Day Eight – Lewiston to Kamiah

Today was a challenging day, but manageable contributing to a daily increase in confidence. Today we had a 16-mile climb covering 2700 feet in elevation. It was mostly a 3% grade making it manageable. It did get punchy towards the end with an increase in grade and challenge. 

As I was riding today, I realized that I don’t actually hate the climbs. I prefer them to the hills. It’s an odd thing, but everyone seems to push over the hills – which I find challenging, but they spin it up on the climbs. I’m okay with spinning it up on the climbs. What that means is you put your bike in a lower gear to remove the resistance and let the bike do the work as you ‘spin’ your way to the top with an increase in cadence and turnover, but a lower resistance. You go slowly up the climb, but you don’t wreck yourself in doing so. I am finding that this isn’t as terrible as I’d thought. On the second day – to Condon – we had an 8-mile climb, but it was very hot, and I hadn’t quite dialed in how to manage my fuel and hydration. 

As I rode today, I thought about the key elements to manage on this ride – or any ride. Of course, given that we are spending hours on a bike, we have nothing but time to think about these things.

I realized that there are four key elements to manage. There are several other uncontrollable elements like the weather, road conditions, etc… But, if you can focus on those within your control and establish a system of managing them, it makes the ride manageable and comfortable in spite of its challenges.

