Rasputitsa At Last: The Narrative

At last! Race day in the Northeast Kingdom. And lest we be disappointed that race conditions would be - gasp! - dry, packed, and fast (as they were Friday when we reconnoitered some of the course), Mother Naturavichskya swooped in overnight with a barrage of snow showers, slush, and icy rain that, as we would all discover, delivered the proper Rasputitsian flavor.

Race Day!
6:15 AM
View from my hotel room window

Newport, Vermont is a small city on the southern shores of Lake Memphremagog. Most of Lake Memphremagog is in Canada. The Rasputitsa starts on Main St. in Newport. The pack of riders gets led out of town and along the eastern shore of the lake for a neutral mile or so before the racing actually starts. Except that's not quite accurate, as Team Shad learned.

Team Headquarters
Four Seasons Inn, Derby, VT

The thing is, despite staying overnight at team headquarters just a few miles north of the starting line, we left the team hotel later than anticipated and by the time we got downtown, parked, geared up and mounted our bikes, hundreds of riders had already queued up ahead of us so that we were forced to start near the rear of the pack.

The rear of the starting line
The Virginian in neon high vis lime on the left

Despite being pretty far back in the throng of riders waiting to get underway our spirits were high and we felt ready for the competition. We had a plan; we'd stick together for as long as possible and then, if it was clear that one of us was holding the other two back, we'd split up and allow for individual attacks and the quest for solo glory.

Team Shad, Loose and Confident

The thing is, when you assemble a small squad of riders as I did, you never quite know what you're going to get. On the surface, all seems jovial, convivial, unified. In the training rides leading up to race day and in team meetings and dinners everything seems as One. But when the rolling throng of competitors spins off the starting line and you suddenly find yourself in a large group of riders, most of whom immediately begin jockeying for advantage and position, dynamics change quickly. It requires discipline and communication to stay together.

Little did I anticipate Team Shad exploding within the first two miles. Turns out that The Virginian, despite what I believe to have been a sincere willingness to be a team player, is, at heart, a solo assassin. He is preternaturally unable to subsume the wild need for the attack. So as the peloton began unwinding itself along the long, narrow, still-paved lake shore road, The Virginian immediately began accelerating, working his way forward. Teammate I-ward, on the other hand, not quite as fit as myself or The Virginian and knowing he'd need to pace himself in order not to bonk over the long haul, fell into a sensible, if slower, pace behind me.

I found myself in a conundrum; to keep the team together, I had to keep both lads in sight. I attempted to stay visible to I-ward and give him the comfort of knowing I wasn't beyond reach. At the same time I knew that if I allowed The Virginian to drop me at this very early juncture I'd be on my own for most of the race so I had to pedal a little harder and make a bigger effort earlier on than I'd hoped to do. All the while, other riders whir forward or fall away behind me as I pass them.

By the time we hit the first stretch of unpaved road, maybe two and a half miles into the race, Team Shad has imploded. I-ward is hunkered down in a small gaggle of cyclists somewhere behind me; when I glance back hopefully over my shoulder, I can no longer see his scrambled-egg-colored jersey. He's gone. The Virginian on the other hand is 100 yards ahead or so and moving along at speed but within sight and within reach.

First stretch of unpaved road
about 3 miles into the race

Then the first significant climb arrives, the road is soft, riders begin faltering and bogging down, some already climbing off their bikes, another poor soul already with a flat tire. Over the course of the race we end up seeing many people pulled over changing tires, an inordinate number of them, it seems. Perhaps they're riding on road tires? Plenty of riders are though there are also plenty of mountain bikes and cyclocross bikes.

I use the climb to my advantage and ride up to The Virginian. I excoriate him for blowing up the team in the first four miles, deliberate with him over whether to wait for I-ward or not, then both of us lessen our pace thinking that I-ward may catch up with us if we slow it down. Other riders take advantage of our meandering and pass us. It's difficult to let them go knowing that we're dropping in the standings even as the race is just getting underway. Eventually, we agree to leave I-ward to his own devices and press on with our own quixotic pursuits. The reality is that even had I-ward caught up to us at that point we would likely have lost him again on the next major climb. At that moment I realized that the team strategy was out the window and it was every shad for himself.

