This blog chronicles the story of a guy, his bike and a strange obsession with finding the outside edge of his personal limits.
In this chapter, having broken the UMCA record, recovered from a bone-crushing crash and achieving a top 15 finish at the inimitable Furnace Creek 508 we find our hero grappling with the realities of completing a 100km foot race.
For the complete story, follow this link, and read from the back to the front. The story won't make anymore sense when you've finished, but at least you'll know as much as the rest of us.
The Ultrarider mall tour starts today. I’ll be on the trainer at parasuco at sqaure one between 12-6 today and 12-4 tomorrow.
Stayed tuned for more coverage of this exciting event! :)
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Rode out to the escarpment in Burlington tonight. Just grabbing a quick snack in oakville before heading home. About another 90 minutes of riding if I jet.
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RAAM 2009 is the closest RAAM ever. After 2600 miles of racing, there are just a few seconds separating the leaders, Wyss and Robic. The race is rarely this close this far into the event, especially with Robic’s dominance these last few years.
Posted at 23:38 - Comments (View)
Dallas Morris is this years *only* solo finisher in the Race Across the West. This Calgary native outlasted the entire field to be the only solo finisher in this years race.
Awesome work Dallas!
More on his spectacular effort can be found on the RAW blog.
Posted at 17:27 - Comments (View)
I’ve been pretty quiet here for the past couple of weeks, even though some pretty important stuff has been going on. I’ve been quiet about it because I didn’t want the race committee to hold my injuries against my application.
Two weeks ago I crashed my bike pretty hard. I was crossing the street car tracks, like I do dozens of times a week, and my back wheel slide into the trackbed as I was turning the corner. The torque on the rear of the bike was enough to rip the back wheel right off the frame, snap the top tube, and body slam me down onto the pavement.
I didn’t skid, or roll, just a straight down thud. And it hurt like hell.
Lying there, my first thought was “don’t move, you’ve hurt your back”.
My second thought was “get up, you are lying in the middle of the road.” I tried to sit up and I couldn’t. I was terrified. I laid there for what seemed like an eternity, only 4 of 5 seconds in reality, bracing myself for the crunch as a car ran me over, or worse, a streetcar.
Thankfully some people ran over to see if I was okay. I was so relieved. Lying there waiting for what seemed like certain death or dismemberment was the most terrifying thing I have ever experienced. The EMS quickly showed up and they put me, immobilized on a backboard, and my bike, in pieces, into the back of the ambulance.
To make a long story short, I ended up with a whole lot of pain. At one point while I was fully medicated with Percosets, the medical team tried to move me in order to x-ray my chest. I passed out from the pain. Now I know what it takes :-) They upped my prescription to something called “dilaudid”, which is supposed to be 8 times stronger than morphine.
The medical team was concerned that I had broken my back, shattered my hip, broken my ribs, etc. so they did a lot of tests, consulted with surgeons, etc. before clearing me for release after a full day in the emergency room. I still couldn’t walk without excruciating pain, every movement made me dizzy and nauseous and I suspect it was only the meds that were keeping me from passing out again.
We paid the cab driver extra to ensure that he drove slowly and deliberately. I also told him that there was a strong likelihood that I would throw up in his car if he drove like a maniac. We finally made it home after picking our way through the city at 40 kilometers per hour.
Landing on my back, I ended up with a lot of deep bruising, torn tissues and other trauma. The doctor tells me that all the small ribs, the tiny baby cartilage ones, in my front, lower left rib cage have all been crunched up and tenderized. Nice to know - explains why they hurt so much all the time.
I took almost 10 days in bed before I was able to get around. This past week, I’ve been back at the office full time, but not without a lot of general hurt.
My recovery is going in the right direction. I still can barely sit up from lying down, and lying down even hurts. Something about the amount of weight that gets put on the rib cage when I lie down is especially painful.
My lower back and hips are still swollen and bruised two weeks later. It will be another 10 days before I can get back on the bike.
In the meantime, I’m trying my best to eat right and take in all the vitamins and minerals that my body is going to need to recover quickly. I’ve also been seeing a ton of doctors and therapists. Laser therapy, ultrasound, chiro, you name it. Anything and everything I can do to get better quicker. My goal is to get back on the bike and restart my training on July 1.
So anyways, I’m fine, I’m getting better and I apologize for not sharing more over the last couple of weeks!
Posted at 17:13 - Comments (View)
By Saturday morning, I hadn’t heard back from the Furnace Creek race organizers about my application. I was guessing this meant that I had been passed over, so I sent them this note to make 100% sure.
Hello AdventureCORPS!
A quick question -
The message below implies that I’ll be notified either way if I’m confirmed to compete. I noticed on the Facebook page earlier that confirmations for 2009 have been sent out. I’m on pins and needles waiting to find out if I’ve qualified or not, but I’m beginning to wonder if no news is bad news :-) Should I still wait to see what comes, or is a lack of a confirmation at this point an indication that I won’t be invited to compete?
Either way, I understand, but the suspense is killing me! Any light you could shine on the subject would be sincerely appreciated.
Late last night, I got this in response:
Ross
We sent you the “you’re in!” email on Friday morning. Didn’t you get it?