1. Rest – The first, and likely most important element is rest. It’s important to take the time to rest when you can. This includes when you finish your ride and ensuring that you rest your legs – as well as your mind. For me, the quiet of laying in the bed in my hotel room, regardless of whether or not I sleep, helps contribute to the rest needed to facilitate recovery. Recovery is key because you often have less than 24 hours between rides – in some cases just 12-14 hours. Resting as much as possible helps with the needed recovery.
2. Pacing – While on your rides, it’s important to pace yourself. Every day is a relatively long day. Knowing what is ahead and ensuring that you go out easy, let your body warm up, and ease off when needed contributes to an overall better experience on the bike. It ensures you have the necessary matches to light during the climbs and can carry yourself up and over the hills as they present themselves. Taking advantage of the downhills to give your legs a rest and working together in a pace line also help with the overall pacing. What I’ve discovered is that, at times, I’ve struggled to keep up with the pace lines having a counterproductive effect in that I’m not reaping the benefits of working together because I’m drifting off the back and slowing down and then needing to speed up to keep up. In those cases, I either drop back to another group and create a new pace line or ride alone. If the wind isn’t terrible, sometimes the riding alone is mentally recharging because you don’t continually feel defeated because you can’t keep up. Staying with those in a comfortable pace is important. It can help ensure you don’t burn yourself out too quickly on the ride – or at any point.
3. Hydration – I’ve been tweaking my hydration while on the ride and think I have it dialed in relatively well after 8 days. One of the game changers for me was ordering the Bivo insulated water bottles. They are surprisingly light but do an exceptional job with their double walled construction and keep the water extremely cold. In fact, in the first day, I put too much ice in the containers and, because it didn’t melt, didn’t have enough actual water to drink. I’ve found filling the containers with 1/3 ice and topping out with water keeps everything cold and ensures that I have sufficient water. I also found that I was likely overdoing it on the electrolytes. It was extremely hot the first few days and I was adding electrolytes to every bottle. I found my stomach upset by the end of the day and that I wasn’t drinking enough because I couldn’t bear the thought of consuming ‘warm tea’ type electrolyte beverages. The bottles helped with the temperature, but I found that if I keep two bottles on my bike – and one with only water, I can use the other bottle to fuel with electrolytes and always have a ‘just water’ on hand. I have also found that starting with an electrolyte bottle and then adding water to it at rest stops and only adding another electrolyte packet once I’ve had a full bottle without one has helped tremendously. I take advantage of the ‘watered down’ electrolytes and the flavor but then ensure that I’m not overdoing it. I’ll tweak this for heat as needed, but it’s worked really well the last couple of days. Also, key is hydrating when not riding. I’m consuming a lot of water outside our riding hours and have an insulated bottle filled with water at all times. I’m sipping away at the remnants of this afternoon’s electrolyte bottle as I write this settled in my bed. On the day we rode to Condon, I woke up in the middle of the night to pee and my urine was very dark indicating that I hadn’t been sufficiently hydrated. I watch this carefully as well as how I feel. I tend to make a point of sipping on my water bottle every few miles while riding to ensure that I am consuming enough and am well hydrated and ready for the climbs as it can be harder to drink while climbing. One other aspect of hydration that I discovered was that as much as a yummy seltzer water hit the spot at lunch on a hot day, it tended to leave my stomach feeling less than optimal for the afternoon ride. I cut these out starting a few days ago and have had far better afternoons as a result.
4. Fuel – It’s hard to argue which of the elements is most important, but I’m finding that hydrating and fueling are tied for first. Ensuring that I eat enough is critical. Not only is it eating enough, but it’s eating the ‘right’ things. During my training, I ate exceptionally well when not on the bike and had a fairly solid regimen of peanut butter (or almond butter) and jelly on an English muffin while riding for solid food every hour or so. In between, if I felt hungry, I would pop a few gummy bears (I call them sugar bombs) in my mouth for a quick hit of sugar as needed. When we started riding, I found I was eating entirely differently. First, I wasn’t eating my regular 5 meals a day while not on my bike. It’s hard to eat those when you ride all day. I’ve tried to stick as close as I can to my breakfast routine of eggs and oatmeal or English muffins. I’ve avoided bacon because I just can’t seem to wrap my head around the salt in the morning though I had eaten it daily while training. Lunch is always nutritious and delicious on our picnics. We’re blessed on that front. Dinner has been a bit more challenging, but I’ve done my best to keep it close to my previous routine of higher protein content with a lot of greens and some carbohydrates. It’s hit and miss. What was challenging was the intraday eating while riding. The snack table is always amazing, but I was finding that it was things that were different from what my body had been used to during my training. In the last few days, I switched over to making a couple of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches in the morning and putting one in each of the vans and support trucks. This ensured I had something ready at each stop and could quickly get it from the guides and consume it to be on my merry way. I generally have a 1/2 banana in the morning at the first stop – or a whole one – and a 1/2 sandwich. For the rest of the day, I have a 1/2 sandwich at each stop – and add a 1/2 sandwich to lunch depending on what we have. I’ve found this to be a good system and providing me sufficient nutrition. Today, after our 16-mile climb, in spite of lunch being only one hour out from our rest stop, I ate the entire sandwich. My challenge will not be over consuming but will be to ensure I consume enough. Tonight, we had a pizza party in the parking lot. The pizza was delicious, and we had some salad served with it. Because a) I was hungry and b) we are riding 115 miles tomorrow, I had 3 slices of delicious pizza and absolutely don’t feel terrible about doing so. 

I’m not worried too much about not eating ‘right’ while riding in the sense that I’m balancing my macros as I had been. We are burning through thousands of calories on each day’s ride, and I will resume the balancing act when we finish. For now, it’s about ensuring I have enough fuel to keep my body moving through each day such that it’s not consuming my muscle as fuel because it’s not being fed enough. I was fortunate enough to lose 20 pounds before I started this ride which will be 20 pounds less that I’ll carry with me across the 3800 miles of the trip, but it does mean I have to ensure I eat enough to maintain the necessary energy.

In the last couple of days, I’ve managed to be aware and on top of each of these elements, I’ve found the days have felt better and less strenuous. I’ve rolled in at the end of the day tired, but not feeling entirely wrecked. Tomorrow is 115 miles with an 8 mile climb at the end, I’ll do my best to focus on these elements to ensure that I finish out the day feeling strong and can enjoy the gift of only 40 miles the following day, and then a much-needed rest day on Sunday in Missoula.