Hmm, grass and blue sky. What is going on? Where is my
bike? More importantly where are the other bike
racers?
This was my thought process a few years ago when as a
newbie racer I bonked hard at the Provincial Road Race
Championships in Kitchener-Waterloo.
Up until the crash I was having the race of my life. I
hadn’t been dropped and even better I was in the lead
group. I was pretty excited.
So excited that I stopped drinking. A hot
mid-afternoon day in August and I decided the best
race strategy was to forgo liquid.
Like I said I was a newbie racer. I was so happy to be
in the race that I focussed on staying in the race.
This is what led me to the grassy ditch on the side of
the road.
After a couple of laps of using my scientifically
honed “no drinking” strategy, I began to notice little
bumps on my arms and legs and I started to go
backwards.
Pretty quickly I was dropped from the race. Then I was
in the ditch. Friends told me afterwards that I began
weaving across the road and simply pedaled my bike
into the ditch.
I ended up in an ambulance (how cool!) and in a
Kitchener-Waterloo hospital. I lay on a bed with no
socks or shoes for what seemed like hours in my race
clothes with an IV in my arm and something poking me
in the back (this turned out to be my race food –
plums…).
Eventually my trusty OBC team members collected me and
we made the trip back to Ottawa. I felt pretty rough
for the next few days and spent most of my time lying
on the couch.
The moral of the story – eat and drink often!
The worst aspect of my big bonk – a bill for the
ambulance ride and I lost my favorite pair of cycling
socks.
Interesting Reading. . .
"Winning Moves"