In your head

Date: July 2
Mileage: 50.4
July mileage: 66.7
Temperature upon departure: 55
A reporter asked Geoff an interesting question the other day that I had never thought much about before - when you're out running or biking solo for four or eight or 24 hours, what do you think about? A lot of people would like to believe that the act of engaging in intense physical activity will lead them to life affirmations or ponderings on the human condition. But really, as Geoff answered, it's no different that driving or sitting alone in a coffee shop. What does a person think about when forced to spend four hours by themselves? Mostly, the random and the mundane.

People who know me know that I like to mark random and mundane anniversaries, and sometimes I spend the solo time on my bike dreaming them up. Today I did a three-hour ride that was intermittently chilled with headwinds and sweaty while tailwinds held the air stagnant as I climbed a couple of long hills. But I also realized today that July 2, 2006, marks nine years since the incident that remains my closest brush with death by outdoor adventure.

I coaxed my boyfriend at the time to hike with me up the Pfeiferhorn, an Alps-like pinnacle that towers above the Salt Lake valley. He was, for the most part, terrified of mountaineering in general but wasn't about to let his 17-year-old girlfriend out-man him, so he followed me tentatively as we traversed a knife ridge and scrambled up the scree-lined face of a mountain so steep that from a half-mile away it looks like a sheer cliff. Everything was going textbook well, and he was pretty buzzed by the time we began to work our way down. I thought for sure that I had him converted.

We were crab-walking down a boulder outcropping when he made a joke about skiing on the snowfield that plunges down the length of the bowl - about 1,000 feet elevation - into Lower Red Pine Lake. Not understanding that he was entirely kidding, I said "That's a great idea!" Why labor down a mountain when you don't have to? So, equipped with only an old book bag and a plastic zip-lock baggie that had formerly held my lunch, I stepped out onto the snowfield and motioned for Eric to come join me. He stood almost frozen in place as I turned to make what may be the stupidest single motion I have ever made - I placed that zippy neatly on the crusted snow and sat down.

The fraction of a second that my butt had contact with that plastic zippy was the closest I came to any semblance of control. Within another fraction of a second, my body was careening, zippy-free, in a downward spiral toward the lake. The boulder outcropping where Eric stood was mere feet from my path; he swore for months afterward that he saw my head hit a rock. But all I felt was the burn of ice shards against my bare skin. All I saw was a whirpool of blue sky. And all I could think about was a trick I had learned the previous winter - that if I wanted to stop my snowboard, all I had to do was turn sideways. Problem is, I had no idea which direction sideways was.

After several of those eternal seconds, by some miracle clearning all of the thousands of boulders scattered over the snowfield, I planted my feet in a large depression and managed to make them stick. My body still swung around until I was lying sideways, facing up the mountain, squinting at the tiny stick figure of Eric waving from a rock many hundreds of feet above my current position. It took him a full 15 minutes to get down to me, and by that time I had crawled back to the boulder outcropping, stood up, and erupted into fits of laughter. I never saw my book bag - or the zippy - again. I also never convinced Eric to go "peak bagging" with me again. And I have never since, even with an ice ax, tried glissading. Good life lessons - those are the random things I think about while I'm grinding at the pedals.

On the boardwalk

Date: July 1
Mileage: 16.3
July mileage: 16.3
Temperature upon departure: 58

Wow. Until today, if someone had asked me if there were any good mountain biking trails in Homer, I would have scrunched up my nose and told them sure - but if they had anything longer than a three-mile ride in mind, they'd have to wait until January.

When I heard rumors that my ice-biking Mecca - a vast network of snowmobile trails weaving through the muskeg around Caribou Lake - had a rideable summer trail, I was very skeptical. But today Geoff and I decided to drive out there and see for ourselves.

During the winter, the Caribou Lake Trail rolls over ridges on punchy, snow-covered double track and traverses the bogs on fast, smooth ice roads. To my pleasant surprise, in the summer it does pretty much the exact same thing - if you replace snow with rutted dirt and the ice roads with hundreds of rough-cut 2x4s.

