So, How did the Quad go?

Me: “Well, the weather looked like it was going to be a mess of snow and rain, but in the end it was perfect. I could tell my endurance is not where I’d like it to be – I got so tired on the way up. I was having a good race for me though, meeting my time goals despite some nasty calf cramps, until the bike down.”

Friend: “The last leg? What happened?”

Me: “I DNF’ed. My first. Boy that was a bummer. I had a mechanical. I was so disappointed”

Friend: “What, a flat tire? Didn’t you carry stuff to fix a flat?”

Me: “Yeah, I had a flat tire…. well, really it was two flat tires….”

Friend: “Oh, so you didn’t have enough to fix two flats. That sucks.”

Me: “Yeah, and then the seat came off the titanium rails, and the carbon fork broke. Not to mention the handlebars were crumpled into a small doughnut, and the aerobars snapped off.”

:P
Here’s a picture of my ‘mechanical.’

Unfortunately, a forest service employee had a seizure while driving his truck through the bike transition area during the race. No one was hurt, miraculously, but he crashed into a line of about 15 bikes. Mine was one of the casualties. If I’d gotten to the transition area 10 minutes sooner, I could have saved my bike! D’oh!

Quad Race Report

All the down and dirty details that no-one wants to read but me, next year before the race. :) You only think I’m kidding if you’re still reading this. You’ll learn.

On Friday, first Co and I went to the doc for his second opinion. No news there, unfortunately, his tremor issue is still unresolved. No surprise really, but still a big bummer.

I kept checking the weather before I left: it kept saying it would rain and snow all night and all day Saturday during the race. Ugh, I hadn’t planned for that – in fact, I’ve never done a race in bad weather. What to bring. I packed my rain shell and otherwise stuck with what I had.

I got to Grants, it was clear and partly sunny. !?! I picked up my packet under the helpful guidance of K and K – I was race number 13, and it was Friday… Oh well. I’m not superstitious anyway. Went out to eat at La Ventana – nice place – steak house type. I had grilled chicken with BBQ sauce, baked potato, roll, and broccoli. Back to the hotel room. In packing my transistion bags, I locked myself out of my room twice. Hotel clerk was really nice…. And the contents of those bags:

T1
2 Cliff shot
Mini cliff bar
Running shoes
Yak Trax
Knit gloves
6 oz flask with water – nice to take gu with, but maybe I can do without.

T2
Gaiters
Fleece Jacket – don’t bother next year
Wind Jacket
Ski Gloves – don’t bother next year
Ski Mittens – don’t bother next year
Knit gloves
Cliff shot
Mini cliff bar
Spare socks – don’t bother
Head band – don’t bother if similar temp.
Hat - don’t bother if similar temp.
Flask with Velcro on it, filled with water

T3
Snowshoes with running shoes preloaded
Ski wax plus cloth


I attached a ziplock bag on the front of each bag using safety pins with a piece of paper in the bag with my race # and my name in small print. (This was a good idea.) I preloaded my ski boots on my skis, and my skins on my skis. (K and K told me to – good plan.) Label ski boots with race number using duct tape. Bring a marker and a scissors and extra safety pins – these came in handy. I had pre wrapped my skis together – don’t bother with this, as the race requires certain colors of duct tape to be used. Gray duct tape, the volunteers know to remove. Red duct tape denotes run/ski tranisiton area. Yellow duct tape denotes bike/run transition area. I used zippered bags – another good thing.

At equipment drop off, in the firestation, I see huge trucks loaded with skis and bags. Just a ton of gear. They tape my T2 bag, my T3 bag and my skis and poles together with gray duct tape and load them on the truck. T1 bag gets loaded separately. And now, as K says, nothing more to worry about, you’ve got to live with whatever choices you’ve made!

Back to the hotel room, I meet K – she’s sharing my room. She seems really nice and has done the race several times., so she gave some advice. K and K came over, and we all talked about the weather – would it snow? Rain? They told stories from other years, and basically caught up with K who now lives in Co. She used to live in ABQ.


Went to bed around 9, didn’t get to sleep until maybe 11:00. Woke up several times, and finally at 5:00 I couldn’t get back to sleep. (not abnormal for a big race for me) Stayed in bed until K’s alarm went off at 6:30. It had snowed and it was gray and spitting out. Showered, ate oatmeal and orange, drank some water. K advised me to mark my bike shoes and helmet – good plan! The weather was starting to clear, yippee! Headed over to race start at 8:15. Sat in the car for a bit, then got the bike ready. Put on sunscreen – could use more of this! Bathroom trip – next year, bring a roll of TP – they ran out. No warm up – I guess I could run a bit, but too cold to really warm up on the bike.

