Race Day. Dennis and I had already decided we were going to have breakfast at the hotel and so didn’t even bother going up to camp for it. I ordered eggs and pancakes, Dennis ordered an omelette – 4 eggs turned up, followed by another 3 – we’d been having a lot of trouble ordering our food here – losing a lot in translation! However we ate all the eggs, and then of course the omelette turned up so I re-ordered the pancakes and we were both happy! A pretty good breakfast I would say. I was ready for the race.
So it was mando day and a 100 mile race. Had to play that silly waiting game for everyone to be ready to check out. Anyway 6 of us left together – myself, Paul, Horst, Adam, Jorg and Dennis. However we didn’t take enough notice of the directions which was a bit of a mistake because we soon realized we had gone the wrong way – so we turned around, got even more confused, asked the locals and finally found ourselves back on the right road – riders ahead and the trucks passing confirmed this!!
The pace was good but I was still really struggling – my stomach felt bad again after I thought I was better (…….. what? the eggs you think??) Scott had gone the right route and was having a good morning – we eventually caught up with him after about 60 km and rode into lunch with him at 80km. By this time I had to head straight for the bathroom because of my stomach – I had a good rest at lunch – couldn’t eat the sandwiches but had some bananas and oranges and filled up my water bottles. As I was taking so long to recover Paul, Horst, Dennis , Jorg and Scott all left – followed by Tori and Lindsay – so I went from being with the lead group in the morning to being quite a way back. Couldn’t be helped – so I set off on my own and felt I was riding quite well – I felt pretty comfortable. There were other riders ahead as well as the lead group – people who had ridden from the lunch truck. I caught up with Lindsay, feeling a lot better again and riding along at my own pace. It was quite busy – animals everywhere, but the views were great – beautiful countryside. Should have had my video camera recording. The afternoon was rolling hills – I finally caught up with Scott who was suffering – he had felt really strong in the morning (with the added bonus of starting out in the right direction) but not so good now. I told him to follow me which he did – I was beginning to feel a lot better but had given up any hopes of doing well today.
So I just enjoyed the ride with Scott – we did take some video and enjoyed the scenery. There were people working on the side of the road making straw fences and furniture – a lot of furniture! There were some good short climbs – pretty steep – and although my legs were hurting I was still riding OK and Scott was still following. We finally caught up with Kendra and Kristian who had ridden from the lunch truck. Then we got to a pretty dcent climb and passed Gary and then I could see one person up ahead in a white jersey – travelling fast as we weren’t really gaining on him for a while. Then as we climbed we saw two more people – so just before the top of the climb Scott and I decided to go a bit faster and catch them up – turned out to be Hendry, Tori and Dennis – with Adam and Jorg not too far ahead. So we flew down the descent and caught them up so we were all in a group together at the bottom. We pushed pretty hard with a small hill just at the end and we made it into camp with Scott and myself 4th and 5th . So it turned out quite well on a day I had pretty much given up on!!
The campsite was in a nice field – but I had to go and sit in the shade for a while as I was feeling a bit groggy again. I then went for a lie down under the truck but did get up for yoga which helped and I did manage to eat a little before going to bed.
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