Bad Day on the Bike

There are people who claim there is no such thing as a "bad day on the bike." Do not believe these people. They are patently full of shit.

I had a bad day today. Yep, I got out and rode. But it started grim. When I got up early to roll to Thurmont, for 70 miles of joy I call the Leg Breaker Route, it was raining. Nearly 5 hours of hills is one thing. Five hours with a wet ass? No way. So I slept in and headed out through Annapolis to Cape St. Clare, hitting Sandy Point and all points in between. While I was out there, I got desperately lost. No big deal, I can handle that. There's no such thing as being lost on an L2 ride; there's just days when you go longer than usual.

Except for a little problem with the weather. It was 92 degrees when I rolled out at 11, hotter on the road in the bright sun. It was also in the mid-90's for humidity. I've rolled in hotter weather; I think it was 103 or so one day a few weeks ago when I commuted home from D.C. But the humidity was relatively low. The humidity today, in contrast, was utterly oppressive. As I headed out of the house, a neighbor was headed into hers and we chatted; only after she left did I notice she was walking in slow motion. Even inside the house, at a cool air-conditioned 79 degrees, I was sweating like a pig thanks to the humidity.

The discomfort didn't end when I started pedaling. Usually it feels cooler when you roll, but it didn't feel cooler today. It just got worse and worse, despite opening the jersey up all the way.

I could pedal at a high L2 level for about 2-3 minutes, then I'd start to lose steam. It wasn't my legs or lungs giving out, per se; it was just plain overheating. The legs would just peter out, and I'd find myself cruising at a high L1 / low L2 pace, and feeling like I normally feel pushing tempo. The legs aren't shot from efforts, though they are a little underwater; WKO+ says I should be tired, but not exhausted from the last week's work.

So I pushed on anyhow and got out to Sandy Point. That's when I got lost, and did a tour of Sandy Point and Broadneck. Every stinking street, I think. This included riding up and down a number of dead end streets, the last 45 minutes of it without anything to drink.

Eventually, as the 3 hour mark approached, I found myself back near Route 50, but with no idea how to get back into Annapolis. I found a Citgo / Highs Market and stopped, getting a huge Coke, a Strawberry milk, and a big Gatorade. I also got directions and after downing the milk (320 calories, 250 of which tried to come right back up...) I headed back toward home.

There was no power to be had, unfortunately. I could push, but only at low cadence. Anything over 75/80 was just unbearable, so I ground along with sore knees. Eventually, I was back in Annapolis. But the discomfort was pretty severe - hot feet, soaked in sweat, a wet, stingy ass, an incipient migrane headache, and an all-over discomfort that could be rivaled only by the mother-in-law walking in on you and your significant other in flagrante delicto. They only thing that provided any relief was riding in the shade, and this minimal relief was only really welcome because it was less uncomfortable than riding in the sun's full glare; it's not like it was objectively comfortable.

Passing the Annapolis Mall, I realized that I was probably flirting with a heat injury. Once I crossed General's Highway and got onto less-trafficked roads, I did the unthinkable and took my helmet off. It brought sweet relief. I wasn't super comfortable doing that, it sets a bad example for the kids and has obvious health effects if you crash, but it lowered my head temperature immediately, killed my headache, and helped me cool off incrementally - a key increment as it turns out. Coming up 450 I managed to maintain a mid-L2 effort for the most part, and I got home without causing further harm to myself.

Once inside the house, my body let loose and I started sweating profusely. Within minutes I had downed 3 quarts of water, and took a world championship-caliber poop.

The rest of the day was spent doing some reading for work, eating a balanced slate of food to recover, and chilling out. And I've drunk another 3 quarts of fluid, and about to down a fourth.

Yep, it ain't the heat, it's the humidity.

The problem with rides like this is they take more out of you, than you get back later in training benefits. I did manage to hit my training goal, just. I rode a touch under 4 hours, with an IF of .65, just inside the aerobic endurance zone. But it wasn't pleasant and has me thinking about bumping tomorrow's scheduled long ride to Friday, to give myself a day to recover from this little trauma. The lesson is to go early if it's going to get hot and humid.

So it was a bad ride, but even so, it still beat a good day at work.