As many of you know who follow this blog, my training for the Ride Across America 2 Cure Cancer started in earnest with the recent change in my employment status, from employed to unemployed when Natron Energy closed their doors in early September. All of a sudden I had plenty of time to train in my spare time when I wasn’t looking for work in the Data Center, Energy/energy Storage, and Investment industries as an advisor, consultant, or board member.
With this new found training time I started to execute my plan to build a support team to ensure that when I put my bicycle wheels in the Pacific Ocean in San Diego I would have the fitness, endurance, body metabolism / gut, bike fit, and nutritional understanding to ensure I was able to give it my best performance and not bonk along the way to St. Augustine and the Atlantic Ocean. Where I would be treated by my wonderful, supporting wife, granddaughters, son and daughter-in-law. Now that is worth riding for!
So I started upping my riding miles from a haphazard collection of 75 to 150 mile weeks in the past to a planned ramping from 200 to 250 miles, with mostly zone 2 intensity to 300/350 miles in late October. Then the plan was to push for 400+ miles within the first two weeks of November. Weather and family / life commitments notwithstanding. Hold that thought, the wheels fell off the bus (bike) the night of Monday October 27.
To achieve these results I knew I needed a few coaches. First up was a nutrition coach as my Garmin Edge 830, with Garmin dual power pedals, was recording my calorie burn (based upon power data) at between 470 and 500 calories/hour. Even higher burn rate on shorter duration, high intensity rides. This meant for my planned 60 to 100 mile rides in zone 2 at around 15.5 mph average (terrain, wind, etc.) riding solo with no sag support was going to require access to 1,600 to 2,400 calories and I would still be coming up short for the ride. So a post-ride recovery snack of proper nutritional composition would be in order.
My wife was keen to help me organize my training plan, food / drink, coaches, etc. She was a tremendous resource researching sports nutritionist pointing me to OC Nutrition Coaching where I met up with Jessica Mumaugh. Jessica and I quickly connected to start analyzing my current ride nutrition (which was not too bad), review recent and upcoming ride data for time, power, calorie as a stand-in for carbohydrates, and hydration. She then set about developing an excellent plan for pre-ride carb/protein/fat composition to the carb intense ride fueling (along with some protein and a little fat on longer rides), and the very important post ride recovery, rest of day meals, and evening snack and/or hydration formula to assist with recovery. For those who watch any pro cycling tours you know understand the importance of recovering every single day/night.
For my cycling coach although I have been riding and racing bikes for years and could formulate a reasonable training plan there is nothing like asking your best friend and fellow competitive cyclist (also former pro athlete) to be your coach / training advisor. Thankfully Jeff said yes, as his schedule permits. And since we already spend a great deal of time together between bicycles, motorcycles, dinners / events it wasn’t too hard to develop a solid training plan.
And lest I forget, none of this would have been possible without the support of my wife. She has taken on a great deal of the work finding the various nutrition and hydration items for my rides. Developed meal plans. Bought all sorts of supplies (bars, Gus, Skratch, etc.) and really helped push me towards ‘real foods’ for my rides including making what we call Power Balls (original recipe from Bicycling Magazine). Not to mention all the help with my ride kit, washing / cleaning, changing daily/weekly plans to fit my ride schedule, and the occasional rescue mission when something goes awry.
Of course there are other key contributors to my training and ultimately successful ride across America; my local bike shop – Pure Ride Cycles and the incredibly knowledgable Kristen Lawrence and her fantastic staff, (where I lead the Friday Coffee Ride, at least when my back isn’t a mess, spoiler alert), my fellow NICA MTB coaches and athletes who keep testing my skills, balance, and fitness on the mountain bike Go Trabuco Hills MTB.
Finally, I wouldn’t even consider doing this ride on my own. The logistics would be a nightmare. Thankfully I have been able to rely upon the wonderful people at Cycle of Life Adventures who have been leading this epic ride for many years. Their success rate in getting riders to the finish is simply amazing. Of course, I plan to do it in style with ample fitness, training, and nutrition education to give it my all.
Ok, as my wife frequently says to me – get to the point.
After a solid September recording weeks of 175 to 225 miles, collecting data, and working with Jessica on nutrition it was time to get serious in October. Jeff laid out a great six-week training block, late September to end of October that factored in my Monday NICA MTB coaching sessions, incorporated plenty of zone 2 training, and included zone 4 efforts to build endurance late into the rides.
Everything went great! I was riding 250+ miles most weeks feeling refreshed every morning I woke up after a long and/or hard ride. At the end of the month I hammered out a 340 mile week with only one day where I felt a little bit ‘off’ on the bike. Now I know how the pro tour riders go from hero one day to back-of-the-peleton the next. It is all about recovery.
Now it was time to plan out the first 400+ mile week in November. Except October 27th happened and frankly I still don’t believe any one single thing caused this.
We had a fantastic training ride session with the Trabuco Hills NICA team. It did include some awesome climbing sessions and yours truly may have gone a wee bit too hard a few times. But at the end I felt great, excellent ride home with my usual 7 to 8 minute power interval home showing no signs of strain/fatigue. Post ride meal. All good.
Until that night. Woke up around 1 AM with some pain in my left hip and leg. Took some Ibuprofen then in the early AM texted my ride buddies I had to bail on the planned 80 mile training ride. Sadly it did not get better despite taking the rest of the week off.
Friday, off to Hoag Urgent Care in Foothill Ranch. X-rays of hip and hey, you should take more NSAIDs for your pain. That didn’t work.
Saturday, off to Hoag Urgent Care in Foothill Ranch. X-rays of back and hey, you should take two ibuprofen and two Tylenol for pain. And call to see a neurosurgeon at the Hoag Spine Institute because what you have is a serious spine problem. Oh, and we are unable to prescribe real pain medications due to the opioid crisis. Of course the two ibuprofen / two Tylenol combination was totally worthless for me.
Monday morning, call to Hoag Spine Institute. They see all the files from Friday and Saturday (Thank you again Dr. Eskarous for the recommendation) and realize this is a rush situation. I get into see a neurosurgeon on Tuesday. This begins a series of exams, MRI, some serious pain meds once the realize – hey this guy’s L3/L4 disk is ridiculously herniated (laterally) almost completely pinching off the left-side nerve bundle. How the heck did he even manage to ride a bicycle much less do 300+ miles in a week.
As I write this on Sunday November 16th I am loaded up on medication, most of which say very clearly do not operate machinery, heavy equipment, or write a blog as you will be extremely verbose. I now have an epidural procedure for Monday morning. The hope is the epidural will help the body accelerate its own internal healing process to reduce the inflammation further and faster than the drugs I’m taking and quickly reduce the size of/ amount of herniation thereby freeing up the nerve bundle to return more closely to normal.
Should that not work in a timely manner or not provide complete relief then it will be time to see the neurosurgeon for a microdiscectomy. And a much longer recover period.
I am off the bike for at least another few weeks to a month. Until we know the epidural was a complete success, and that could be a few months, my bicycle riding will be somewhat restricted.
Right now, sad to say it appears the Ride Across America 2 Cure Cancer will be pushed to 2027. On the bright side: I will be turning 70 in 2027, during the ride, making this quite a milestone.
Trek Red Rocket, ready and waiting to ride.
RAAM2CC© 
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