RUNDOWN
- "Rest Day"
- 35km Bike, downhill to the pool & back
- 3km Swim, 50m long course pool
- 10km Run, big elevation with option to extend to 2hr/15km for additional point
HOW I FEEL
I'm destroyed. Last night was bleak. After the longest ride of my life, I tried to make up for lost time and ate two tortillas full of whatever vegan carbs I could find. Something in that mix did not sit well. (I'm getting sick to my stomach just thinking about those tortillas. It might be some time before I'm able to look at one without getting nauseous. Call your broker and short Chipotle.)
By the time dinner rolled around about an hour and half later, I was totally despondent at the table and just doing all I could to not bring up what little I could put down. Several others were looking equally as smoked, so I went pretty unnoticed. As a side note, JB didn't arrive back from the ride until nearly 8pm. He had stopped mid ride with a few others and took down a monster calzone + a Chimay Blue (a dark ale that's freaking 9% alcohol). Impressively, he refused the van picking him up at 7pm and continued on until the late hour. Still on track for camp completion...
I quietly plastic-wrapped my glorious yet untouched vegan curry dinner prep'ed by the rockstar chalet chef, and headed off to bed. I contemplated throwing up, but knew I needed to keep down whatever calories I could. (I had burned 3,900 calories on the bike and around 700 calories on the run, so my deficit was high on the day.) Despite the stomach pain, I fell asleep pretty quickly; maybe around 8:45pm. At 12:30am I woke up in a fit. After about 5 long minutes of not wanting to get up, my stomach forced the issue and I rushed to the bathroom. I quickly kicked up everything in my system and then sprawled out on the floor for the better part of an hour. I finally got back to bed around 2am, feeling better.
The rest of the day would be a steady improvement from the rock bottom of puking and lying on the cold bathroom floor...
RUN (Part I)
Adam K and I were rooming together - he's been kicking the shit out of himself since day one, so was exhausted and able to sleep through my barfing with no problem - and had discussed doing the 2hr run for additional points yesterday. When our alarms went off at 6am, we both got up and started getting our run gear on. While I felt better, I was still banged up and realized I needed more sleep. "Sorry dude. I'm hurting and was puking last night. I'm going to do this run later." With that, I was back to sleep.
BIKE (Part I)
At 8:30am I finally got back out of bed. Feeling much better this go 'round and was just in time for the tail end of breakfast. By 10am I was in my bike kit and ready to ride down to the pool. The ride to the pool was a ~18km (11mi) descent from our chalet door. The weather was rainy and foggy, which actually helped my post-fever frail state.
Once on the bike, I pedaled maybe twice, hitting nearly 40 mph down the windy road down to the pool, dropping nearly 2,800 feet in elevation from start to finish. This was going to suck climbing back up. The sun came out just as we rolled into the parking lot of the pool.
SWIM
I knew this was going to be a slow one, so I avoided the fast lane where John and Adam were during it out for points in an effort to get the Yellow Jersey by day's end. As I slowly plotted through the water, I watched John knock out 1000m with bands (feet tied together), followed by 10x200 on 3:00, and finally topped off with a 200 fly. Good God. This dude wants the Yellow. Afterwards, John said he really had to dig deep on those sets and was in a world of hurt ~40m into the 200 fly. Damn impressive. Louie, AKA Louie the Fly, also drilled a ridiculously graceful 200 fly despite his long day on the bike yesterday. While I felt like shit, coming in at 2min mark on 100s, I was inspired by how deep some guys were going and was motivated to get my 3km done no matter how slowly it was coming along.
BIKE (Part II)
18km of straight climbing at 3-7% gradient is not fun when you're feeling super rough. Thankfully I had fellow Endurance Corner athlete Ben Moore with me, also taking it easy. We took our sweet time, me slowing things down. After 1hr30mins we were back at the chalet our bikes and hanging up our clothes to dry. (Worth mentioning, in addition to being a great guy, Ben is one of the most humble triathletes I've met. He has a 9 hour Ironman to his name, but you'd never hear it from him. With Ironman Wales coming up in ~10 weeks time, Ben is taking Epic Camp with caution per coach Alan Couzens advice, much like myself and Walter.)
RUN (Part II)
This was purely a check-the-box run. With zero flat terrain in the area, I jog/walked up 4km of a trail and then jogged down, zigzagging across the path, partially to slow down but mostly in a desperate attempt to increase the distance and maybe pick up an additional km on the downhill. I finished the 10km in an almost flat parking lot near the chalet. Total time 1hr16min (aka 12:09/mi) - my new slowest 10k. Total elevation gain was 1,300ft. Just look at that graph!
PERFORMANCE OF THE DAY
Have to add this section in today. My man Walter took a spill while doing the 10km trail run up on Alpe D'Huez and banged himself up. Sprained ankle, possibly broken hand, and a chin that probably could have benefited from some stitches. After taking yesterday off, he bounced back today. In fact, he, Phil and Peter rode to Italy for a coffee. Yes, you read that correctly. He and these two RODE to ITALY for a COFFEE!! A 30km climb up Col du Grand St-Bernard. This ride to Italy embodies all that I love about Epic Camp. After Walter mentioned doing it, Phil and Peter jumped on the idea in a matter of seconds. Italy? Yeah, I'm in. We should get a coffee. Can add it to my list of countries visited on this trip. (Due to some last-minute booking, Phil's trip to France from New Zealand included layovers in the US and Germany, and will include Spain and China on the 40 hour trek home...) Very bummed that I was too banged up to do this impromptu trip to Italy. So awesome.