Ridin' in the Rain

Week 16: June 16-June 22

Bike: 270 km
Run: 0 km
Swim: 1500 m

It was solstice weekend in the Yukon and time for more than 1000 cyclists to join together in suffering and complete the 240 km ride from Haines Junction to Haines, Alaska. This ride an be done in teams of 8, 4, 2 or as a solo. For the first time, I was attempting to finish the entire trip as a solo rider. Thankfully, I had my Dad to ride with, a seasoned veteran on his 4th full Kluane Chilkat bike ride. The plan was to ride together, and then I would sprint away in the final 20 meters (a skill I had learned from my Mother who had honed the maneuver during the Birkie ski race.

As a solo female rider, I knew I was going to be in a pretty small grouping. I was crossing my fingers, hoping that there would be less than 3 of us - guaranteeing myself a podium finish. Unfortunately, my hopes were dashed when I got to the Captain's meeting and saw there were 6 girls - my hopes for the podium were gone and I was fairly sure a top 5 would be out of reach. At least I was going to finish in the top 10...

After 5 years my KCIBR planning skills have been perfected. This is after a 2 years of doing the full drive in one day (5 am drive to Haines Junction for the start and a post-race drive back to Whitehorse)and 1 year of 3 people sleeping in a 1 bed hotel room. This year, I booked the hotels one year in advance and took the Friday off work. This approach worked well - especially because I was extra careful and booked 2 rooms in both Haines and Haines Junction, so when Dad tried to check into the Alcan and there was someone already in his room, we were able to all sleep in the same room without too much trouble.

The Haines to Haines relay started with a Bailey's and Coffee early Saturday morning. I have decided that this is not an ideal pre-race beverage, as it didn't take long for my stomach to become displeased with me. My Dad and I started off slow (okay - we were the last ones to get up the Haines Junction hill), but soon took advantage of an uncharacteristic tailwind and starting flying towards Dezadeash Lake. It seemed like the first 3 legs of the course were over with quickly and besides a mini-breakdown at leg 2, where I thought my knee would cause me to pull out of the race, I was feeling good. My Dad and I were riding together and able to rotate pulling (with the Dad rotation being inevitably longer than the daughter ones). Even when we hit leg 4 and the big hill out of Million Dollar Falls, I was feeling strong and had a great ride up the hill with Wendy (thank God her bike was about 5 pounds heavier, 10 years older, and I was able to keep up).

The main job of my KCIBR support is to listen to me whine. I usually catch up with Tony and the Subaru every 20 km, which gives me almost one hour to think about all the things I could whine about. I create a mental list, which I then prioritize, just in case I don't have time to whine about everything. When I met up with Tony after leg 4, I started whining about my stomach, when Tony (correctly) pointed out that I'd only drank 1.5 bottles in 100 km of riding. This was a bit dissappointing because it ruined my perfectly good complaining with a solution. Then I whined about having to pee - Tony pointed out a bush for me to squat behind. I was almost out of ideas when it started to rain harder, and I began to whine about being cold. At this point I realized that my Dad still hadn't arrived, which was part of the reason I was getting cold. This led to some fairly heavy duty complaining that I didn't know what had happened to my Dad. Unfortunately, Dad did not have the complaining gene and had been suffering through some stomach problems and instead of whining had decided to take a quick nap in the ditch. I didn't know this, so I decided to keep moving on my bike, and leave Tony the job of finding my Dad.

Once I got back on the road, I caught up with George and his pack of solo riders who were kind enough to let me join their pack. I couldn't decide if the pack riding was good because it cut out the (now) headwind, or if it was a bad thing because the wet conditions were leading to grit and water being sprayed into my already wet face. Leg 5 of the race was definitely the most brutally slow and miserable, and I was happy when we got to the checkpoint and the last of the summit legs. At this point, I had to disembark from my pack of fellow solo-ites, as they were stopping for food and Tony was still behind me with the dry/warm clothes. I was nice and soaked and figured that stopping would lead to hypothermia and possible death.

Leg 6 started with a big climb, but my favorite "Steep Descent - 18 km" sign was at the top of the hill and I started to cruise down towards Haines. The hill was long, fast, rainy (picture being pelted with little spit balls at 50 km/h), and very cold. The realization that I was going to get to the bottom of this hill, completely soaked, and Tony was nowhere to be found started to sick in and I began to panic...who would be there to hear me complain about the freezing rain or road grit??? More importantly how would I ever warm up. At checkpoint 7 I found salvation in Beth's friend Margo, who was able to provide a warm coat; as I sped by the 50 car line up waiting at the border I realized this would be my last piece of dry clothing until the finish line.

The last 2 legs were long, flat, windy and largely uneventful. My IPod bit it with about 30 km to go and I suffered through the last hour and a half in silence. Tony managed to catch me with 20 km to go and we planned to meet at the finish line, so I could get some warm clothes. I happily rode through the finish, down the hill and into the waiting car. I stripped out of the cold, wet clothes (much too tired to be modest) and we headed back down the course to support my Dad through the final 20 km. Our hotel room was about 100 meters from the finish, and when Dad crossed the line we went straight for a warm shower.

The 5th riding of the KCIBR was a success. The big question will be whether I solo it again next year (a challenging, but relatively pain-free experience), or try it as a 4-person team and go with a fast, but insanely difficult event. Only time will tell...

Sierra posted this on Jun 30, 2008 from the outside | | permanent link