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Draper Mile

As the summer drew to an end, one of the events that I was getting pretty excited for was the Draper Mile. Ever since I signed up for Richmond Maration, I'd been running more than ever before and was feeling pretty strong.

This annual one-mile race put on by the Blacksburg Striders and Runabout Sports is a part of giant, two-day celebration known as Steppin Out. It's basically a huge festival in downtown BBurg, with three stages and hundreds of local artisans and businesses covering downtown in their tents.

At the start line, I found Ignacio Moore who is a prof at VT that I know from cycling, and he said he was planning to run 4:45 pace so my plan was to stick with him for the race. At the starting line, there were tons of us skinny guys in short shorts crowded onto the line and it was pretty intense.

The gun went off and the fast guys whom I had lined up behind took off.  Without thinking, I took off with them. We were flying, and in very little time crossed the (slightly uphill) quarter mile mark with a timer reading off 61...62...63. Hearing these numbers, I knew that I had went out to hard, but kept going. Before long, my legs were just big loaves of lactic acid, and moving them became laborious. I dropped off that very front group, trying to hold some pace on the downhill, but going only as fast as my exploded legs would let me. A long line of runners passed me all the way through the finish line. It wasn't much after the initial explosion that Ig flew by me, embarrasing. And two girls passed me, but there was nothing I could do about it.  Needless to say, I didn't hit the 5-min mark, but still finished in 5:20...my fastest mile ever! Link to results: http://civic.bev.net/striders/DM2011_agegroups.html

Six hours of Dirty Dawg

After a crazy week (Lyric Monday, TOTS Tuesday, Wed comedy night, Thurs baseball game), I spent a night in the woods Friday night (hammock style of course) and then partook in the longest bicycle race I've ever done, and it was on a mountain bike! I was hoping to get some time to think about what I want to study, and that didn't happen, but the race was nothing short of EPIC.

The idea is to complete as many laps as possible of a 5.7mi course in 6 hours.  Laps were rumored to take 45min, and Christian was shooting for 50min, so having only mountain biked twice this summer I set my goal at 1hr pace for a total of 6 laps.  There were three categories: solo, duo, and single speed. Duo guys alternate laps, solo do it alone, and the real crazies aren't the solo guys (myself included) but the single speeders. They're riding with one gear up and down the mountains for 6 hours...

Kirby sent us off at 1PM, to do a small part of the course before coming through the start/finish area.  I started near the back, and that turned out to be a huge mistake.  At the first corner, someone ahead didn't make it up the steep and technical little climb, and there were 40 of us that had to get off and walk up too.  Then the pace was pretty weak, and it wasn't until we hit some grass that I could open up and get around everyone.  It was probably good that I didn't hammer out of the gate though.

The first few laps went without issue, and I turned in some 45min lap times which I was happy with while still learning the course.  I went hard up the long climb, but wasn't really feeling too fatigued.

Crash 1

There were some gravel sections, and on one of them I locked out my front fork because it's easier. Basically, turned off the suspension.  Well, having been riding for like 3 hours, I forgot to unlock it and went bombing down the ensuing downhill. On the downhill, there's a log in the way, and I'd been fine bunny hopping it every other time.  But when I landed, the suspension didn't absorb shock...instead sent it right back at me, and it sent me flying through the air.  Realizing I was in the air, I had a pretty cool moment, and thought about what I should do.  "Tuck and roll" popped into my head, and that's exactly what I did by lowering my shoulder into the trail below and rolling along.  Turns out, this is the best way to crash, and I got up , saw no blood, and kept right on going.

Rain

During the race, somewhere around 3hrs I think, it started pouring. Just downpouring.  I got soaked to the  bone, which was fine, but my cell phone I had left in the hammock probably wasn't as happy.  Nor was the trail, which for real real sloppy, and the rocks on this very rocky course, which protested by becoming extremely slippery.

Crash 2

At the 3hr mark, I was one minute off finishing four laps, and figured I should keep it up and go for nine laps. I'd get to finish the 9th lap if I came in before the 6hr mark.  So, two laps later, on what was my 6th lap, I was again bombing down the really rocky downhill.  Having seen Mark Zhu crash on it right after it started raining, I had been pretty intent on focusing on the trail.  But after 4.5hrs of riding at this point, constantly monitoring the trail ahead for every root and rock, my focus had dwindled.

