Gravel Worlds 2018

If Tyler can blog for the first time in ages, then I figure I can dust off the old blogger account too.

For the past several years I've wanted to race at Gravel Worlds. However, it has always been on the same day as the Papillion Twilight criterium. The crit is close enough that I can ride to it, my family can come watch (and they seem to enjoy it), and I stand a chance at winning in my category. Well, this year the crit is no more. I was quite disappointed to hear that, but it did open up the date to finally try Gravel Worlds.

I knew I was going to be best off using a hydration pack for a race like this. With the large number of oases that the event offers, you can easily get by with just the bottles on your frame, but then you have to stop so often and I wanted to see how fast I could finish and that means that stopping should be kept to a minimum. The new Camelbak Chase Vest sounded like the perfect hydration pack for me to use. I already owned a hydration pack, but it was much larger and meant that I could not access my jersey pockets with it on. It also doesn't allow for easy access to its own pockets without removing it, so it wasn't going to work for what I wanted, despite the large amount of water it can hold.

Fortunately, Cycle Works was offering 10% off any items racers were buying during the check-in event the night before the race, plus I still had a gift card for that shop that I had won two years earlier! So I asked them to hold a Chase vest for me for that Friday night. I wished I could have it earlier so I could test it out before the actual event, but budget-wise, this was how I needed to make it work.

Rob telling me to not try and ride with the lead group. That would not be a problem.

I tried stuffing as much as I could into the shoulder pockets of the Chase vest on Friday night. I was able to cram a lot of clif bars and SIS gels into them, but when I put the vest on and leaned forward into a riding position, I realized that the pockets would rub on my arms when they were so full. So, I moved to having less food in the shoulder pockets and more to my jersey pockets. No big deal. I still had three clif bars in the left shoulder pocket and like 5 gels in the right one. I filled the bladder up with electrolyte mix and tossed it in a cooler full of ice overnight.

The next morning when we got to the start, I finished kitting up really quickly, tossed the vest on, and rode to the start area looking for portapotties cause I had a bit of a nervous tummy, if you get my drift. The line for the three portapotties was stupid long! I waited for a few minutes and then realized that there was no way I was going to get to one before the start in 10 minutes. I thought about riding over the grocery store across the way real fast, but I still didn’t think I could get there and back fast enough. I just had to hope that my colon would settle itself, or that I could find a nice secluded spot out on course!

I jumped into line and the followed a guy on the Panaracer gravel team to get myself a better position. I found a spot I liked. I went to take a quick sip from the Camelbak and… I couldn’t get anything to come out! It was like there was a blockage in the hose or something! My teammate Brad Oldfield rolled up to me right then and I explained what was happening. He and I pulled the bladder out real fast and checked the quick release, which was fine. While that was out I blew through the hose while it was detached from the bladder and it flowed just fine. We put it back on the bladder and it still didn’t work! As we’re putting the bladder back in the pack, they started the race. Obviously, I decided that I would have to just do my best with my bottles only and I hoped that I could figure out a way to get the Camelbak to work.

The start line is NOT the place to be figuring out new equipment!

So, Brad and I started in the absolute back of the field. Not ideal. But, I hoped I could work my way up to a good group quickly enough. I tell Brad that I’m going to start moving up and so he heads to the right of the riders in front of us and I go left. Just as we are out of eyesight of each other, gels start falling out of my should pocket. WFT!? So, I have to stop, turn around, and pick up my gels. And each time I lean over, another gel falls out! SUMBITCH! I realized that I couldn’t just stuff the gels in the pocket, I had to then pull the zipper on the pocket as closed as possible too. Again, I’m completely in the back of the field (except for a bunch of riders who apparently showed up late).

At that point, I was feeling frustrated and pretty down. Any decent group was WAY up the road and I didn’t think riding hard to try and catch up was a great idea. I told myself that this was always going to be a mostly solo TT and to not worry about it, but I was having a hard time getting my head out of that dark place. I felt kind of embarrassed, like I didn’t deserve to be there and it was silly of me to think I would do well. It’s a weird place our heads will go over relatively trivial things!

Going back and looking at the live video that Gravel Guru put on FB, it appears that I was about three to five minutes behind groups that I figure I would have ended up in, so I figure this whole mess of a start had me at least that far back from any kind of good group to ride with.

I kept thinking about how to work with my Camelbak, cause I didn’t want to stop at every single oasis for more fluids. I found that I could pull the bite valve off the hose and then drink directly from the bladder that way. It meant riding with no hands and spilling water every time, but at least I could use it. It was still very frustrating. Not to mention that I had another gel fall out of my pocket maybe 15 miles in that caused me to turn around and retrace my steps a bit.