Race started at 9:15 – to let the snow on the bike course melt a little more. (!!) I was wearing tights with grippies on the ankles, padded shorts over top, sports bra, tank, hoody, bike jersey over that, long fingered gloves, smart wool socks. I had cliff bloks in my jersey, a gu in the little pocket in my tights, and one ¾ full water bottle.

The Bike: my feet got a little cold, until about ½ way through the bike, then they started to warm up. I did manage to eat 133 calories (bloks) on the bike – I forgot to set my 10 min timer, so had to remember on my own. I’m satisfied with that. In town it was easy ot maintain about 18 mph, but then on the small incline, that decreased to about 16, and went steadily down from there. I could feel that I hadn’t been on my bike much – I need to work on some endurance here. As I crossed some slushy patches of pavement, my wheels slipped a bit. Just enough to make me nervous! I felt really good about the bike as I realized I was going to finish near my goal time of 1:10. I actually crossed in 1:15 or so. I took off the jersey, helmet, bike shoes, forgot to take off the bike shorts, grabbed the water flask, slipped on the run shoes with the yak trax preloaded, and headed out. Good transition – I think I was in there about 2:30. It threw me to have a volunteer help me, but it was nice. I made sure to get my shoes back in my bag before I left.

The run: More uphill, and I almost immediately started to cramp – in a weird muscle in my quad. Not normal. Then my calf. I knew it was going to be a long day! I just tried to focus on RFM – relentless forward motion, like K had told me. I started to count right footfalls – helps me keep form and pace. The first mile was 10 minutes, and I was really happy with that. I sipped water along the way. Didn’t bother me to carry the flask. I loved wearing the hoody – if I got cold, I flipped up the hood, warm, took it off and unzipped a bit. I didn’t really need the yak trax. On the final uphill I started walking, and ripped open the cliff shot I had. I ate about half of it – that was really all I could manage. Swallowing a big slug of that starts to make me gag after about three of them. Except for the cramping, the run went as planned, and took about 1:10 including T2, so the run must have been close to my goal time of 1:05. The run-ski transition was more hectic, but I remembered to take off my bike shorts, and forgot to put on the gaiters. (didn’t miss those until the snowshoe.) Again, having the volunteer threw me off a bit, but she was helpful getting my ski boots on. Wind jacket on. I put the velcroed flask on my backpack, and slung the backpack on, and went.

The ski: Skiing with momentum after running was really tough, esp. with the cramping I was having. Now there was a solid knot in both calves. The skins made climbing relatively easy, and I just kept plugging away. I passed a few people, and then the team folks started passing me. (2 had passed me on the run, one being E’s team.) RFM, baby! I passed a few people without skins, they were having a hard time on some of the inclines. I sipped once from the flask, but it was unwieldy. Best to skip this, I guess, and just drink in transition. It would be really nice to figure out how to have warmish water in T2 – maybe a thermos. All the aid stations had water with ice chunks in it. The ski up felt longer than I remembered. Really showed me that my run and bike endurance were not what they should be. I had to pause a few times to stretch my cramping calves. I was frustrated by that, but focused on keeping up to the guy ahead of me. I didn’t find the groove like I had in training, the groove I was in was much slower. I still am satisfied with my ski up time of 54.01 which is under my goal of 55:00. Including T3, though, it is 1:00. Some improvement to be made, mostly in endurance, I think. I took some water on the way in to T3.

Me, going up "Heartbreak Hill"

T3 was frustrating. I could not get my foot in my snowshoe because of my cramping calves. I kept groaning trying to just force them in. Finally I was able to get both feet in, and thank the volunteer that was trying to help me. I had to massage both calves a bit to get them to release, and I realized that running to the “edge of the world” was not going to happen.

Snowshoe: I hiked quickly to the edge of the world – most people around me were also hiking. The aid table at the edge of the world had music and booze, but I declined the offered drink. That was fun to see. The hike to the top from here has a really steep grade, and I was chugging along trying not to look up too much. I stopped several times to stretch and catch my breath. My glutes and hamstrings were burning by this time. (More squats and lunges next time!) Getting to the top was a relief, I had some water up there and took a minute to enjoy the view and rest. So sue me. Time 32.14 not including T3 versus goal of 35. Wahoo! On the run down I had to walk a little as the footing was really bad in some spots – loose snow with big divots in it. Tough to navigate. I jogged on the flatter sections for about ½ of it and walked the final bit into T3’. Time: 14.07 versus goal of 15. Again, getting into the ski boots wasn’t fun, but I did better. T3’ time was 3.37.

