Breck Epic

I am just returning to some sort of sanity after blowing my mind and destroying my body all last week in Breckenridge, racing my single speed bike at this year’s Breck Epic. As it turned out for me, it was a good race: I won the Single Speed category outright, though it did get a little interesting in the end. Six days of going all out for 3-4 hours and then doing everything in my power to recover enough to do it again proved no easy task. In the end I rode my bike for 21 hours, 16 minutes and 48 seconds which was 3 minutes and 38 seconds less than second place finisher, Mike Melley. That’s a close margin after so many hours. I can’t speak enough to how great a competitor Mr. Melley was and how much he enriched my experience of being nailed to the cross of pain by NEVER letting up a forcing me to stay on it the whole time.

I found it amazing how difficult it was to keep going so hard each successive day. It was a lot like alpine climbing, only without much threat or hazard. In that, I found I could pour out much more than I would in the mountains since I was not in any real danger. Still, I did have to dig similarly deep into my reserves of will power to scrape up enough energy to continue the level of output that it demanded of me to stay in the lead. The ascents would be total lung scorchers, having me breathing as hard as I possibly could. the descents would offer an initial respite in that the aerobic demands would be given a break, but the mental difficulty increased dramatically here by forcing me to push my bike to the limit going down rough, rocky and often loose trail and roads at dangerously fast speeds. My body would ache during the descents as I’d be tensed up trying to deliver my total focus to the trail and bike handling in order to keep things moving as fast as possible. I’d be begging for more climbing to give my fingers, shoulders, back and mind a break. Then, it’d be th lungs’ turn again.

I’d spend my after race hours eating, soaking in a cold creek, getting massage, eating more, trying to sleep, cleaning my bike, fixing my bike, eating more and trying to get down as much water as possible. I’d complete most days with 32 oz of water mixed with GU Electrolyte Brew in my hydration pack and having eaten 3-4 shots of GU Roctane mixed with a bit of water in a Gel Flask. That seemed to work for me and immediately after each race, I’d down 16 oz. of GU Recovery Brew. This stuff really works charms and I can’t say enough about how well the Roctane GU is. That stuff works! As for recovery, a buddy of mine turned me on to Pro Anox, a super powerful antioxidant formula that really helped kick my recovery into high gear. I’m not much of a believer in most supplements and stuff. I like to keep it simple, but the ingredients in products like GU’s Roctane and Pro Anox have well researched and documented science behind them. And, I can personally say that my experience with these types of things have helped quite a bit when going to the extremes of my physical capacity.

Here’s the numerical stats, though I’m not sure what kind of story they really tell.

Stage 1: 3:37:49, 39.5 miles, 6,000′

Stage 2: 3:50:03, 39 miles, 5,300′

Stage 3: 4:05:08, 39.5 miles, 5,950′

Stage 4: 4:07:15, 42 miles, 6,000′

Stage 5: 3:02:30, 27.3 miles, 4,300′

Stage 6: 2:34:13, 31.5 miles, 3,300′

Totals: 21:16:48, 219 miles, 30,850′

That’s a big chunk of terrain to cover. A LOT of it was rocky so the mileage took it’s toll on me. I felt good for the first three stages, then it was a progressive slide downwards. I had built up a pretty good lead after stage four (my toughest) and then played a game of hanging on and trying not to wreck or have any mechanical problems. By the final stage, I was hammered and flat. I rode as hard as I could, but couldn’t manage to stay with Mr. Melley as he dug into my hard work and 12:30 gap, taking 9 of those minutes off by the time I dragged my self across the finish line, holding onto second place for that stage and the overall lead. As much as I would have liked to have felt stronger on the final day, my strategy worked to give me the win.

It will take me a while to recover from this one. Now, its time to get back to the business of climbing mountains!

This entry was posted on Monday, August 22nd, 2011 at 4:33 pm and is filed under Biking, Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.