The ride started with a few thousand people trying to squeeze through the start point in Rosarito. I've never seen so many people with bikes. It almost reminded me of Critical Mass, multiplied by 100. Once we got through the stragglers, my group split up. Tammy forgot her cycling shoes, so she was in the back. Evan was on his "antique" Bianchi, which has been affectionately named Black Angus (by yours truly) for its all-steel brute heft. If he managed to finish riding that behemoth faster than Marty, he's got legs. I stuck with Marty and his Cannondale CAAD3, though he probably had the advantage of having longer legs.
The bike route was lined by people cheering and gawking. Traffic came to a dead halt around the start point, where they blocked off roads for the cyclists. Kudos to Rosarito and Ensenada for being supportive of such a ride, because I'm sure some people in cars wanted to mow us down. Kids lining the route extended out their hands, either to ask for candy or to get a high five from passing bikers. Some of them were bold and asked for money. The men on the side looked at all of us as though we were crazy for spending our weekend on our bikes to go 50 miles.
I was in a pretty good shape until half way through the course. The chart below depicts the beast in the middle that taught me a lesson in torture. After the long hill, my legs were shot. Since the crash 2 weeks ago, my legs have been cramping under heavy load. My guess is that it hasn't been stretched enough and I've lost flexibility during the last 2 weeks while I was recovering. The hills weren't too bad until I was 3/4 of the way through the big incline. When I tried to pedal hard and got up from my seating position, my thighs felt a sharp muscle pain. I backed off immediately but still kept pedaling and switched to the granny gear.
The pain was forgotten when I reached the downhill. All the torture coming up the incline paid off marvelously, as we all went down at a thrilling 45 mph. Unfortunately, I didn't have the mass to accelerate down the hill. So all the fatties that I passed on the way up were zooming past me on the way down. Rest of the ride was supposed to be easy, but I struggled to the finish line because my of my leg cramps and loss of energy. After chomping furiously on an energy bar, I was able to hobble to the finish.
Once I crossed the line, I had to stand still for almost a minute to be able to walk. Even Pinocchio with his wooden leg could've walked more fluidly than me at that point. With no flexibility, I was able to walk like C3PO to find Marty, who had passed me 2 miles before the finish line. Both of us were somewhat relieved that neither of us would have to shave our legs, as we had betted that the last person to cross the finish line would say goodbye to shaggy legs. Just so it happens, the last person in our group was Tammy, so it wasn't really that big of a bet.
As painful as it was towards the end, the ride was fun overall. Even though I probably would've been able to finish the ride with less pain had I taken a long break in the middle, I felt accomplished. The lesson was learned and will be applied for the next ride. Maybe I'll have a new bike by then. There's a carbon frame out there with my name (and money) written on it.
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