Ski down: I could tell my muscles were tired, and that control was going to be an issue. Not helping matters, the racers around me were also unsteady on their skis, and it was hard to pass on the 8 foot wide trail. I did pass several people. And I fell three times, twice when I could not get rid of speed and lost control, and once where I caught an ice patch. On one of these faceplants, my right calf cramped up so badly I cried out in pain trying to move it. Oh, that hurt so much. I need to work on my quads so that snowplowing isn’t so hard at this point. I was having trouble directing the metal edge into the snowpack to slow me down. More practice on skis will help too. (There are no training shortcuts!) The knit gloves for this section may not be the best choice – when I fell, they instantly got wet and the snow clung to them. My hands got cold. Taking the gloves off, whacking them against my leg worked ok. I was very glad to see the end of the ski section. Volunteers now were a little less organized, but still so helpful. Brought me my bag. I ate a mini Cliff peanut butter bar. Yummy. Time including T2’: 35.10 versus goal of 30 minutes.

Run down: Starting the run down felt so good! I cheered as I headed out. I maintained an even pace that felt pretty easy – I wanted to make sure my calves didn’t give up the ghost! I took off the yak trax after ten steps, as I just didn’t need them. I think I was doing about 9:30 miles until the short uphill sections. I walked maybe 3 times. I took water and an orange at the aid station, which tasted really good. The last two uphills, I was praying I remembered that the last one was really the last one, and there wouldn’t be one more uphill! Just like K said, I was so glad to see the transition area!!! Time: 49.03 versus my goal of 50 minutes – excellent! I was really excited now about getting on my bike and finishing the race, hopefully under 6:30 total (Total time at this point: 5:45.)

Remember my race number? Unlucky 13? Unfortunately, my race was cut short – my first DNF. Someone had a seizure while driving their truck and ran over about 20 bikes in the transition area. Mine was one of them. My first thought was “but, how am I going to finish the race?” I guess I could have run down the 13 miles. I guess I took it pretty well – I joked with a few others who were standing there. It was neat to see the inside of my carbon fiber fork. And, no one had been hurt as a result of the accident (although I’m not sure how the fellow with the seizure is doing). That is amazing, with a full and quite busy transition area, that no one was injured. In the end, it was only ‘stuff’ that got destroyed, and the police said everyone would be given replacement cost for their items. So, I let it go. If I’d gotten to T1’ about 10 minutes earlier, I would have saved my bike. If I had had K’s cell number memorized, I would have called him from T1’ and asked him to loan me his bike so I could finish. Crazy, but I would have. I know it now! I thought that the 2 in his number was a 7, but I won’t mess it up again! With no way to finish the bike section, I picked up the pieces of my bike, loaded them on the team buses, and got back to the finish line. I was really disappointed that I wasn’t able to finish the race! I was really looking forward to crossing the finish line and being able to recount the whole day. K found me at the finish area and asked me how it went. I held up a piece of my bike’s fork, and told him I had a souvenir. K said I still have a great story, it just doesn't happen to be one about how I finished the race.

So, I’m disappointed, but I’m resolved to come back next year, about hopefully post an even better time. The event was fantastically well run, and course is gorgeous. Quad 2009 here I come!

Quad Prep v 3.

I love it when I come off a training day having eliminated some of that ever present self doubt.

“Coach” K and I headed out to Mt. Taylor a week before the race to do the ski and snowshoe sections. I’d been skiing a lot, so I hoped that I’d feel more powerful on the way up, and more at ease on the descent.

I woke up to a bad scene, however. I flipped on the light in the kitchen, and there was a mouse on the floor. Dead. Yuck. I left it for Co to take care of. Not proud of that, but I was grossed out and in a hurry. (Needless to say there was some kitchen cleaning done later that day!!!)

But the rest of the day was perfect, and the ski up was easy. I tried it without skins on my skis at first, but then put them on after maybe ½ mile – the slipping backwards was not helping. The snowshoe up and down was a good workout, and the descent on the skis was a blast – I didn’t even fall once. OK, I put my knee down once, but it was in a very controlled manner. Really. We ran into some guys out snowmobiling the ski course to get it level for the groomer to come out – they were really friendly, and seemed happy to see us out there. It took us about 2:40 including the stops we made on the way. Moving time was 2:00. Here’s an elevation plot to show what it was like. I wish I’d brought my camera to take photos from the top.

And, as a special bonus end to a great day, my manager called. She made me a verbal offer to become a permanent staff member where I work. I accepted. It feels like a weight has been lifted, in that I don’t have to start looking for another job. Yay!

How to Fall on your Sword

FREE lessons and instruction book available! Act now!

