The 6 mile downward decline on the bike path to the Peaks Trail should have been easy, but it wasn’t. There was a headwind and I found myself alone trying to spin a big gear to maintain a “fast” speed. I kept looking at the mileage count on my Garmin and despite the faster pavement speed, the miles ticked by slowly and I grimaced from the pain. The tourists on the bike path probably thought I was weird.
I had no idea what my gap was getting onto the Peaks Trail and later found out it was a mere 3 minutes. I assumed I couldn’t lollygag and attempted to keep the speed at full gas. The only problem was I was OUT of gas and was not able to ride to the top of the rollers on the trail. I’d poop out 5-10 yards before the top of each climb, run, and get moving again.
The short dirt road climb to the finish twisted the knife in my quads. I felt completely drained, but happy to take the stage win. About 3 minutes later, Selene crossed the line looking strong! JJ was working at the finish every day and he told me at the party after the race that he could tell how my day went based on what I ate. “Oranges. You eat a lot of them at the finishes where you struggle.” I did eat a lot of oranges that day.
After the stage, I got back to the condo and had to lay down, chamois and all. After all the other finishes, I energetically burst into the room telling Yuki and Jeff about the excitement of the day. Fortunately, there was only one day to go.
STAGE 6
At the Stage 6 meeting the night before, Selene said, “Parade lap tomorrow?” meaning that we would all ride together at a more leisurely pace. I said, “Are you sure?” She said, “I won’t be able to make up the 40 minutes you have on me unless you rip off your derailleur or break your bike, and I wouldn’t want to win that way anyway. I want to look around and enjoy the ride tomorrow. Are you cool with that?” Hell yeah I was! We also checked the gaps between the other racers and asked if that was cool. Everyone agreed, so the stage was essentially neutralized for us.
