On Aug 29, 11:37 pm, Crescentius Vespasianus <
[email protected]>
wrote:
> the ride reports of Paris-Brest-Paris
> are starting to show up, read this
> shocking one
>
> http://zecher.org/clare/PBP2007RideReport.html
For the woman who's probably over vilified. I read most of the post
yesterday, eventually I switched from skimming to stopping, but there
are some major things that apply to other people:
1. The problem with your bag??? Did you ride the brevets and all
summer without using the setup you used during PBP? I hope there was a
last second breakdown that caused the issue, because otherwise it was
sheer stupidity to not have tested your setup long before. I know my
Carradice to experimenting and finally investing in the more expensive
support to make it work with my Roubaix.
2. Not pulling. It sounds like you're my worst nightmare of a
triathlete who doesn't know anything about cycling. OK - how many
responses will that get? Of course people expect you to share the
load. You were a complete asshole just taking off. I you could do that
you could've pulled your best.
I'm glad I don't remember more of the post but a lot of it sounded
like lack a planned and unbelievable lack of experience.
Lessons learned from my rookie PBP:
PBP was rough, but for me the biggest issue wasn't the weather, it was
the lack of places to sleep when I needed it. Fortunately, I made a
couple of key last-second purchases I hadn't really thought I'd need.
These were Sugoi heavy shoe covers and mid-weight leg warmers. I had a
heavy pair of leg warmers (Kolcharik wool) that I knew would be too
heavy. I suffered the second night because didn't stop to put on the
stuff needed.
So, like many others, I made it to Lodiac needing sleep along with a
few friends. We agreed to take a long sleep break and I never managed
to fall asleep in the bright cafeteria w/all the noise. I couldn't
believe some of the volunteers who (in my state of mind) seemed to be
trying to keep people up. I know that wasn't the case. Like, I one
point they started opening the windows more even though it just let in
the freezing wind besides lots of talking while standing next to
people trying to fall asleep. That wasted a few hours of not biking
and little rest.
Here I'll say my legs weren't feeling bad even though I usually slow
down a lot between 200 and 250 miles. It must have been that this was
the first time I've ever taken Ibuprofen during a ride. I took one
Advil at each control as a preventive.
Got to Brest feeling OK except tired. I did like others and slept on
the grass in the glorious sun for 30-45 min. When I woke up, my left
knee was sore. I upped the advil to 4xper 12 hours, as an experienced
friend (PBP, BMB) said 3-4 is what it takes once you're fighting an
existing pain. I spin all the time in general, and rode the rest of
the ride as "gingerly" as possible to avoid making it worse while
hoping it would get better.
Another thing I hope people read. I saw a friend there who was clearly
out of it. I assumed it was sleep deprivation and left thinking I'd
convinced him to sleep for a few hours. He's a very strong rider so he
could've afforded the time. Later in the ride he DNF'd and in the
hospital was diagnosed with heart and liver issues. I still don't know
what was cause and what effect (haven't talked to him yet), but I
think RUSA should start providing some rider ed about watching out for
other riders. Yeah, we're supposed to be independent, but I agree with
other posts I've seen that rider exhaustion was probably the cause of
a lot of crashes. We need to be proactive about getting people off
their bikes when they clearly can't ride.
Almost forgot to add. I stopped at a cafe after Brest and left my
helmet there. I'd never do downhills without a helmet and really
considered this a crisis at the time b/c it had my headlamp on it.
This headlamp was awesome for riding in general beyond its intended
purpose of making it easy to see the route markers. Highly recommended
for all night riding now unless you have a Schmidt hub.
At a stop before Lodeac I slept a couple hours where they had a nice
corner of pads blocked off. I'd brought my kitchen timer so I could
punch in the time I wanted to sleep (no working phone or watch w/an
alarm). Someone had to wake me up by shaking my shoulder even though
the alarm was right next to my head. I napped at Lodeac like everyone
else, this time no problem putting my head on the cafeteria table and
passing out. Another survival method was I'd bring in my clothes (in
ziploc bags) and use that as a pillow, with one clean shirt on top of
the bags.
After that it was the typical just keep pedaling until you finish, no
major drama and not much more sleep. The only drama was my friend
mentioned before. I British rider pulled him over because of his
erratic riding and asked if anyone knew him. So I pulled over, we
found someone with a phone and called officials to pick him up. This
was at night and I was very worried about being dropped by the big
group we were in. The British guy was willing to wait for the car and
I took off - I realize how lame this sounds and am very grateful to
him.
Finally, I'll only do a 1200 after I have a much faster double
century. Will tour northern France rather than do another PBP unless
they expand the sleeping facilities.
Dave,
Chicago
Great Lakes R's