#raamday7

[pattiraam2021]

An Epic Day!

by: George Metzler

Tuesday began slowly. At 2:30 am, Mark awoke from his 2.5 hour overnight sleep in the RV, ate some Mac and Cheese, and began riding towards the Fort Scott, Kansas. He plodded along at 10 miles per hour with zero power in his legs; none of our usual tricks to wake his brain and get his body to play along were working. Mark and I talked about it over the headset and decided after 6 miles of futility that a 30 minute nap was the only option.

When Mark needs a nap during the race the options are, the front passenger seat of the van or lay down on a bit of foam in the back of the van. Given this was a long 30 minute break Mark, decided to lay down in the back of the van. The crew sets a timer as we stand outside the van and talk and wait. Dex thought it would be a great idea for me (George) to be the one to wake him up…Dex is that kinda guy!😀

I roused Mark by telling him his 30 minutes had passed and he was certain I was telling him he had 30 minutes to sleep. He said he wanted to finish the sleep cycle, which sounds kinda legit, so I set my phone timer for another 15 minutes, but this time I keep the lift gate open on the van. Within seconds he was back in a deep sleep.

Now I’m questioning myself, should we be more aggressive in trying to wake him up? Sleep is valuable, but so is moving up the road. While Leah Goldstein is not in Mark’s division, both of them want to win Solo RAAM outright. Neither came just to win their category. Leah is the real deal. She is riding like the champion she truly is. She is also 40 miles up the road ahead of Mark while I’m standing next to an exhausted Mark whose chest is rising and falling in a deep sleep. Ten minutes into the second sleep a car passes and Mark stirs a bit. I seize the moment and tell him 15 minutes have passed.

Mark gets back on the bike and gets going. Within a few miles I can see him “Wake up” on the bike. He stands on the pedals on the little hills as we go further into Missouri. He begins standing on the pedals on the flat parts, too.

A few hours later Mark has reengaged with the race. During a 5 minute break around Weaubleau he reads a comment about how slow the 2021 RAAM compared to other years. Mark gets a little ticked off and now has an axe to grind just as he begins the time station. He averages 17.4 miles per hour over the next 49 miles of rolling hills.

We enter the heavily trafficked area of Camdenton, MO and Mark, after being frustrated with the effect of heat on his performance, unleashes his fury on the bike. In an unexpected way, the danger and energy of highway traffic can add purpose to rider and crew. Mark is on a mission, averaging almost 18 mph for the next 58 miles to Jefferson City. That’s a respectable training ride on any day. Riding a hilly 107 mile century at 17.6 miles per hour after riding 1,700 miles in six days…I don’t even know what to call that.

I went off shift before Mark reached Jefferson City. We planned the next crew exchange well shy of the Mississippi, thinking Mark had completed a solid effort and would shut it down about 30 miles before the river. I was wrong, really wrong. He reached the exchange point, then the river, then kept going 34 miles beyond the river. He finally called it a day at 3am local time and 363 miles after taking an extra 45 minute snooze in the van. Wowza! So yeah if you are looking at the tracker this morning and you wonder why the dot started moving by its usual time, someone had a late night!