to cut the wind, and we could roll faster and/or with less effort than if we were riding individually.

I took this a few places back from the front:

The sun was getting lower in the sky, and we rolled into Morton at the end of "The big valley" laid in by the Chehalis River. The valley is 3 miles wide in places.

I partnered up with a couple different people and groups out of Morton, but for various reasons broke off until I was riding alone.  One thing they do down here is grow Christmas Trees

Shortly after this, I connected with Jason, and we rode together up the ever popular Centralia-Alpha road, which has a number of steep pitches up followed by descents that are longer than the climb.  Jason and I have ridden together before, and we had a pleasant no-stress ride for about a half hour, at at relaxed pace, chatting about this and that.  This is one of the fun parts of Randonneuring, if you're not too pressed for time, and the road is suitable for side-by-side riding with little or no traffic.  And that's exactly what we had going.   Narayan caught up with us and the three of us rode into Centralia together, arriving around 11:00 PM.

Stopped at a Gas station/mini mart and now my stomach was starting to act up again, just like it had on the 400k 4 weeks ago.  Little burps, and no desire to eat anything.  That is NOT good for a long distance ride, you HAVE to keep eating or you'll stop.  Also, my shorts had been moving about and I had some serious chafing issues that were quite painful - and nothing to be done about it.

We all kind of felt like this: (this is Narayan)

But what can you do, you gotta keep going.  So we rolled out of town.  I spotted a Safeway, and hoping to find some Desitin to calm my posterior, I said I needed 5 minutes.  Jason and Narayan continued on, rolling slowly.  I could catch up if I wanted to.  No worries, go on ahead.

No Desitin at the Safeway (!?) but I did get something that didn't do much good.

Now I'm rolling along, it's late, I'm really tired, and what I want now is a nap.  I have a space blanket for just this purpose, and apparently it's a popular thing to do on the PBP, so I found a spot, rolled it out, and took a 20 minute power nap.  Well, I never fell asleep, so I took another one.   Now all I have do to is ride 50 km to Elma for the overnight.  I'm hoping to get an hour or two sleep and then have some time in the bank (leaving ahead of the deadline) to attack the brutal Tahuya hills later in the day.  But I'm not rolling to fast, barely 20km/hr (just over 12 mph). While this is acceptable brevet speed late in the day, it's not going to get me to Elma very soon.  The road is flat, the night is dark, I'm tired, my butt hurts, and there are hours of this to go.

And then it hits me: I don't really like this part of it.  I don't like my upset tummy, feeling tired, feeling sleepy, and in pain.  And despite my 4 layers on my body, I'm also cold.  And I think "If I don't even like doing this for one night, why would I subject myself to three nights of this in France?"

I've heard it said that you learn different things about yourself as rides get longer, from 200 to 300 to 400 to 600k, and what I learned on this ride was that I don't care for all-night riding.  And especially when your shorts are digging a hole deeper and deeper in your skin with every pedal stroke.

I got to Elma at 4:20 AM, wanting to leave by 6:00 AM.  I ate a bit, went up to the the assigned room, scheduled my phone timer for a 45 minute nap, and then extended it twice.  Finally I came down to the meeting room and asked "If I wanted to  quit right here, would there be a way to get me back to Seattle?"  Of course nobody likes to see anyone quit, but it's an individual decision.  One fellow said he could take me.

I briefly considered going anyway, packed up my bike, and as I got out the door - it started raining!  Not hard, not much, but who knows?  So I brought the bike back in, with my tired legs, fatigue, and sore bottom and declared myself DNF.  I wasn't about to subject myself to more pain and suffering if I didn't have to.

What does this mean for PBP? It means unless I change my mind now and try for the make-up 600k, I'm not going.  And right now, I'm fine with that.  I've achieved a lot, and there are still rides to ride and RUSA awards to collect - I'm just 2 100k rides short of my P-12 - so I'll continue to ride, but the landscape for the future will be different.

I'm not even too disappointed - I admire those who will go and do the ride, but I'm glad now I know how I feel about night riding, how my body reacts to long rides, and really glad to not have found this out too late.

Postscript:  Wednesday, 6/3
It's now 4 days later (3 from Sunday) and I've been mulling all this over and over.  Lots of things to consider, including a change of direction for the summer schedule big time, what my riding goals are now going to look like, and if I should keep trying for and do PBP or not.  One thing I do know: the chafing on my leg is still healing up, it was actually pretty bad and if I had kept riding, I don't want to think what I'd be facing now.  So although I wish I had finished, I don't regret quitting when I did.