2016 Rockwell Relay Race Report, Part 15: To the Finish Line, But Not the End

08.1.2016 | 12:52 am

A Note from Fatty: A NEW PRIZE In the “Choose What Fatty Rides at Leadville” Contest: You already know about some of the awesome prizes offered in my NICA fundraiser: 

• An Incredible Fully Loaded DNA Cycling Wardrobe
• A Year’s-Worth of GU Energy
• New GU Stroopwafels

Today, though, I’m excited to announce that I’m adding another prize: a $200 Gift Certificate to TheFeed.com. This is basically the cyclist’s equivalent of a kid being given the keys to a candy store. $200 will buy you a lot of whatever kind of gel (such as GU Roctane) or energy food (such as GU Stroopwafels) you like. 

As you know (or should know), TheFeed.com sponsors this blog and the FattyCast, and has been very generous with other fundraising efforts (such as the 100 Miles of Nowhere) I’ve done. So I’m super-stoked to have them on board with this one, as well.

And consider: your odds of winning just went up if you’ve already donated. And if you haven’t donated, now is a great time to do so. Just go to the “Choose What Fatty Rides at Leadville” Contest page and vote with your dollars. You’re going to be doing NICA — one of my favorite practical organizations — a lot of good.

Annnnnnd, speaking of the contest. here’s where things stand as of right now. 

 
Not a lot of movement in this one. To be perfectly frank, it would take a donation of more than $1000 to move the needle here. I’ve had Racer change my single speed’s gearing and put on the racing tires; I’m very confident (and excited!) I’ll be racing with The Hammer as her domestique this year.

 
There’s a real narrowing here. While The Monster is staying in the lead so far, one or two really robust donations could either reverse that lead or ensure it, just depending on which way the voting goes. If you want to throw your weight around, here’s where you could do it. 

To the Finish Line (But Not the End)

Things change so fast in the Rockwell Relay.

Just before I finished my final leg of the race and sent Lindsey off on hers, she and Ben had taken this picture at the Cedar Breaks exchange:

By the time Lindsey got down to the next exchange, a mere eighty-seven minutes later, the cold early-morning temperatures would be gone. Which is to say, it would be hot outside.

Why the change? Well, after fourteen miles of climbing, Lindsey would be bombing downhill for seventeen miles, descending nearly 4,000 feet in about seventeen miles. 

It would still be fairly early in the morning, but in the Southern Utah desert, it doesn’t take long to heat up.

And also: it would be windy. 

The Worst Two Hours

Ben wasn’t all that excited for this, his final leg of the race. And you couldn’t really blame him. It’s by far the least scenic of every leg of the race. The flats are straight and with frequent traffic. The climbs are not particularly inspiring.

And there’s about a 70% chance you’ll have a headwind.

Last year, we had sent The Hammer out to help Cory with the headwind in this leg of the race. And it might have made some sense for Lindsey to go out and help Ben…except Lindsey is a fun-size person, which means she’d be of very little help at all in giving Ben a break from the brutal headwind.

And we no longer had the Mike Nosco Memorial team to work with; Jack had broken away from Lindsey and his teammate was working with the front men’s competitive team up the field.

Which meant, alas, Ben was on his own. And he was suffering. It was like he was riding into the devil’s own blowdryer. Later, after the race, Ben would say, entirely earnestly, “That was the worst two hours of my life.”

More because we couldn’t stand the sight of all the suffering than because we needed to, we left Ben and went to the next — the final! — race exchange.

The Hammer suited up and — taking pity on Ben — she rode back to him, so she could help him get to the exchange as quickly as possible. Getting to Ben, she later noted, was the easiest thing in the world. Even though the road was flat, she didn’t have to pedal at all. The wind just blew her right to him.

Of course, you can see how that powerful of a hot wind is not going to be as fun or easy on the return trip.

Change of Plans

As The Hammer was suiting up, I had asked her if she’d like me to work with her on her final leg, like I had with Lynette the year before. With the harsh wind, it might be useful to have someone to ride with.

“No, I’ll be fine,” she said.