Falling on one’s sword is a noble gesture, but not everyone is able to undertake this act. Fear not! Co is willing and able to give one-on-one lessons on the feat. First tip: He recommends you start by sitting on a knife. Then move up from there.

'Twas the night before Quad prep v.2…. I was running about getting my things ready for the bike and run sections of the race. I was also thinking to myself – WHY am I still awake!?! It is 11:15. I have to get up at 5:30, with a long day ahead of me. *grumble grumble.*

Then Co calls from the other end of the house, “Mo, I need you.” I thought he wanted me to help him test this computer game scenario. “you’ve got to be kidding me…” *grumble grumble.* I took my time. I round the corner and see Co in the bathroom, with his pants around his ankles, blood on them, and Co looking a little panicked. He had stabbed himself in his inner thigh. See, he was playing with this military-type knife he uses to open letters. Then he set it in his lap while he was talking to friends on the computer. Then he adjusted his seating to sit on his ankle, and as he sat back down he stabbed himself. He was bleeding quite a bit. What did he say to our friends? “Hey V, I gotta go. Talk to you tomorrow.”

We worried that he had gotten the femoral artery, so in to the ER we go. You should have heard the nurses laughing when I explained how Co had managed to stab himself there. Six hours and three stitches later, and we’re back at home. I cancel Quad prep v.2, and go to bed.

Confronting the Ick factor

Am I squeamish? Maybe. Maybe not.

I came home one night a few weeks ago, to find Dante shut out of the office. Aww! Poor Dog. Since he has no voice of his own (except for loud groans) I asked Co what was up.

"His right front paw has a split nail, and it was bleeding. I wasn't sure about cutting the nail, I thought I'd wait til you got home."

"Oh," I said, feeling confident, "I'll go cut it now."

Upon looking at said split nail, I set down the toenail clipper hastily. The bottom of the toenail had split from the top half, and had split waaayyyy down into the quick. It was still bleeding a little. Dante licked my hand holding his paw. Poor Dog! To cut off the dangling portion would still leave a split in the nail quite a ways back into the toe. Ow!

We debated. Cut it? Where? As far back as possible? Only the dangling part? I told Co I would help him, but that I didn't think I could do the cutting. For sure we'd actually be cutting into his toe, so to speak. So Co goes for the clippers, gets Dante in the tub with his paws up on the edge, and.... hesitates. He's just not sure where to cut. Dante has no clue why he is getting so much attention!

We call a vet friend, B. She says, well, actually, you've got to yank it. Take a pliers and yank it out. Ack! Co says, hey, isn't that used for torture in small countries? B says, well, yes... this is why you only have one shot at it. Take it and yank, don't be gentle. If you screw it up, you're done. I hem and haw, and ask some inane questions, and B finally says,

"I'm working tomorrow. If you don't think you can do it, bring Dante in and I'll take care of it. "

So I was off the hook. Co was totally ok with letting B take care of it! He was not about to yank out the split toenail.

But. Well. What she said made sense, she said we could use corn starch or styptic to stop the bleeding. I was confident it wouldn't hurt Dante long term. Just the short term. Alot. Come on, am I going to drive for an hour to have her do this? Really?

So I did it. Dante laid down, Co held his paw, and I took the pliers and yanked.
A brief yelp, and Dante hops up and comes over to me to apologize for whatever he had done, and then he promptly forgets about the whole thing. Gotta love that about dogs.

Quad Prep v. 1

What is that, you ask? What those two abbreviated words mean to me is a whole lot of (fun) biking, running, x-country skiing, and snowshoeing up and down a mountain. The race is the Mt. Taylor Quadrathlon – you go up the mountain (bike, run, ski, then snowshoe) then turn around and come back down. At the summit, you’re at 11301 feet. The race starts at Grants, NM; elevation 6450. Not bad! The race course is 42 miles long, but will still take me about 6.5 hours to finish because of the elevation changes. Okay, maybe longer. I really have no clue.

I went out on Friday 1/18 to do the ski and snowshoe portion of the race with a friend who knows the course. We get extra credit for getting the Outback stuck and digging it out, twice, plus skiing an extra 2 miles. Extra credit is good for the psyche. The whole excursion took us about 4 hours.

You may think the ascent would be the hardest part. You’d be wrong. Descending on cross country skis after you’re tired from ascending on ski and snowshoe – THAT is no mean feat! Picture your legs kinda wobbly, your hands kinda cold, and then think about going down a grade that is steep enough to easily make up part of a downhill ski terrain in Wisconsin, but only 6 feet wide. Oh, and the water froze in your Camelbak tube an hour ago, even though you swear you blew it back into the reservoir. Oops. As the first cross country ski of the year, perhaps this was a little ambitious.

But I think I fell less than my friend.
:)