John's Tuesday Ride
by Rob Schott
report filed 24 May 05
I was on vacation last week and worked much of it, including a day of call when I should have been vacating. As payback I took today off for some recreation: the "Tuesday Ride". John Elgart and a shifting cast of cycling types do a longish ride every Tuesday (since January), with sections, particularly today, that were described as "hard" and with "lots of climbing". These are code words for "brutal" and "nearly impossible" in my lexicon.
I flopped in the back on John's van for the hour drive to Jackson, up in the foothills. Seven "serious" cyclists were there (I feared I was the most casual of the lot, riding barely 200 miles a week). One fellow, Bennie, retired, rode 4100 miles last March. That was in a month. Every day, 8 hours or so, in some sort of National Ride Your Bike Month. It was a contest, I guess. He won. There were 2 Jesse's- one a physiology grad student and another owns a local bike shop. Both 30-somethings and competitive in cycling- lean and hard. Then Tony Reid, who also rides a bunch and is a good racer (not sure what he does with the rest of his time), and Rick and John who've been riding alot in preparation for defense of their National Time Trial Championship on a tandem, among other celebrated bike things.
There was discussion of the PG&E road (Pacific Gas). This climbs up over 5500' as it turns out with sections of dirt and grades of perhaps 20%. Most of it is exposed (on day when the mercury was in the 90's). It just goes up relentlessly along the edge of a beautiful canyon near the Mokeleme River (I actually have no idea where I was most of the day). Tony had done this before and advised: have plenty of water and "stay within yourself". I understand better what he meant by this after 2 or 3 hours of slogging up this mountain without adequate water and riding over my head.
We finally emerged onto Highway 88 which runs across the Sierras. There was a bar/store- I drank 2 cokes and loaded my water bottles with half-gatorade and water, unloading a large black bug that was floating in one (where did he come from?). I poured him out with a little of the contents and saved the rest. I didn't think I could get West Nile from an ingestion. I drank until I was bloated, sensing that I was in a spot of trouble, hoping the caffeine would help. I ate a bar (my only food in 7 hours).
Having not ridden yesterday I was relatively fresh and realized early on that I was having a good climbing day. All these guys can ascend faster than I can, but I was able to keep Retro Rick in sight which "inspired" me to go really, really hard. Rick was following Tony's advice and wasn't going au bloc. Unfortunately, I didn't know what was in store for the rest of the day, but was able to maintain monstrously high heart rates (over 175 BPM) for miles as we climbed. The sweat was pouring off me but I maintained a good climbing tempo, and actually went by Rick at what I thought was the top when he stopped to douse himself in a waterfall (it was really getting hot). The others were waiting in a shady area- I assumed we were at the top, but alas, there was another hour of more of vertical to confront. At one point we were riding past melting mounds of snow (a real temptation to stop and jump in- I was really overheating).
We hit some gentle grades (the top? ... I prayed). Everyone was low on fluids- we passed a PGE crew and John, Tony and Bennie begged some water. I still had a third of a bottle and for some overbaked hallucinatory reason thought we were at the top and that I could wait on the fluids. I ran out of water a couple of miles later and still we were climbing. I was riding with Rick and starting to slip behind- I would "hammer" back on false flats but it was getting harder. John, Tony and Bennie came up from behind and now Bennie passed me (he had been the caboose for most of the day). I was obsessing about water. My power output was dropping.... hammering, nay securing a push pin, was no longer possible.
We finally hit mostly descents (although there were still "rollers" with shorter climbs). I was descending full-tuck but every time the road pointed up I was off the back. The group would wait for me at the turnoffs, but I was holding up progress. We dropped 4000' feet- I was sitting on my top tube, my hands next to the stem trying and leaning over the bars, in an effort to gain back time on the descents (I was pulling out all the stops, taking corners at 40 MPH in a rather tenuous position on the bike). With about 15 miles to go- the descents had mostly run out, I exploded out the back of the pack for good, now in survival mode. Everytime I had to climb even a bit, my heart rate would shoot up. I had fluids but wasn't thirsty (although I was forcing myself to drink) and not hungry. Bad signs, all.
I teetered back to the van at 4:30 pm- a full seven hours after we started, with 85 miles and about 8000' of vertical. I slumped in the back, utterly spent. My cell phone rang, startling me- it was Morrow. I had to get back to do an unsceduled cardiac cath! I couldn't pull it together to talk much- we were in the parking lot of a grocery store and I had to get in there for some food and drink. I staggered around in the store, decisionally impaired. I eventually forced down a half of a sandwich- some cheesy stale veggie wrap, a yogurt and some potato chips with a liter of Soy Milk. I tried to eat while lying in the back on the van with my head on lumpy backpack filled with smelly bike clothes and my shoes. Everytime I moved, my feet would spasm painfully. My thumbs were in tetany at one point- that was a bit of a mystery. I felt like puking after the vigorous ingestion! of food and fluid.
After driving for awhile, I pulled myself together enough to call the cath lab- I'd be there by 6:30, although I thought somebody might have to go in and hold me up during the case. The woman in need of a cath was complicated- 2 prior bypass surgeries, multiple stents. I was a wreck- I couldn't move without triggering spasms somewhere. So I tried not to move- just laid there on an uncomfortable pile of stuff with my arm resting on a dirty bike, thinking that in an hour or so I'd be wearing lead....
We rolled into the driveway shortly before 6 p.m. It took a couple of minutes (and Rick pulling on my arm) to get me out of the van. I had a palsied gait. Morrow came out and took one look at me (she actually could tell from the earlier phone conversation, where she described me as "incoherent"- clearly an exaggeration) that I had gone a bit far. She was really pissed, "you don't have enough life insurance for this, you idiot!" Not an ounce of sympathy (rarely is for my self-inflicted wounds). She yelled at Rick and John, "I'm not letting him come out and play any more!" (which really gave me a fright- she seemed quite serious). Kate came out and looked at me, "you don't look very good," and then went back to her term paper. Realizing that I had been outed (as terribly dehydrated and a bit heat exhausted), I tried to fake perky. "How was your day?" I was selling but nobody was buying. I snuck in the bathroom and weighed myself (down 5 lbs after a liter or so of fluid in the van). I threw on some scrubs and tottered out to the car, now to start my work day.
(Got through the cath without a hitch, read some studies, drank another 2 litres of water and my 4th bag of chips- I'm in that lucid moment before the seizures start, although I'm hopeful after all the chips I've had enough salt. It seems possible that my serum sodium is less than 130). I'm hoping I'm looking sufficiently resuscitated to go home from work, because I really want to do this again next Tuesday. (All interested parties are invited to join the fun, these will run every Tuesday until the fall.)