Mile 10 or so and the race has split apart

What unfolded was an arduous and intensive pursuit of every rider up the road that we could see; and for me personally, a continuously rolling gut-check. There was very little resting or coasting, not if you had any intention of riding for placement. This, I realized, is what separates a good hard weekend 40 mile ride from an actual organized race. On the weekend ride, you let yourself rest periodically, recover a little bit, maybe amble along some to enjoy the scenery and catch your breath. In the race, you are pedaling hard all the time, and when you're struggling instead of easing up you force yourself to push through and keep pedaling as hard as possible.

After the initial big unpaved climb and then a long rolling stretch across a ridge, after 10 miles or so, I was warmed up and feeling fairly strong. I felt bad that we'd dropped I-ward and now I was keeping a weather eye on The Virginian in the event he tried a sudden attack. I was determined to stick to his wheel as much as possible.

Keeping The Virginian in Check

The Attack!

Climbing into the hills heading for Cyberia

Counter-attack!
I rode off the front, leaving The Virginian to chase

Eventually, after a period of steady climbing, we came to the section of the race known as Cyberia. Pre-race talk had suggested that riders would need to "shoulder" for this section. That is, we'd have to heft our bikes and hike. Not knowing any better I had doubted these reports, dismissing them as hyperbolic or as race organizer scare tactics. Alas, my skepticism proved naive in the extreme.

The beginning of Cyberia
and the rider I would eventually power past

The first bit of Cyberia edged a sloping field and ridge line; the 'road' was little more than a dray path and was half mud and half frozen snow-ice. With the bravado that comes from just having powered up one of the major climbs of the day and having dropped a number of riders, I stormed into Cyberia full of confidence. At one point, impatient with following the rider I'd caught up with, I churned past him in the slush and left him to his mincing caution. I was in Cyberia! I was flying!

And then I wasn't. Rather than continuing flat on the ridge line for miles in a state of ride-able mud & slush/ice/snow, the rough path turned upward and into the forest. Actually, it became something of a mountain side rivulet for the melting snows, a rocky stream bed at places crusted over with thick snow-covered ice, at other places a running stream of slick round rocks. There was nothing to do but dismount and begin the long schlep up up up toward the top, a mile or so away.

Cyberia turns gnarly

And gets worse as it ascends

Even The Virginian has to hoof it

Then, at the top of the Long March of Cyberia, a surreal sight awaits. A Sasquatch-guarded maple syrup dispensary complete with frozen shot glasses from which to slurp the golden nectar. The Cyberian Reward.

Cyberian Sasquatch Syrup Stand

Iced shot glasses of Vermont's Natural Tree Fuel

The Virginian High-Fiving Sasquatch

Unfortunately, the descent down a power line on the other side of the maple syrup stand was deeply mudded, pitted, snowy, and impossible to ride. Plus, my cleats were encased in ice from walking up the ice slope so when I did try to mount my bike I couldn't clip into the pedals. I spent an ungainly few minutes trying to stay upright and pedal and keep my tire line straight. Finally, the power line (and Cyberia) ended, dumped us unceremoniously onto a gravel road that pointed very steeply upward. We all stood around with rocks and sticks picking at the undersides of our shoes trying to clear the ice.

My feet got wet slogging through Cyberia and then they got cold. And the race was only halfway done (more or less). Surprisingly, even though we immediately began a very steep climb, it felt good to be pedaling again. Pushing and carrying your bike for a mile on rutted, slippery terrain while wearing non-traction bike shoes & booties is TIRING. Pedaling, in comparison, felt easy relatively-speaking. Shortly after the initial steep climb, we evened out and cruised along for awhile on a pretty steady flat. Then we descended and made it to the valley floor.

At this point, I sort of lost my bearings and was unsure exactly where we were and what sections we still had left. At one point, we hit pavement and began a long, flat (with some minor rolling hills) stretch directly into a headwind. Once again, The Virginian proved pitiless. Instead of hanging with me and working together, he put space between us, latched onto the wheels of a group of four or five up ahead and tucked in behind them. Me? Hung out to dry alone in no man's land. I mounted a desperate attempt to catch them but couldn't. Instead, I toiled and slogged in a very low gear, I hunched forward to be as streamlined as possible but that didn't help much. Caught out in the wind like that forced me to use huge amounts of energy.

