I have finally finished my cycling season here in Hawaii. This last weekend I did the Dick Evans Memorial road race. Dick Evans was a cyclist here in Hawaii that was hit by a car back in the 80's and was killed. Every year this race is held to remember him. The race is a 112 mile loop around the island of Oahu. This was a very well put on race. There were four water/support areas with free water bottles. There was about 20 police motorcycles riding the entire course stopping all traffic till we passed and keeping the roads clear of people and cars. And there was about ten vehicles with spare wheels and parts following us around in case we needed help.
The day was a nice start at 5 am. We rode about 30 miles in the dark rain through honolulu in a group of about 250 people. as we neared the first climb (near our house) the rain stopped and the sun rose higher in the sky. We turned a corner and after about 100 meters the guy in front of me crashed his bike on the wet roads. I had nowhere to turn and I hit him head on and flew over my handle bars. This sucked! I flew and landed on my head, knees and slid on my chest for a while. I jumped back on my bike only to find my seat was busted, my handlbars were thrashed and my arm and knees hurt really bad.
It took me about 20 minutes to catch back up to the lead group at the top of the hill and by that time our group had dwindled to about only 35 people. We rode together till mile 75 when the hills started to pop up a little bit and the weaker riders gradually fell off the back. I stayed up front and felt fairly strong untill 12 miles to go we hit a large steep hill and all of a sudden my legs started to cramp up and I couldn't physically ride any more at their speed. It was a horrible feeling since I had enough energy, I just couldn't move my legs... anyways I dropped off the back, then caught back up on the other side, then it happened again on the next hill, and on the next. With one mile to go I was in the first chase group of 5 people and we were only a minute behind the leaders when my legs cramped hard, I stood up and then some different muscles cramped and I sat back on my broken seat and watched everyone ride away up the hill to the finish line. I finished in 12 or 13th 2 minutes behind the winner. So there you have it. My finish time was 5 hours 4 minutes. This is 1 hour 30 minutes faster than my ironman time in 2004.
So anyways if you read all that I am sorry for boring you, but I wanted to make sure I wrote that experience down because it was the longest toughest american race, and I finished really well considering the obstacles I went through to finish. Secondly, it was the last sunday race I will ever do. I realized after I got home and was waiting for Robyn who was at church to get home with Melia that I would have way rather been with them at church and I don't ever want to leave them on a sunday for a silly bike race again.
So there is the wrap up for the weekend.