Hallucinating on the Bike



gntlmn

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Jul 28, 2003
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Many top riders have hallucinated on the bike. Even Lance Armstrong has mentioned having more than one "out of body" experience. I can think of other long distance endurance athletes who have hallucinated. The one that impressed me the most was the triathlete Mark Allen when he won his first Ironman Triathlon in Hawaii. He was neck and neck with Dave Scott, the reigning champion at the time and was about half way through the marathon, the last event just after the bike ride, and he saw an Indian descend out of the clouds. At the same time, he got a surge of strength and left Dave Scott in the dust to win his first triathlon.

I have never hallucinated on the bike, but I have had "rider's high" accompanied by a serious increase in power. I have had one off the bike, however, in a semi sensory deprivation environment. I know what it feels like off the bike.

Have many of you hallucinated on the bike? I'm talking about naturally, not drug induced, hallucinations. It sure would be interesting to hear your stories.
 
I occasionally have the delusion that i'm a decent hillclimber

but it never lasts long....

i've never had any serious hallucinations on the bike but i've had them before during a food and sleep deprivation exercise i did in the army.

Its pretty scary when you start seeing dinosaurs and stuff
 
It's kind of like dreaming with your eyes open: you see what you know to be real, and at the same time, you see the image or images interspersed or in the middle of it all.
I have a feeling most people would start to hallucinate on the bike if they could stay awake long enough. They might have to ride for 48 hours or more straight, but I think it would happen.

I think if you get the hallucinations w/o the sleep deprivation, you are most likely going beyond yourself with extreme exertion.
 
Originally posted by Jfurmmtnbike
And here I thought this was going to be turned into a shroom discussion
I once heard that endorphins, the brain chemicals produced when you do a very hard ride or long ride or which result in what runners describe as runners' high, are ounce per ounce (or if you prefer, gram per gram) one thousand times as powerful as morphine. I also don't think you can expect to OD on them. The trick is to get them to emit. Think about this carefully; one gram would be equivalent to the kick of more than 2 pounds of morphine without the overdose. And of utmost concern to the cyclist, traces of natural endorphins in the blood has a direct and major positive impact on aerobic output. It increases your capability to consume oxygen.

I suspect that endorphins are connected with hallucinations. That's why athletes often say they see the hallucinations when they are breaking effortlessly away from the crowd. They wouldn't feel any pain, would they?
 
Originally posted by gntlmn
I once heard that endorphins, the brain chemicals produced when you do a very hard ride or long ride or which result in what runners describe as runners' high, are ounce per ounce (or if you prefer, gram per gram) one thousand times as powerful as morphine. I also don't think you can expect to OD on them. The trick is to get them to emit. Think about this carefully; one gram would be equivalent to the kick of more than 2 pounds of morphine without the overdose.

At the risk of pointing out the obvious, the only reason you can't OD on your own endorphins is that your body can not or will not produce enough of them to cause an overdose. Our bodies have beautiful biofeedback mechanisms to prevent this sort of thing from happening. Give the guy enough adrenaline and endorphins to run away from the lion, but not enough to send him into a coma or cause a heart attack!
 
It would be neat to develop the ability to "endorphin" at will, wouldn't it?
 
Originally posted by gntlmn
It would be neat to develop the ability to "endorphin" at will, wouldn't it?

:cool: But that would take away the motivation to sprint up the hills!

--Josh
 
Originally posted by jgatts
:cool: But that would take away the motivation to sprint up the hills!

--Josh

Who cares about the podium with that carrot in front of your eyes. lol.
 
I have never hallucinated on the bike but I did on a forced march in the Marines. We had been humping ( hiking with packs ) for 13 hours a day for two days. NO SLEEP and only a packet of coffee grinds to eat. I was tripped out. I was having visual and auditory hallucinations. Bright colors exploding in soud, weird things walking around in the hills. Crazy. The biggest hallucination I ever had, though, was the one when I decided to join the Marines.
 
Originally posted by adamholck
I have never hallucinated on the bike but I did on a forced march in the Marines. We had been humping ( hiking with packs ) for 13 hours a day for two days. NO SLEEP and only a packet of coffee grinds to eat. I was tripped out. I was having visual and auditory hallucinations. Bright colors exploding in soud, weird things walking around in the hills. Crazy. The biggest hallucination I ever had, though, was the one when I decided to join the Marines.

Wow! I guess they want to really make sure you know what to expect in a real conflict. What you describe sounds similar to Army Ranger training. A friend of mine told me during his ranger training, 4 people died out of I can't remember, maybe 300 men (heat exhaustion, hypothermia, heart attack, drowning). I can see where people might be dying in the conditions you describe.

I see a common trigger for hallucinations in this thread and other accounts I read: sleep deprivation. I see it in RAAM (race across America) and the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race in Alaska. Hallucinations are fairly common. Contestants are very motivated to avoid sleep in these events.
 
