It’s kind of funny. I’e been having my best “season” ever (three races; three podium finishes) and feeling a tad bit confident. And then a race like “this” comes along that reduces me to virtually rubble.
Thought it was my longest race in a while (30k) and a fairly tough course profile (4,000 feet of climbing) I wasn’t overly concerned. I have a few half marathons in my legs already and have been feeling fairly fit.
The morning started off normally enough and I didn’t anticipate anything being too out of the ordinary – until the race started. I immediately felt a bit of heart burn and was burping quite a bit. But I thought it would pass soon enough.
Wrong. Wrong. Wrong.
The first “wave” – stomach cramps like I have never, ever experienced – hit me like a ton of bricks at around mile 5. They literally stopped me in my tracks. Fortunately I am very familiar with this course and knew I was “only” about a mile to a bathroom. Maybe the longest mile of my life. Took all my power to keep it “in” if you catch my drift. After hitting the bathroom I felt a tad bit better and though that woudl be it. ANd then at the top of the Marincello climb (a 1.5 mile monster climb for those familar with it), I got hit with the next “wave”. This one was even worse and I knew the next bathroom was very far. At this point, I considered dropping out and calling my wife to pick me up – it was that bad – but I knew that she was pretty far away and that this wouldn’t get me out of my “predicament”. So onwards I forged.
I won’t get into the details. Suffice to say, the cramps never stopped. In fact, they got worse. It was a death march to the finish line. The good news, if you can call it that, is that I was so focused on this situation I couldn’t think of anything else – including how sore my legs were becoming from being out there longer than anticipated.
I finally made it to the finish line and went straight to the bathroom yet again and then directly to my car to get home. I continued to have cramping for the next few hours, though it settled down a bit that night.
What happened? I’m still not sure. I guess it could have been that large pizza I ate the evening before but I have had pizza the night before a race to little effect. If I had to guess, I think I got hit with a 12 hour stomach bug. Right in the middle of a race. I guess there’s a first for evertything. For my sake, however, I hope this is both a first and a last, because that was a brutal, absolutely miserable experience.
Perpetual Motion 