No Pain, No Gain?

Had a spot of physio on Friday. The old left achilles has been playing up a bit with all the hike-a-bike stuff lately. Never had an archilles problem before, so it was good to learn how to treat it now (not halfway through Montana). The physio, Sebastian, taught me a new stretch that had me writhing in agony on the table. It wasn't natural, I tell ya! But then neither are anti-inflammatories - too many of those suckers and you'll end up bleeding out your poop-hole.

Saturday was a family day, although the Great Divide Race wasn't off the agenda. Sarah, her mum Shona, and I worked on a pattern for the frame bag that will go inside the main triangle, and discussed tweaking the Ground Effect proto-type race jacket to keep the tail down. Since then I discovered it'll stay down fine when my riding jersey pockets are full. And then there was some secret-squirrel stuff to do with my sleeping bag that I can't tell you about yet.

Today was race day. A flattish, 70km, handicap road race - not my forte, especially when I haven't raced on the road for months. So, it was good to be plonked in Break 2 with a handful of vet riders. We rotated like clockwork for the first 35 km, but made no progress on the bunch in front. At the start line the Scratch and Break groups were combined, creating a real juggernaut. They gobbled us up at 37 km. We all jumped on the back and the pace was OK until we turned into the wind and started working our way back up the Wainuiomata Valley with it's endless small rises. Being at the yo-yo end of the bunch, my legs were suffering the death of a thousand 3-second intervals. With 8 km left to the finish - 'KA-PING!' - I was gone. Que sara.

It was a seriously painful workout and by the time I dragged my sorry arse back up to Northland the speedo was reading just 115 km. Hopefully, the high intensity will be all good (once I've recovered enough to ride a bicycle again).