The 2013 AOTC, a recap

Assault on the Carolinas....I think they might have misnamed this one.  The "Carolinas" did the assaulting, so shouldn't that word be the predicate at the end of the sentence....and where is the word "Riders?"  I think the sentence should read, to be grammatically correct anyway, "Riders Assaulted by the Carolinas."  Enough of the English lesson for this article, I'm sure that is not why you dropped by to read this entry.

I have set a number of goals for myself for this year when it comes to riding a bike.  One of them, I can now check off the list.  That was participating, and finishing the 14th annual Assault on the Carolinas which is a 100K ride starting in Brevard, NC and going into SC before returning to Brevard.  So what?  its only 100K, or 62 miles....I've done that before.  Oh, its the climbing that is different with about 5500 feet of vertical climbing?  No, that's not it, I've climbed more on a similar distance ride before.  So what is the big deal you ask?  Well, its not the total climb, its a single climb that starts at the 42 mile mark into Caesar's Head.  This is a 2000ft climb to the top in about 8 miles.  That is the challenge here, and what drew me to this event.  You see, climbing is not my strong suit at all, and it is something that I need to get better at.  I figured that this would be a pretty good opportunity to prove that I could....to myself.

 

 

As I have alluded to in previous entries in this blog, training for this ride started on January 1st.  I needed to get lots of saddle time, and build my muscles, loose weight, and work on my internal engine's efficiency.  I accomplished a lot of this by spending time on my trainer doing interval after interval.  This helped me drop a little bit of weight, and gain a ton of endurance and power.  As the weather got warmer, I headed outside and hunted down all the climbs in the area that I could do on a regular ride.  I tended to stay away from the flat routes and gravitated towards the rollers.  I pushed myself, and also learned how to monitor my efforts so I wouldn't burn out early on a climb.  Its a difficult lesson to learn when your instincts tell you to go all out all the time.  That just can't happen with the climbs that I was looking at doing in the AOTC.

 

When I started the year, I was at about 189LBS which is very light considering I weighed in at 238 not too long ago.  However, I wanted to get down into the 160-165LBS range for this ride.  I wasn't able to do that, but my body composition changed dramatically in the first quarter of the year.  I got smaller, my body fat dropped substantially, and I felt great.  However, I bottomed out at only 181LBS before the AOTC.  However, my legs had become swollen with new muscles, and we all know that muscle weighs more that fat.  So, in a way I did reach my goal....my power to weight ratio was much more favorable than it was the last time I rode on the Blue Ridge Parkway.  I was pleased with my progress, I just needed to put it to the test on the 100K route on April 13th!

 

 

After my last training ride on Tuesday before the big ride, I checked the bike over, cleaned and lubed it.  I wanted it to be perfect for the ride so that mechanical issues didn't play a part in any failures on my end.  I had just started to hear a clicking that sounded like it was coming from the chainrings up front, so they got tightened.  I checked the chain for wear, and it showed to be at 50% and still had life in it.  I debated on replacing the chain and thought I would wait until it was closer to 75% before swapping it.  Everything was ready on the bike, but I needed one final addition.  I knew that this was going to be a hard ride, and I wanted to have Toni with me....or at least waiting at the finish line for me, but she was working on Saturday.  So, I did the next best thing, I took a bracelet that she had made as a kid and wrapped it on my bar so that she could be with me on my ride.  I can't stand to let her down, so I knew if I needed to dig deep, I could just look down and think of her.  That was my secret weapon for the day!

 

 

After work on Friday, the night before, I got the truck loaded up, and the bike ready for transport.  I wanted to be able to leave early on Saturday and didn't want to take the time to do all the loading then.  After I got the bike secure in the bed, I did a final check of everything, including the chain.  It was still reading about 50%, but the clicking I had been hearing recently had me worried.  I decided at the last minute to swap out the chain for a new one.  For simplicity, I just put down my protective cardboard under the bike and started to tear into it.  In about 30 minutes I had a new chain on, and stripped of the protective coating, and oiled.  I felt better knowing that the drivetrain was fresh for this ride.

 

Saturday morning arrived much too early.  With a three hour drive time, I had to wake up about 3am.  I actually woke up before the alarm rang....can you say anxious?  I got up, got dressed, and ate some breakfast.  I chose to go with oatmeal for the long lasting fiber/carbohydrate combo.  I also took two bagels to eat for a second breakfast before we left the starting ling.  I was going to need the carbs to fuel my muscles on the climbs of the day....that I knew.  The trip up went without a hitch other than the effects of my two day long hydration activities.  My bladder was filling at a rate of once every 2 hours it seemed.  I needed to stop on the way into Brevard....never needed to do that on a three hour trip before, but it meant that I was sufficiently hydrated which was good.  Just as a conversation point, I had to make two more pit stops before we started at 9am.  I guess it was the combination of nervous and several hundred ounces of water consumed over the last 36 hours or so.