But then, as she left, riding toward Ben to pull him the final miles toward the exchange, a couple of cars pulled into the exchange parking lot.

Z5R racers. All suited up and ready to roll.

Naturally, I freaked out.

Could it be, I thought, that with their three teams working together, they have closed the gap between them and us? The wind was truly horrific; I could imagine that a group of three would make huge inroads on a single racer.

And also, they’d continue to have three — or more! — racers on the road on this last very windy leg. They could, in fact, put as many as nine racers on the road…against one woman. Into a headwind.

We could lose the whole thing in these last two legs, I thought. And there was no way I was going to let The Hammer fight off between three and nine racers by herself. No way. 

I ran to the van and started suiting up. 

The Cavalry Rides Over the Hilltop

In hindsight, I wasn’t being perfectly honest with myself here. Sure, I was genuinely concerned that ZR5 would execute a perfectly-timed reversal of the last-minute victory we managed last year. That would be poetic, I have to admit. But while I can appreciate this kind of poetry abstractly, I was not remotely interested in being the butt of this kind of sweet revenge.

But the real reason I wanted to suit up was a little more personal, and smarmier, to boot: 

I wanted to impress a girl. 

Specifically, I wanted to impress my wife. Even more specifically, I had this vision in my head of me, riding strong in the blasting heat, heroically pulling my admiring little dove through the fiercest of summer heat.

I pictured me as saving our team, somehow finding victory where there should have been no possibility but defeat.

And in short, I felt like out of everyone in our team, I had been the weakest link and was hoping I could maybe redeem myself a little bit.

Hero

The Hammer was a little bit surprised to see me as she and Ben crossed the line and we switched the timing chip over to her ankle. A little surprised, but not really. She knows I’m a bit of a glory hog.

And, my coxcombery notwithstanding, I was actually helpful. I did most of the pulling, stoically refusing her offers to take a turn. (Later, after the race, she would note that we probably would have finished a lot sooner if I’d rotate through. I acknowledge this to be fact.)

The heat was intense; the wind was brutal. But they were nothing compared to the awful traffic, which seemed to take great offense at the fact that we had the gall to be on the road. When we reached Veyo (home of the famous Veyo pies), I was just so grateful to be turning off the main road, and I know The Hammer was too.

So far, we hadn’t seen any of the Z5R team vehicles start leapfrogging us: a big relief, since I really don’t know whether we would have been able to counter an attack from a three-person paceline. We were just smoked. Hot wind in our faces, sand blowing past our glasses and into our eyes.

Every time Ben and Lindsey came by in the van, asking if we wanted something, our answer was the same: “swap for cold water!” Truly, it’s amazing how fast a bottle of ice water can turn into a bottle of hot water.

We rode what is known as the “Gunlock loop” in St. George — a route we had become very familiar with back when we were training for the St. George Ironman so many years ago. The Hammer has gotten so much faster since then, I thought to myself.

We made the final turn, neared the finish line, with nobody passing us.

And then, there was the finish line. We had done it. 

28:02. Third team overall, and the fastest coed team by about 45 minutes. First Coed team. Our dynasty intact. 

But more importantly, there were a pair of banners at the finish line. As it turned out, The Hammer had a little surprise waiting for me there:

Pictures from my life — from when I was a baby, a kid, a teenager, a young father, and now. 

It was awesome. Touching. Just…perfect. The Hammer is so much more than just someone who hammers. I’m incredibly lucky to be married to her.

Ben and Lindsey arrived in a moment or two, and we got a group finish line photo:

Then we found some shade and ate popsicles and pie while we waited for other teams to come in, at which point we’d do the podium ceremony.

Could there have been a more fitting fiftieth birthday for me? I don’t think so. 

Well, I guess it could have been more perfect in a couple of ways:

First, it would have been better if I hadn’t needed to make a phone call, to tell Cory about what I had done to his van.

And second, it would have been better if the podium ceremony would have actually happened. Because it didn’t happen. More to the point, right as it was going to happen, there was a crash, the sound of broken glass, and bloodcurdling screams.

Which seems — for the last time in this series — like a good place to pick up in the next episode of this story.