Fast and fun - and so completely rideable that you can go all the way to the lake and back without so much as getting your feet wet (unless you're like me, and try to shortcut across a bog only to sink up to your rear derailleur in sludge.) The mosquitoes will keep you moving - but everything else about this trail is like that California Adventure Park at Disney Land - all of the pleasure; none of the effort (OK ... Maybe a little effort).

I'm not even sure who put a trail this sophisticated out at an absolute end-of-the-road, middle-of-nowhere destination. My best guess is local land owners, who use ATVs to transport supplies into their remote cabins. But I think local bike enthusiasts helped. Either way, it rocks. Now, when I meet a person that tells me they're coming down here to catch a halibut or fish for king salmon in a slough, or do whatever people come to Homer to do, I'm going to insist they bring a bicycle. "This trail is pretty much the best thing about Homer," I'll say. And, depending on the day, I might even mean it.

Guilty until proven innocent

There is something seriously wrong with the Tour de France. Really. To dash the hopes of thousands by kicking out your top players mere hours before the event. Barry Bonds is under intense doping scrutiny, and they still let him play. Why? Because he's interesting at it. That's the American way.

I'm not saying I'm an advocate of illegal substance abuse; but what happened to burden of proof? I think casual fans such as myself should toss their cable boxes out the window in protest. Then they should tune into another crazy long bike race where substance abuse is still limited to caffeine, and perhaps the occasional something that a Ninilchik resident would grow in their attic.
The Great Divide Race has been plugging along for just over a week now. Eight racers started the 2,500-mile epic across the Continental Divide trail. I believe five are still in, laboring toward the Mexican border. All the updates are posted on a very thorough blogspot blog. Beats OLN anyday, if you ask me.

A baiku attempt

Date: June 29
Mileage: 17.1
June mileage: 664.4
Temperature upon departure: 57

Got back on the bike
Saddle sores still scabbed over
Summer never waits

Recovery

I've been feeling like a slug for the past couple of days, a little unsure about the point when my body goes from "recovery" to "atrophy while eating Tostitos on the couch." I hit the gym today because I thought it would be good for my energy level to get my heart rate up without stressing my impact injuries. Can't say it helped, but at the same time - it didn't seem to hurt. And that led me to another question - if 72 hours after a 24-hour race, I feel well enough to run for an hour, maybe I didn't push myself hard enough during the race itself. But how do you make that decision? Where does "pushing hard" turn to "massive meltdown in the middle of the woods?"

I am still dealing with Kincaid fallout. I'm beginning to wonder if I'll ever get the feeling back in my three middle fingers on my right hand - they're disconcertingly locked in that "asleep" phase that usually precludes the tingly feeling that leads back to normal circulation. I also regained that constant, sharp pain in my left shoulder, proving that it's not a camelbak injury, but rather a consequence of hanging over handlebars for 24 hours. As for my fingers - I blame the roots.

At the same time, I do feel pretty good for just putting my body through the 16 circles of hell. It has me asking those "what if" questions, and I'm already formulating a plan for "next time:"

1. Race more competitively. Now that I know I can ride it out, I feel like it wouldn't take an unreasonable amount of effort to ride faster.
2. Take less chatty breaks. This goes with being more competitive. On Saturday and Sunday, I wasted a lot of time stopped at my camp, nibbling on sandwiches and chatting with Geoff. This added to the enjoyment of the race for sure, but did nothing for recovery and generally slowed down my progress.
3. Experiment with liquid nutrition. Peanut Butter Sandwiches, while delicious, just don't ride well over the long haul, I've learned. I probably don't need to elaborate.
4. Start keeping closer track of my progress. If I had decided to make a push beginning at 5 a.m. rather than 9 a.m., I could have easily completed 17 laps instead of 16. As it was, I came up only 10 minutes short.

I already feel excited. It's amazing how quickly we forget the pain in the aftermath of one fleeting moment of triumph ... how I wasn't able to eat - and hardly drink - for the last 40 miles of the race as I struggled with sensations that my body was about to turn inside out ... how my forearms vibrated with intense pain as I flew over roots and rocks, unwilling to slow down and waste perfectly good gravity ... how after 18 hours in the same pair of sweaty shorts, I ended up with the equivalent of a diaper rash ... but that didn't matter anyway because I already had a saddle sore on the verge of bleeding.