 







Brevard is a beautiful little mountain town, and full of really nice people.  On this particular day, they were invaded by 1000 cyclists who all shared a common goal, to kick off their spring training with a bang!  Registration was from 7am to just before the start at 9am.  I used this time to get registered, get the bike ready, and load up with snacks for the ride.  I also tried to calm myself down because I was getting very nervous about this ride.  I was pretty sure I could complete it, but I didn't know how much it would hurt, and if I was going to have to make unscheduled stops because I could just go no further.  Lots of these questions were rolling around in my head, but I knew that one way or another, I would finish this under my own steam.

As part of my sense of humor, I chose to wear this particular jersey for this particular ride.  It says, "The Beatings Will Continue Until Morale Improves".  I figured that would be appropriate for the beatings that my legs were getting ready to endure.  Oh yeah, and notice the arm warmers.  Even though the temperature range was forecast for 49L-71H for the day, I decided to bring them as a last minute addition to my supplies.  I'm very glad I did because when I arrived in Brevard it was a chilly 39*.  My bike even had frost on the top tube!  At least it wasn't raining though, which was a concern from some of the extended forecasts I had seen about a week before.  We were expecting nothing but sun today, and that was just perfect for me.

This, for me, is the worst part of a large group ride.  Here I am in the starting area waiting for the 9am release of the riders.  I'm not exactly the most stable getting started and clipping in.  I always worry about bumping other riders, or being bumped.  I just gave myself a little bit of room in front and hoped for the best.  I remember thinking to myself here "I can't believe I'm going to do this....I'm finally here."  I knew that about 65 miles later I would be passing back through this point, I just didn't know what condition I would be in.

At exactly 9am, with a 10 second countdown, the riders were released.  The pros went first, followed by other sponsored riders and then the masses.  My friend Doug and I were close to the front of the line (as you can see in the above picture with the green banner).  My start was a little wobbly because as we were getting moving, the folks up in front had to stop quickly.  But we all made it out of the gate without incident.  After leaving the gate, somebody lost a water bottle (since it was only seconds in the ride, I assume it was still full).  They might miss that later on.  A short time after that, one of the riders threw a chain and had to pull off to get it fixed.  My last minute chain swap came to mind and I suddenly felt better about my choice.  We were off, and making good time through town.

Doug and I stuck together, but he is a stronger rider than I am and he was pushing me to keep pace.  I was able to do so, and we were blazingly fast, passing other groups and climbing hills like crazy.  I was feeling the pressure to keep up, and knew that I was going to regret this pace later on, but stubbornly kept with it.  I wasn't too keen on the large groups that we were riding around.  They made me feel very claustrophobic considering I am used to riding solo, and not surrounded by other cyclists.  Its a skill all unto itself to ride in a peloton, and I'm just not that good at it.

We continued our charge down the road until the first big climb of the day at Walnut Hollow.  This was a short climb, but what starts out as a steep ascent, pitches up dramatically at the halfway mark.  Some say its the worse climb of the day because of that.  Doug plowed on ahead of me, and I found my rhythm and churned the pedals in my lowest gear (thank goodness I switched to an 11-28tc cassette).  I was starting to feel winded by the time I made it to the top, but I had a new found confidence after completing the first challenge of the day.  Doug and I rejoined and continued on.  We were still moving at a pretty fast pace and hit the second big hill of the day.  This one wasn't as bad as the Walnut Hollow climb, but was still listed as a Cat 4 climb.  Doug and I parted ways on this climb as well, and later rejoined afterwards.  That was two big climbs down, and I was still feeling pretty good.

Now was the fun part, the descent into South Carolina.  I can still remember the sound of all the whizzing freewheels as everyone coasted down some 1500 feet around curved roads.  It was nice to get a slight rest after all of that climbing, but in the back of my mind I knew that we were going to be climbing back to above our original altitude in a few more miles.  Doug and I were still together as we arrived in the valley for the rollers.  We kept with a strong pace, but I could tell I was pushing too hard, and I needed to slow.  I didn't want to hold Doug up, so I tried to keep pace.  At 30 miles, we arrived at a rest stop that we both wanted to stop at to refuel and recover a little.

When it was time to roll out again, we got into another large peloton which turned out to be a very strong group, and the speeds were amazing.  However, I knew I needed to save my energy for the big climb, so I allowed myself to get dropped.  It was at this point I really started to enjoy the ride.  I was all alone, and riding my ride.  This was my comfort zone.  I kept remembering some advice that Gary Daniels had given me that I needed to be in a group at the top of Caesar's Head for the rollers because there was always a strong headwind there.  I was going to have to deal with that when I got there.  I just wanted to ride solo at this point, and was happy.

