Notes
This is the remaining portion of the course. We had a nice tailwind out of the South for the first 50 miles or so which led to a quick pace going out. We kept it pretty easy though to conserve energy for the return trip. We took a pit stop in Richards at about the halfway point to refill our bottles. At this point, since it was humid, I took up Aaron's offer to share his electrolytes (Nuun). I hadn't had any trouble up to this point, but figured I was sweating a lot so it wouldn't hurt. BAD DECISION. The Nuun tablet dissolves in your water bottle, but it's kinda like alka-seltzer and fizzes and produces a gas because my bottle kept squirting out every time I took a drink. I downed this bottle over the next 15 miles or so and then immediately started feeling bad...throwing up in my mouth. I kept quiet about this for a while and pushed on against the wind for another 10-15 miles but it was getting worse and worse with every mile. I had slowed significantly between mile 80-90 and finally a little after mile 90 we stopped at a gas station for another pit stop. I leaned my bike on a pole, walked to the side of the building and threw up everything in my stomach in 4 violent bursts. It felt terrible. I forgot how painful it is to throw up to the point that you are dry heaving afterward. I poured some water on the back of my neck took in half a stinger waffle and about half a bottle of water and felt MUCH better. We got back on the bike and I felt pretty good, just a little weak. I was great over the next 10 miles or so and then my weakness started to show on the last 5-10 miles since I had nothing in my stomach. I was very thankful to be back at the truck! The part I'm most dissapointed about is I knew better than to try ANYTHING new that I wouldn't be using on race day and it didn't even cross my mind that I'd never used the Nuun stuff before. Oh well...lesson learned. I'm glad I learned it before race day.
I predict the toughest part of race day will not be the ride itself but rather the humidity and the wind. Even with throwing up and feeling terrible for a good 40-50 miles of the ride, we still averaged high 18 mph. There's some encouragement!