By the time I got to Touhy about 20ish miles in, I had to pee. So, I stopped and did my business and I took the time to pull of the bite valve and give it more of an inspection. I blew air through it and it flowed just fine just like before. I was still confused, but I did notice that blowing through the valve while biting down on it was kind of hard to do but when I had it pinched with my fingers, it worked okay. So, I put the valve back on the hose, used my fingers to pinch the valve and viola! The water started flowing! I was so relieved! Pretty soon, I didn’t even have to pinch the valve with my fingers, I could use my teeth like intended. I don’t know what was wrong, but at least it was working!

I kept riding and picking my way through the field. By mile 50 or so, I caught up to Brad. I chatted with him a bit and updated him on the Camelbak issue. He said he wasn’t very happy with how he was feeling only 50 miles in, though he looked fine to me still. I kept moving since he wasn’t quite riding at a speed I wanted to do. At this point, I was holding a 17 mph average which would definitely net me a sub-9 hour finish. I tried to keep my stop at the first checkpoint 58 miles in as brief as I could while refilling bottles and the Camelbak. I had to pee not long after that stop so I found a nice place to water some corn. While I was peeing, a group containing Dixon and FDR passed me. I caught up to them just riding my pace and FDR kept telling me to jump in their group. He was insistent. But I had caught them with no additional effort and they were hitting each hill harder than I wanted to go so I stayed out of it. Eventually I got past them and left them behind.

The rest of the ride was uneventful up to the second checkpoint at 128 miles in. I went through some mental ups and downs, stopped at mile 100 to restock and drink a red bull, and kept moving and passing riders. I witnessed a couple guys crash going uphill, which was entertaining. I was starting to feel pretty tired when I got to the second checkpoint. But it was only 22 miles to the finish after checkpoint 2 and I knew I would see Ken and Rachel there. I rolled in and Rachel grabbed my bottles. At mile 100, I had put CarboRocket in both bottles. I had finished one of those bottles and the second was still ¾ full. I told Rachel to not bother filling the empty bottle since there was only 22 miles to go and to just fill the nearly full one. Then I went to pee. I came back, chatted for a hot minute with Rachel and Ken, and then got back rolling again. I had felt like my pace was okay, but my average speed had dropped to 16 mph and I was 8 hours in so I knew the sub-9 finish was not going to happen. Oh well. I had held a NP of 196 watts all the way there which was pretty much my goal.

My stomach was not super happy with me and I was not loving the CarboRocket flavor, but I knew I needed the calories so I forced myself to take a drink a couple miles out of the checkpoint. Shit. Rachel had heard me say fill the bottle and thought I meant refill with cold water, so she had dumped the CarboRocket out! I should have said top it up or something more clear! That was going to be my calories for the rest of the race! I felt my back pockets for gels and came up with nothing. I didn’t think I had any clif bars left either. I just had to gut it out. The last 10 miles were a real struggle. My back was starting to hurt and my energy levels were dropping. Still, I did what I could and coasted wherever it didn’t lose me speed. My average power for the last 22 miles was solidly in zone 1, "active recovery." I was sorely low on energy!

Funny thing is, when I got back and tossed the Camelbak on the ground so I could lay down, there were two gels peeking out of the pockets! It didn’t even occur to me to check my Camelbak pockets! There was also two and a half clif bars I found later and a full baggie of CarbRocket I could have put in the water Rachel got me. My thought process goes to trash when I’m 8 hours in to a race/ride! I bet I would have finished feeling a lot better if I had just stopped to take inventory of my resources!

That feeling when even laying down is uncomfortable!

After most races of this length, I'm usually not ready to think about doing it again very soon. It usually takes me a couple weeks to think I might like to give it another try. Not this time. By the next morning I was already scheming how to do a better ride at Gravel Worlds next year! What if I had not had the troubles with the Camelbak and was able to get into a good group at the start? What if I finally get serious about core strength so my back and arms don't bother me as much in the final quarter of the race? What if I did an even better job hydrating and taking in calories in the final 1/3 of the race? I've got a few things to improve still! I can't wait!

I finished in just under 9 hours and 25 minutes which was good enough for 72nd overall and 45th in the open men category. I'd like to see if I can improve my time to sub-9, though I think my main goal next year will be more about getting a more perfect process in place.

While I have to wait a year for the next Gravel Worlds, we do have another longer gravel race coming up in just a couple weeks on September 8th. I can test out some pacing ideas at the OGRE which is a 100 mile mixed surface event my team is putting on. I say mixed surface because it's got pretty significant portions of pavement in it. Like 35 of the miles are on pavement. but there's also a few MMRs mixed into the remaining mileage. I previewed the course back in June and I think it should be a really good time!