Bitten by the Dog!!!

Salty Dog 2010 gave me the rookie smackdown, ultimately leaving me fending off extrusiating leg cramps and nausea.

We had a huge groups of friends (including Team Moustache and Team Beer!!) from Kelowna out which made for a super fun race and the weather was cooperative with mostly cloudy skies and warm temperatures. Peter (a fellow Union Cycle rider) had the Marin tent set up and we were both rocking the Marin Mt. Vision bikes which I found were awesome on the down hills. I think I may have had my best down hilling in terms of lines and speed and not hesitating. It felt good to be riding the tails of all those bow valley riders who then just refused to get out of the way!!! When are those damn Albertans going to learn to descend (ok, it's taken me 3 years to get good too!!)

Yannick and I decided to race together which was nice as we had some conversations up the long fire road and discussed pace for the first couple of laps. I think looking back we were both going too hard for the first 2 hours to maintain for the whole race, especially without a race under our belts yet this year. We rode together for four laps which we did in good time (under 3 hours). Yannick started to feel off so I rode out ahead. Lap five things went slightly south with me not being able to eat as much and my stomach feeling off. I stopped at the aid station at the top and had some banana and water and made my way down.

Once at the aid station the wonderful girls in pink from Team Beer helped me out with some food and water refills and I set off on lap six. I was still easily on pace to do 8 laps but things quickly deteriorated. Out of transition is a steep, windy climbing section and I started having sharp muscle cramps in the inner thighs. I took it really easy but not long after the cramps spread to the quads and I spent the next 5 minutes slouched over my bike unable to move!! I tried to shake out my legs only to have a tennis ball sized cramp shoot up my hamstring!! Probably one of the most painful things I've ever experienced! After some rest I set off and eventually made it to the top and back down. It was a long lap and I had started to have some knee pains from the cramping quads so I called it a race.

Yannick cruised on and after some long breaks he pulled through an extra lap and finished with 7 total. Peter was a machine and did 9 laps and Jen broke the female record and did 8 laps in under 6 hours! Ushy did 9, Ian did 8, and Matt and Rob did 7 each. Mark and Chris did 6 as a team and Dave and Nikki raced as well. Overall a punishing but fun day!! Definitely a learning experience and I look forward to more races later this year.

And now from Tess, member of Team Beer:
Who had more fun? Team Beer or Team Moustache? Check out the photos and decide for yourself. Team Beer likes to think that we helped ease some of Team Moustache's pain with our wild and crazy cheering antics at the end of each lap. Favourite moments: "The Matter Horn!" written across 3 female chests and Walter's tummy as Matt rode through; kissing competition between Emma and Walter for a fly by kiss from Ian -Walter won; Rob's response when Team Beer asked him if there was anything else we could get him; Ian's fly by ass smack of all members of Team Beer.