Sunday is traditionally the Ironman course day. We ride the whole course except the 20km out and back. Wow the legs are sore, but they always are this time of the camp. I think this will be my fourth time doing this training camp. The weather looked a bit cloudier today. Some of us wore jackets, and some of us also took longer getting ready. Trevor was chomping at the bit as he had a flight to catch immediately after the ride. I kept bugging him that he'd have to pull me around the course(do most of the work) to ensure he makes the flight. ha ha
So we headed out of town, had a few hicups with some of us heading the wrong way or some small mechanicals so we had to wait and go back a little bit to make sure everyone was ok. It's amazing how everyone's abilities are so different and how a group can split up so quickly. Anywho, once Greg had confirmed everyone was on track we got back on track. From Penticton, to Ok falls, to Oliver and to Osoyoos. The same road we did on friday just the correct way this time. Greg and I were a bit behind, we sent everyone ahead as we helped out one of the stragglers with her tire. So it was my job to help pull Greg up to the rest of the group ahead. He helped as much as he could, but I spent a lot of the time in front pulling. I don't mind this as he's pulled me along so many times in the past. I was having trouble today though. I didn't feel so good after waiting, it's really hard to get the legs going after every stop, plus I hadn't slept much during the camp and was feeling quite fatigued. Grrrr then just as we get close to bridging up to a few of our riders I get a flat tire. So I change it while Greg eats a bar, he fed me a part of it as I was stripping the tube out of the tire. Got the tire changed(it wasn't a very speedy change) and got back onto the road. Soon we were in Osoyoos and I could take a short break while re-filling water bottles and taking in some more nutrition.
After the Husky station we headed up Richter pass. My legs and me just had nothing left, the extra miles and the lack of sleep was not a good combo! So I climbed with Trevor, there would be no heroics from me today, at least not right now. I kept the heart rate lower than usual for climbing and rode. Richter isn't too tough a climb and we got there soon enough. We were surprised to find the wind had changed on us again, tail wind for the way home, man was I ever happy for that. It changed yesterday too, that doesn't usually happen where it changes to favor you. Tail wind makes the rollers after Richter a lot easier and there's a lot less climbing needed to be done on each crest.
By the time we got on the flat road though both Trevor and I were looking pretty bad. So we took turns pulling to get to the Big Bear fruit stand near Keromeos. That flat straight road seems to take forever when the quads are screaming at you to stop!! So we waited at the stand for the others and they came along soon enough, everyone else seemed to be in better shape than Trev and I. Or maybe it only seemed that way. Anyways a 10-15 minute stop will do wonders, along with a couple bites of Trevor's snickers bar. The next bit of road is mostly a false flat heading up to the Yellow lake pass. Three serious looking cyclists had passed by and I made it my goal to catch them, so eventually I dropped Trevor and kept going hard from the base of Yellow lake. They didn't seem too far ahead and I guess my legs had recovered a bit as I seemed to be gaining on them. I caught one of them just before the last pitch. I waited for Trevor at thee top and then we continued down Yellow lake. It's like a 30km mostly downhill ride into Penticton. Some of it was headwind, but it still went pretty quickly and I pushed the flat parts. Back into town again and down the canal back to our hotel. No brick run for me today, I figured tomorrow's long run would suffice. Another great training day in a great place!!
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