I'd just lapped Cecil, and then before I knew it, the bike was gone from underneath me and I was headed for the trail.  I didn't have time to react, and the trail was really rocky = not a good combination.  I landed hard on my leg and rolled onto my back, still attached to the bike in one big clump of mud, person, and aluminum.  Cecil saw this and stopped when I asked him if the bleeding gash on my leg needed stiches, and being able to see the white fatty tissue underneath when I pulled it apart, it seemed that I did.  After debating whether to head back up the climb to the start/finish, since there weren't actually any paramedics there, I decided to just take a really really easy lap.

Emma caught up, and we all rode together which actually turned out to be a lot of fun!  After losing something like 30min on that lap (and getting passed massively), I spent another 20min at the support area cleaning out the mud and putting on some butterfly bandages.

The Moment

After the adrenaline from the crash had long worn away, and I'd been riding for five hours, now bleeding, my body ached and I was about to throw in the towel.  On my slow 6th lap, and the time I'd been at S/F, a bunch of people had passed.  I wandered over to the tent where they we're keeping places, and looked that I was now in 7th, but not too far behind.  One more guy came through for his 7th lap, and then something clicked.  I said "I'm gonna go get him" and hopped on my bike and sprinted off.

I hammered hard for the next 40min, and turned in my fastest lap time of the day on lap 7.  Coming back through, I checked and have passed up to 3rd place overall.  Looking back, there was someone coming down the trail behind me, so I took off without grabbing food or water.  It was now 5:50 into the race, and I just had to hold off everyone behind me to hold onto 3rd place.  2nd place was 15 out, so there was no catching him.  My legs cramped on the long uphill, forcing me to stop and stretch.  I'd look back and see below in the woods, and hop back on and spin as hard as my legs would let me (pretty easy).  I took advantage of my knowledge of the course and hopped off and ran the few really short, really steep sections, and held my speed on the downhills.  On the gravel, I opened up as much as I could, and by the time I was coming to the end, had done it.

Post-race

I pretty much tipped over, and supporters brought me a cheeseburger and beer, perfect!  I told Kirby that I was probably heading out to the ER to get stiches, and as I was packing up, realized my phone had been left in the rain.  Kirby said that he would do awards in like 10 min, so I pulled up my car, and took my third place! Top three in each category got to pick a prize from the table, and I got a seat which I desperately needed.  The one I raced on was really crooked the whole time.  Kyle and Brice won the Duo category, and Kyle got a tire that he needed (he'd rode the finish of the race with a flat to hold a 1min lead) and Brice got a bike cleaning kit (which we all desperately needed).

I was supposed to go over to Stephanie's for dinner, but it was already close to 9PM, I still had to go to the ER, and I was phone-less.  I sent her an email, and a tweet to my parents when I stopped at home, and headed out.

ER

Turned out that my doctor was a huge cyclist, after the PA saw me and said "Dr. ..., you have got to see this!" I was covered in thick mud, including my face, and did have a nice gash.  We talked for awhile, I actually felt a little bad for the other people in the ER.  The PA was super super nice, and got my cut cleaned up.  Turned out that I didn't actually need stiches, but I got it cleaned really really well and some supplies to bandage it.

As I was on the phone with my parents, (apparently the "I'm fine" prefacing my tweet is not sufficient to tell them I'm okay), Greg P walked out of another room.  He had come up from his internship in NC with Kevin and one of their other friends to do the MTB race, and against him, the race had won.  He came in because he had some pretty severe dehydration, and I wanna give some props to Kevin P for having only ridden a mountain bike like twice, bringing a small, fully rigid, commuter with v-brakes and finishing the race.  He was on a duo team with the other guy (sorry, forgot his name), but still he manned up.

One of the funnier moments was when Kevin walked over to my tent area with his bike before the race.  Immediately, all of us hardcore mountain bikers had tools in our hands, and were surrounding his bike; taking off reflectors, fixing his seat height, swapping out his pedals.  I let him borrow my other pair of clipless shoes and pedals, since I was borrowing James, and a VT jersey so he'd look legit.

Dinner/Crash

I was finally able to get ahold of Stephanie with Paul's phone when I got back home at 11, and she had actually waited! After I showered off, and dropped off the other guy's gear at James' place, I went over to her place for some delicious and much needed stuffed shells.  My Garmin told me that I burned over 8,000 calories, which is probably high, but still a lot.  After a long week, and a hard race, lots of food, I slept like a baby once I got back.

All in all, my first endurance race was awesome.  I'm proud of my "moment" to man up, and didn't get too injured really.  Although it's been four days, and my right quad still had a nasty looking bruise. It's actually getting worse.  That 12 mile run last night couldn't have helped.  Anyways, that's all for now, I shall post pictures once they're up!