I managed to bridge the gap only because the route lead us through a feed zone where everyone slowed down and then across a busy intersection where race monitors stopped traffic for the cyclists to pass. The Virginian's mini squad slowed through here and I bridged the gap.

"Thanks for leaving me out to dry, you bastard!" I shouted at The Virginian as I passed him. He shrugged and shouted back "You should have got onto my wheel!"

"I couldn't get your wheel, that's the fucking point! If you'd have hung back a bit and let me latch on, we could have worked together. I'll remember this!"

Etc. All in good fun, of course. But the effort I expended staying in sight and eventually catching up left me knackered. There were still about 20 miles to go. And then the sun came out. And all was good.

Once again, back together

That lasted about 10 minutes. Then more climbing, then more rolling mud roads across unprotected open field; the sky clouded over, the wind picked up, the roads were slick. Riders began to battle. The 20 or so riders that could all see each other up or down the road by now knew that the race was in the latter stages and that all the competition was now in sight. For the riders way back behind us, they were no longer worthy of our consideration. As for the leaders - how many there were we didn't know - they were beyond our reach. We didn't know if they were minutes up the road or an hour up the road. (And in fact, as we later determined, at this point the winners had already crossed the finish line, an hour ahead of us.) So it became a race between the twenty or so riders who were still in contact with one another. At least it was in my mind.

To borrow an extraordinary cliche from Paul Sherwen, the Brit cycling color commentator, I was forced to reach deep into my suitcase of courage in order to press on. I had little energy reserves left. I looked like this:

The face of a man who realizes that there are no more clothes
to be pulled from his suitcase of courage

Then we were hurtling through the sandy streets of Troy, down Main St., across town and out the other side, taking a left onto Bear Mountain Road. Though not unduly hilly at any part, Bear Mountain Road does gain some elevation and there are plenty of ups & downs ("rollers"), the ups being just tall enough and steep enough to summon despair and suffering. The riders were few and far between. I chased the Virginian and the Virginian traced a duo on a tandem alongside a single rider.

In pursuit of The Virginian
on Bear Mountain Rd
mile 35

We eventually all bunched together, then we dropped the single rider, then the tandem dropped us and it was finally me and The Virginian taking it home. Eventually, after some exceptional downhills, we merge onto Lake Road, a paved road that hugs the lake shore (though still presenting a couple of rolling climbs that really hurt; several times my quads protest in spasms and I'm afraid I'll cramp up in the stretch run and either be unable to finish or have to ignominiously push and coast my way to the finish line).

Then we see the 3K marker!

3 K to go!

At last! Main St., Newport, the red arc of the finish line. The Virginian and I are all alone, we've dropped everyone that was near at hand and no one had been in our sights ahead for the whole last Lake Rd section.

The finish line in sight!

Then it was over. The Virginian, in a move reminiscent of Lance Armstrong handing Marco Pantani the victory on the Mont Ventoux in the Tour de France, The Virginian slowed and watched me go past him and finish a second in front. Perhaps he was feeling guilty for having abandoned me to the headwinds earlier on. Or maybe he was, like Lance, secure in his ability to dispatch weaker rivals at will, as if he knew that finish line placement was more important to me than it was to him, and so letting me squeak by at the last was his gift of atonement.

It was a while before I-ward made it in but make it in he did, roaring down the stretch with surprising ferocity considering that he'd basically labored on his own all day.

The arrival of I-ward

Of course, when all was said and done, when we'd changed from our wet and cold cycling costumes and were warm again, any animosity and dissension that had riven Team Shad was forgotten and we were, once again, a Team.

Inity in the wake of the Rasputitsa

There was only one thing left to do. Hit the poutine station!

Poutine, the food of the gods

Ride Summary: This was ride #36 for me on the year. 46.98 miles (74 K), 13.3 mph, 3 hours 35 minutes.

Post script: See also Rasputitsa Miscellany, a follow-up post.