At the 42 mile mark we turned off to the left, and the climbing started.  At first it wasn't too bad, the grade was tolerable, but I had to keep in mind that I had about 8 miles of this ahead, and it would pitch up in the last third.  I slowed myself, and dropped gears to keep my cadence up.  I found my groove that was not stressful on my body at all.  Surprisingly, I found myself passing a cyclist....then another, then another.  Was I going too fast?  Would I burn out?  Did they know something that I didn't?  I carried on at what I felt was an easy pace.  I looked down at my Garmin and saw that I had climbed about 500 feet before I had even started to get tired.  I was a quarter of the way there and still going strong.  I fought the excitement which tried to make me go faster.

As the grade increased a little bit, I was slowing to the point that my Garmin was auto pausing regularly, but that was OK with m as I wasn't trying to set any records on this mountain.  I was starting to consider taking a breather in the false flat portion in the top half.  The grind was starting to take its toll on my body, but my speed was staying steady and it was a comfortable pace for me, I was just tired of climbing.  When I arrived at the false flat I was able to move out of my lowest gear and actually found myself in some of the smaller cogs on the cassette.  I looked down and I was going about 18-20mph!!!  No way I was going to stop here and lose that momentum....I was still going uphill at that speed!  Then we hit the top section which has like a 12% grade and lots of twists and turns.  This was the killer of the whole climb.  I was still settled into my previous pace in low gear.  It felt like I was barely moving, and the Garmin was auto pausing like a heartbeat.....but.....I was still passing other riders.  I was listening to bikes groan and creak as their pedals were churned, yet here I was passing by, no noises except for my heavy respiration.  I started to think that I was no longer tracking distance because it seemed my distance reading wasn't changing at all.  It felt like I saw 46.4 miles for a solid hour before it clicked to 46.5.

I saw some folks over on the side of the road cheering us on, and all I could muster to say was "how much further".  I was afraid they would say 2-3 more miles, but they said less than a mile to go.  I hoped they were right.  On the second group of people I saw I again asked the question hoping for validation of the first answer.  I got a fairly definitive "seven tenths of a mile, just around the bend."  I was filling with lactic acid at this point, but all of a sudden I felt energized and started pumping and pulling on the pedals. I just wanted to get there....to the top.....my personal victory.

I had made it!!!!  and I wasn't the last one to the top of the mountain either.  I had passed probably 20 other riders on that ascent, which was just amazing to me.  I stayed at this rest stop for about 20 minutes before I could convince myself to get back on the bike.  I hydrated, ate, and asked what the address was.  My intention was to just call this home, and not leave.  But, leave I must, ride I shall, finish I will.  Fortunately, with the exception of some small hills, the majority of the last 18 miles is downhill.  I was so ready for that....but Gary's advice was rattling in my head...."don't be alone after you crest the mountain."  Its not that I didn't trust his advice, or take it to heart.  It was the fact that Doug was a good distance ahead of me, and I didn't want to latch onto another wheel.  I chose to finish this ride out the way I like to ride....alone.  I had conquered the mountain and hills, I could do this!

I did do it....all by myself.  There was a wind, but having been training in the wind for months now, I didn't really recognize it as an obstacle.  My speeds were great, and I again found myself passing other cyclists.  Not to say I wasn't getting passed as well, but I was giving as good as I was taking and for that I'm proud.  I found it slightly odd that I was enjoying this part of the ride so much.  In fact the second half was a blast.  I was riding my ride, and was able to reach my zen place in the saddle.  I missed the company of riding with Doug, but the solo thing was where my heart was.

 

I finished the 14th Annual AOTC in 4:29 with two breaks.  Total ride time was less than 3:50 and I averaged 16.9 mph.  I was beat, but so happy at this accomplishment.  I had conquered Caesar's Head and was very curious about how this climb was categorized.  I was thinking at least a cat 3, if not cat 2.  I would have to wait until I got home and plugged in the data to find out.

Here it is.....the climb data from the day.  I was wrong about the category for Caesar's Head....it was a.....CATEGORY ONE CLIMB!!!!!!  Now that is an accomplishment to say the least.  Up until the AOTC, I had only climbed a cat 4 climb.  I can only imagine what a beyond category, or HC climb would feel like.  While I am still not a climber, it is very nice to know that I can climb, and climb really big stuff.  This is exactly what I wanted to accomplish on this ride.  Speed wasn't a concern of mine, I just wanted to prove to myself that I could do it.

Garmin data can be found here.