Originally posted by adamholck
... We had been humping ( hiking with packs ) for 13 hours a day for two days. NO SLEEP and only a packet of coffee grinds to eat. ...
Y'know, that would have sounded much more impressive without the "hiking with packs" clarification. :D
 
Originally posted by gntlmn
Many top riders have hallucinated on the bike. Even Lance Armstrong has mentioned having more than one "out of body" experience. I can think of other long distance endurance athletes who have hallucinated. The one that impressed me the most was the triathlete Mark Allen when he won his first Ironman Triathlon in Hawaii. He was neck and neck with Dave Scott, the reigning champion at the time and was about half way through the marathon, the last event just after the bike ride, and he saw an Indian descend out of the clouds. At the same time, he got a surge of strength and left Dave Scott in the dust to win his first triathlon.
During a cross country running race I was convinced that I saw a man in a trench coat beating me. I was racing my friends for fun. We went to our school's course and did it two times in a row. Winner got bragging rights. I was winning and almost done with the course the 2nd time. I was really cooking. I was working on a 5:30 mile, after doing almost 5 and 1/2. I was burning it to make sure my friend Jerick didn't close on me, then I saw a guy running and I followed him thru the course for almost 1/2 a mile. At my pace I'm convinced no normal human could do that because he beat me at the finishing sprint(im a beastly sprinter) I don't know how it happened but he was running in a trench coat and then he turned around a large oak and i saw his coat swish and then he was gone. I took the cake on that race because I tried to follow this sort of illusionary man who is a running monster. Oh my friend Jerick finished behind me and he said that he almost caught me where I said i saw him and followed he said he didnt understand why i sped up(he didnt see anything and didnt get why i was runngin so fast(to catch the guy))The end. Any one else like that????

I have never hallucinated on the bike, but I have had "rider's high" accompanied by a serious increase in power. I have had one off the bike, however, in a semi sensory deprivation environment. I know what it feels like off the bike.

Have many of you hallucinated on the bike? I'm talking about naturally, not drug induced, hallucinations. It sure would be interesting to hear your stories.
 
Originally posted by trekrider4315

During a cross country running race I was convinced that I saw a man in a trench coat beating me. I was racing my friends for fun. We went to our school's course and did it two times in a row. Winner got bragging rights. I was winning and almost done with the course the 2nd time. I was really cooking. I was working on a 5:30 mile, after doing almost 5 and 1/2. I was burning it to make sure my friend Jerick didn't close on me, then I saw a guy running and I followed him thru the course for almost 1/2 a mile. At my pace I'm convinced no normal human could do that because he beat me at the finishing sprint(im a beastly sprinter) I don't know how it happened but he was running in a trench coat and then he turned around a large oak and i saw his coat swish and then he was gone. I took the cake on that race because I tried to follow this sort of illusionary man who is a running monster. Oh my friend Jerick finished behind me and he said that he almost caught me where I said i saw him and followed he said he didnt understand why i sped up(he didnt see anything and didnt get why i was runngin so fast(to catch the guy))The end. Any one else like that????


I appreciate the story, but it posted like it was my story. For the record, the middle paragraph about the trenchcoat character, which I excerpted above, is your story, not mine. The rest of it indeed is mine. And the running man is a good story. It would be neat to train yourself to "see" that trenchcoat character whenever you wanted to. Be careful with the quotes. I don't want to be explaining to another reader your story when you should be the one to get the credit. Take care! I hope I haven't added to the confusion with this explanation.
 
Originally posted by gntlmn
During a cross country running race I was convinced that I saw a man in a trench coat beating me. I was racing my friends for fun. We went to our school's course and did it two times in a row. Winner got bragging rights. I was winning and almost done with the course the 2nd time. I was really cooking. I was working on a 5:30 mile, after doing almost 5 and 1/2. I was burning it to make sure my friend Jerick didn't close on me, then I saw a guy running and I followed him thru the course for almost 1/2 a mile. At my pace I'm convinced no normal human could do that because he beat me at the finishing sprint(im a beastly sprinter) I don't know how it happened but he was running in a trench coat and then he turned around a large oak and i saw his coat swish and then he was gone. I took the cake on that race because I tried to follow this sort of illusionary man who is a running monster. Oh my friend Jerick finished behind me and he said that he almost caught me where I said i saw him and followed he said he didnt understand why i sped up(he didnt see anything and didnt get why i was runngin so fast(to catch the guy))The end. Any one else like that????


I appreciate the story, but it posted like it was my story. For the record, the middle paragraph about the trenchcoat character, which I excerpted above, is your story, not mine. The rest of it indeed is mine. And the running man is a good story. It would be neat to train yourself to "see" that trenchcoat character whenever you wanted to. Be careful with the quotes. I don't want to be explaining to another reader your story when you should be the one to get the credit. Take care! I hope I haven't added to the confusion with this explanation.

Thanks for some reason I must have put my story in there. Whoops hope nobody gives you trouble.MY BAD!!:rolleyes:
 
Originally posted by juliebeanpie
Pick your Poopy?:eek: I'm sure you must mean Poppy?

juliebeanpie,

Shrooms grow on poopy! (at least that's what I've been told because of course I don't have any firsthand knowledge of that sort of thing...did you guys just see that unicorn?!?)

And, to get back to non-drug-induced halucinatory experiences. I saw a rainbow colored bubble surrounding me near the end of a long ride one night. Maybe it had something to do with high humidity and street lights and low blood sugar but it only happened that one time and it looked really cool.
 

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