Hi All
Well thank goodness today is over. Last night I had limited sleep as my blood stream still had electrolytes floating around in it, however I managed to get a few hours sleep and woke about midnight. Just after 2am I got up and raided the fridge lol.
Everyone was up proper at 4am as we had to get food into us and be at bike registration at 5am for a 5:30am start.
I had a quiet laugh to myself as the Police escort turned up and I overheard him ask the Race Director for directions of the course and the point where he will turn off and leave us to it. Just as well he was a local cop as he did the job well.
Once we got under way without the cop the no-drafting rule of 12 metres applied and eventually the field of cyclists sorted themselves out. The support crews were directed to move ahead before our race started so it took me 45 minutes before I located them. The race was undulating to say the least and by the time I finished I was simply over hills. God knows how many times I changed gears and god knows how many times I was in the lowest gear possible tackling the hills in the Hunterland. This was something I’m not used to as I normally manage hills in New Zealand with a gear or two up my sleeve.
Everything went fine until about 120 kms into it, I found myself struggling for energy and mentioned to Ray as I cycled past. He had already picked up on it with his observation and told me to finish the half bottle of Gatorade over the next 12 kms or so.
I was so flat I didn’t even want to touch it. It was completely my fault as I had let my drink nutrition plan down. I forced the Gatorade down and once on the Bruce Highway section that we were allowed on the team stopped every 500 metres to get food into me as I cycled past.
This included a mixture of honey sandwiches, boiled eggs, a hot sausage roll (which never tasted so good. I’m not sure when they got that from), Tim Tams and even a chicken drumstick. Ten to 15 minutes later I felt good again.
The kilometres ticked by and Ray monitored my nutrition and kept me hydrated with other goodies later such as a jam donut and flat Coke.
At one stage my Garmin must of dropped out for a few kms. I hadn’t been monitoring the distance too much as I didn’t want to realise that I hadn’t travelled as far as I thought we had!
Towards the end Ray said “20 kms to go”. I glanced at my Garmin and wondered why it showed 30 kms to go, so planned on that to avoid getting to the 20 km mark and having my heart sink.
Ray was correct and was I so happy to see the Referee noting my bike and helmet number. This was uncharted territory as I had never cycled that far before, with my previous maximum being 255 kms in Taupo, doing loops of the Ironman course whilst training for this event.
Once finished we were met by Debs and Simon Pohatu whom I knew from when they were both serving in the NZ Army. They are now based in Brisbane with their respective civilian careers. It was great and made me forget the pain… momentarily!
I had a massage and then a check by the Paramedic. This consisted of a prick blood test, blood pressure and heart rate check and a weigh-in on the scales. The paramedic said my support crew did a great job as I had put 2 kg back on of the 2.5 kg that I had lost the day before.
Ray then put me in the wheelie bin full of ice water. I thought I was going to vomit as the cold got to me, so I kept lifting my legs in and out.
Back to our apartment and fish ‘n chips for dinner. Day 2 down and the final day tomorrow of a double marathon.
Thank you everyone for your fabulous support. The support crew are reading your messages to me and writing messages on the road with chalk.
Regards John Humphries (UltraHumps)!
https://givealittle.co.nz/cause/help4ultrahumps/donations
The fundraising has gone over $1,500 today and we are all stoked. Can you please share this and lets try and get over $2,000 before Humps finishes the race – Coach Ray
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