After stepping out of the car in Chittering at 8am on Sunday morning, I thought I had missed a memo and had turned up for a bikram yoga session instead of a bike race.
There was no memo. This was a bike race. It was hot.
Peer pressure (from me) had meant that SPR had 9 girls entered into the Women’s A grade race (out of 12 starters), so we were fairly confident that the odds were in favour of at least one of us making it onto the podium.
With no warm up being done by me (trying to conserve as much bodily fluid as I could), I wasn’t sure how the day was going to go. I had checked out the route and the rolling hills is definitely my preferred style of course. However, I have never raced in super hot conditions, so was just ‘going with the flow’ so to speak.
Thankfully the race started pretty slow with a few accelerations in the first 10km. The first hill saw 4 of us break away from the group, which included myself, Jess, Liz and a WAIS girl (2 SPR girls – awesome!)
Not too much happened during the remainder of the first lap, with the 4 of us concentrating on staying away from the rest of the bunch. The mercury was continuing to rise, but I was feeling pretty fresh at this point (oh how this changed).
The start of lap two was where things got ‘interesting’. The WAIS girl dropped off (after doing barely any work on the front – she must have been suffering in the heat), then I dropped off after feeling like I was going to have a stroke on the hill with the sudden blast of heat (the HR had reached high 190s – heat and caffeine taking effect!). Then 200m or so up the road, Jess dropped off from Liz and was also suffering in the heat.
In all honesty, I nearly considered pulling out after the 2nd lap as I was not feeling good. My feet had expanded to rather epic proportions and drinking my electrolyte was like pouring super sweet hot water into my mouth (not exactly refreshing). However, I had Jess in my sights and as I entered into the 3rd lap, I found that I was still pedalling and thoughts of abandoning were thrown out of the window as my competitive streak took control. I caught Jess and then carried on time trial style, while feeding on a mixture of gels and flies. The cycling top was completely unzipped in the hopes of providing some kind of cooling effect (the reality of this plan did not play out in real life). By the time I hit the 4th lap, I was starting to have hallucinations of being covered in ice cubes. Forcing gels and hot water into my mouth was becoming some kind of medieval torture. I also started feeling a bit cold and the HR was climbing higher as my blood started to boil inside me (??!! – a sure sign of heat exhaustion). Flies had also decided to take refuge on my face, in my mouth and behind my glasses. Delightful.
It was awesome to see the ‘1km to go sign’. It was even more awesome to cross the finish line in 2nd place, rip the shoes off, stand in a cold puddle and down an ice cold lemonade (cheers Ryan).
SPR managed 2nd place (me) in the A grade women, 3rd place (Jess) and 4th (Anna)…I think Pete will be proud!
Thanks to all the SPR girls who gave the race a go and finished it! For many of them, it was their first race so to actually finish in those conditions was super gutsy!!
NDCC put on a great race, with super friendly officials and plenty of cold ones at the end!
Bring on the next race!
Awesome work. Congratulations on the podium, and the same to everyone who competed. The weather was pretty horrid just standing outside, let alone trying to race in the heatsink that is Chittering Valley.
Not only Pete, but the whole club are supper proud of ALL the girls for having a go. Congrats to the Podium Girls (For a change actually standing there in their own right) and all the others that competed. Well done, and hopefully other organisers will start to run a womens race as well.
Top effort!
Priceless write up Bec,I think we’re all glad you censored your real dreams about the ice cubes!
I got 3 day licenses so I guess I’d better do another 2….fool.
Well done to all the guys who ventured out too. The SPR love was out in force.
waiting on confirmation from the city of vic park, but our first crit should be on the 18th dec. will post a blog when we know for sure. you can use a race licence then,
Great effort by all who raced in those conditions, and a fantastic result by the girls! It was quite hot enough on a social ride – let alone racing.
Yes a day to forget weather wise haha. Good work on all finishers it was tough!
Really good effort by all the girls; much tougher than the guys who had others to ride with most of the way. To see Alison and Kat out on the windy road by themselves in 36 degrees was inspiring stuff. Chapeaux to all concerned.
Great effort ladies! Nice write up Rebecca and congrats on 2nd place! Make sure you grab yourself a Camelback Podium Chill (or Polar Insulated) drink bottle from your local LBS and freeze half the contents overnight. Icy cold fluid for hours….
😉
Oh my gosh thanks for that Stuart!! I will grab one to make sure my beer stays cold on those long hills rides :p
Fantastic to see the SPR girls riding strongly in races.
Congratulations Rebecca, I was on the scene to watch and to see you pull back into second place was courage personified.
Very proud of all of the girls who raced 🙂
Great race and write up Bec – although it brought back memories I didn’t actually want to re-live!
The support from the SPR crew for all of the girls has been fabulous, many thanks.
Another trick Bec, freeze your waterbottles….at least they stayed coolish until lap 2!
Did the one in the dress ride? Or was she just there for her looks? 😉
I did freeze the buggers but they were warm by the time I hit lap 2 haha. Thanks for that Grant…got to say the support riding through the start/finish line kept me going 🙂
The one in the dress was Anna…she rode well and scored a 4th placing! She’s was just hoping to raise the temperature a few more degrees…hahaha
Spot on recapturing the hell of the North Bec!
Thanks for the support – wish the dude at the start line had told us earlier that we could have support passing us water before we got to the line!!! LOL
Anyway great efforts by all – I’ll have to try gel shots out as I did that whole race with zip!