And yet, every time I rolled through that checkpoint, I'd get this self-fulfilling surge of energy -adrenaline and dopamine, a dangerous cocktail that turns even the most unlikely candidates into endurance junkies. It reminds me of a quote I heard by Alaska endurance racer Bill Merchant that applies to his epic Iditarod Invitational race, but works well in this context, too:

"We go into the Alaska backcountry to see if we have any cracks in ourselves. We go back a year later to see if we've done anything about them."

Fifth place!

Geoff took this photo at the mass start of the 24 Hours of Kincaid race, a sprint to the bikes that were lined up 50 meters from the starting line. Before the giant stadium clock ticked 12:00:00, I had a quick exchange with the three women in the top left. They talked about how ridiculous it was to begin a 12 and 24-hour-long race with a 50-meter dash. But what a fun way to begin what can become a grueling, repetitive, sometimes excruciatingly slow race. I ran it. I'm not ashamed. Then I climbed onto my bike for the turtle crawl into fifth place of the solo division - and first woman, though there aren't separate rankings. It's my first time being in the top third of any pack, let alone some of the top endurance racers in the state. Slow and steady, but steady is key.

When I set out into the bluebird weather of high noon, I truly had no idea what I was in for. I rode Kincaid Park only once before, in July 2003, and I remember it as somewhat difficult - but then again, in 2003 I had about as much mountain biking experience as a 6-year-old in Kansas. And then I heard people talk about Kincaid as a "road bike" trail network. I figured - how bad could it be?

Either those people have one gnarly road bike, or the Kincaid race organizers, geniuses all, plotted out a loop to circle the toughest terrain that glacial moraine has to offer. Less than a quarter mile into the race the hills began - fast rising, fast falling, climbing a total of 1,100 feet in every lap. Interspersed among that steep double track was at least three miles of fairly technical single track - jumping roots, ducking fallen trees, and plummeting down veritable cliff bands with my butt so far over the seat that I could almost feel the tread on my back tire spinning around. It was difficult enough that after six miles I thought I was going to cry, because I thought there was no way I was going to be able to sustain such effort and focus for 24 hours. But at mile 7 the miracle of Kincaid opened up. The trail dropped into a roller coaster so fast and fun that by mile 10.5 - the starting line - I had completely forgotten why I was so upset. Then I continued that process. For 15 more laps. Those race organizers are geniuses.

The effort of going all night was actually my time to shine. With the 12-hour racers finished, and many of the team racers and most of their support network in bed, I suddenly found myself alone in the Zen twilight - pumping out the miles with serene complacency and a carefully selected songlist on my iPod. At 3:30 a.m., after just one lap with my headlight on, I watched the sun begin to rise in nearly the same spot I had seen it set three hours earlier. I did my fastest lap of the race in the quiet dawn between 3:43 and 4:55 a.m.

It's amazing how those quiet moments, rolling past patches of purple lupine or a moose settled in to watch you go by, add up to statistics that make your mom's jaw drop. Even today, I think about the way I just rode nearly 170 miles yesterday, climbing more than 16,600 feet in the process, all the while maneuvering all those roots and hairpin turns - and it doesn't even seem possible. At yet, at the time, it's just the process, the routine, the way things add up. Slowly. One lap at a time.

I feel like I have more to say, but it's just about time to hit the pillow. Tomorrow, I'll probably try again. In the meantime, I just wanted to thank my fellow racers for their support, Tim and Dave of Megasorass, winner Pete Basinger for being the inspiring machine that he is, and race organizer Reggi Parks for being so enthusiastic and cheering for me every time I went by that checkpoint. And of course, Geoff, for the 3 a.m. peanut butter sandwiches that showed up in the cooler and for lubing and tuning my bike when I was too fargone to care. These races are a team effort no matter how much you enjoy the solitude. That's what makes them so rewarding.