Yay! I’m in! :-)
I moped around all day yesterday waiting for this response. I was really looking forward to the race. Now, I’m on the other end of the deal - I need to get ready for the race!
This’ll be awesome.
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Today is the day that the Furnace Creek organizers send out their invitations to thus awesome event. I sent in my application a couple of weeks ago with the hopes of competing in October. I’ll be on pins and needles today!! Wish me luck.
Posted at 7:45 - Comments (View)
I received this email this afternoon…
Hello Athlete-Adventurer!
Thank you for submitting your application to compete in the 26th Anniversary Furnace Creek 508 on October 3-5, 2009. This is a bold step you have taken and we salute you for the commitment it implies…
…and so it begins. Hopefully, this will be “My Next Big Ride”. I submitted my application to the AdventureCorps Furnace 508 today. The 508 is a legendary 508 mile race through Death Valley. Over 35,000 feet of climbing and lots of heat. I will know in 9 days whether I’ve been accepted or not. Wish me luck!
Posted at 11:59 - Comments (View)
Sorry for not posting anything over the past few weeks. I’ve been working on writing a proper recap of the ride. I’m already at 6,000 words, but still have the last 12 hours of the ride to document. Its definitely going to need some editing. It’ll be a few more days of work, so in the meantime, I thought it might be interesting to share the technical summary that I forwarded to the UMCA as part of the records packet.
This was sent to the UMCA Records co-chairs in May 12. The version I’m working on now provides the heart and soul to the skeleton below.
Rider Summary:
It was an interesting weekend.
We departed Parliament Hill at 7:15 am on May 8, 2009 - a few minutes behind our originally scheduled time of 7:00am. Just prior to departure, I rode a ceremonial lap around the Parliament Buildings and left the grounds at the quarter hour. The ride out of Ottawa was uneventful. We had chosen an early start time to beat traffic and the heat of the day. It was a wise choice.
Friday was a mostly dry day, however as we started into the late afternoon, we encountered thunderstorms, strong winds, which combined with the hills, had slowed us down slightly, although we were on track for an arrival time of 1:30pm the next afternoon at the 1/3 mark. After a quick change into my woolen “evening wear” around 8pm, we left the Peterborough region and headed for Toronto, the 1/2 way point. After another storm that evening, the night turned temperate and the winds died down. I was able to make up some lost ground on our pace as we travelled through the Toronto region. It was awesome to see so many familiar faces cheering me on from the boulevards as we passed through my home town. A full moon lit our way through the Toronto region and down into southern Ontario. As we headed towards Guelph, the terrain flattened out and I was able to pick up my pace even further.
As the moon fell and daylight broke, I was greeted by a blanket of thick gray fog on the landscape. Everything was the same shade of gray and I was finding it difficult to stay awake on the bicycle. I fought drowsiness for almost 2 full hours - first with physical and mental techniques, and then caffeine. Nothing was working. Rather than risk a crash, I bedded down for a much needed nap. 11 minutes later, we were back on the road and headed for our destination.
Around 9am, the wind started to pick up. Moderate at first, but quickly gaining strength. By noon, I was fighting a 25 mph headwind that was rumored to be gusting up to 35 mph. My pace dropped from a steady 16 mph to an agonizing 10 mph. At some points, I was struggling to keep the bike moving as I stood on the pedals and fought to hold the line at 4 mph. I was quickly losing the benefit of the time I had banked and my dream of beating Ron’s time was all but lost. At one point, my crew had miscalculated our ETA, and when I asked how we were doing, was met with stone-faced silence that I could only have interpreted as “I hope you are having a nice training ride, because you aren’t setting any records today.”
Around 2pm, our route turned further westward and the wind moved to a cross-headwind. It wasn’t much of a respite, but it was enough of a break to let me get back to a 16-18 mph pace. I still had a long way to go, but I knew that with some solid effort, I might be able to beat Ron’s original time by at least 15 minutes. 25 miles from our destination, a man stuck his head out of a minivan parked on the side of the road and yelled at me as I passed. “Its Ron Dossenbach,” he yelled. “Its all yours, go get it!”. I had been looking to contact Ron for months and he was the last person I had expected to see at the side of the road. His encouragement was tremendous motivation and I was able to pick up the pace even further.
As the afternoon wore on, I banked more time and rolled into Windsor City Hall at 6:12pm on Saturday May 9, 2009.
I was met at City Hall by Ron and his wife, my wife Amanda, my mother Kathryn and several local cyclists.
Some other interesting stats from the ride:
Total bike time: 31:54
Total ride time: 34:57
8677 feet of climbing
High: 89 degrees
Low: 48.2 degrees
Average HR: 125
Minimum HR: 84 (recorded as I was fighting off the drowsiness)
Max HR: 172
Calories Consumed: ~15,200
Calories Expended: ~20,142
Sweat Rate: 3.6 pints per hour
Total liquid consumed: ~95 pints
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General notes and comments:
I should note that two crew did not start the ride with us - Rob Dyson and Bob Langley - and that a third, Brad Crockford, took ill mid-afternoon as was taken off the ride. You have waivers from all three.
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This is a bit surreal for me. I’ve been a BikeRumor reader for a long time. I never really thought that I’d ever see myself up on the screen as I was scrolling through my news feeds!
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