April 26, 2003
Pedal for Proceeds - WISport series event - University of Wisconsin-Whitewater
Robyn Perrin and Clint Thayer

Oh, what a difference a week makes in Wisconsin weather. We awoke to blue, cloudless skies, temperatures rapidly warming into the mid-60 degrees F, and light winds around 5-10 mph. In contrast, last year’s participants in the Whitewater race had been treated to bone-chilling rain and 40-degree F temperatures (Read Clint's report from last year). We marveled at our luck and the spectacular spring day and headed out on the highway, spirits high. As we pulled into town, I listened with headphones to “I Will Survive” by Gloria Gaynor on the CD player, entertaining Clint and Chris Ley (a college friend who had come to visit us for the weekend) with some garbled a capella vocals. The song would become a focal point later on during the race, ringing through my head as we spun down the road.

The excellent conditions resulted in a good turnout for this early-season race. There were about 146 people in the race altogether, and the start site was a jumble of riders greeting each other, many running into familiar faces from other teams for the first time this season. We quickly picked out other Atkins riders in the bright new jerseys and indigo shorts and, after picking up our registration packets, met up with our teammates for a quick strategy session and a few encouraging words. Clint and I then headed out for a warm-up spin around part of the course, orienting ourselves to the few small hills and the placement of corners. In contrast to last week, our tandem bike Bessie was feeling fine. Clint had shuttled her back and forth to Budget Bicycles twice - once to adjust the brakes and replace the brake pads (which had been worn down by the grit during the Willard Friendly Century workshop), and then again later in the week to replace a cable that had shredded during the Thursday night social ride. With the help of Andrew at Budget Bicycles and a new set of tires shipped in from Precision Tandems in Kansas City, MO, we were thankful to be out on the road without any mechanical troubles.

As we surveyed the course, Clint was concerned that the attacks would come at the outset during the two small hills. We were relieved to learn during the starting lineup that the peloton would be motor-paced through this section until the first turn. As we waited for the start, I looked over the rainbow hues of the riders and thought to myself, “It’s a gorgeous, dry, sunny day, and we’re on the bike. No matter what happens in terms of the race outcome, it doesn’t get any better than this.”

The riders rolled out at the sound of the starting horn, and we were off. The sound of over a hundred wheel sets humming along the pavement, the whir of chain rings, and the calls of riders shouting “Slowing!” and “On your left!” punctuated the morning air as we followed the pace car to the first turn. Once we made the turn the front pack started to accelerate, and we stayed with them for a brief while. The attacks came fairly early, though, and I began to realize that my legs had tightened up; the quadriceps and hamstrings felt like rubber bands stretched taut. No amount of stern directives from my brain could keep them spinning with the intensity needed to keep pace. We couldn’t respond to one of the attacks and fell off the back. Clint did a great job of keeping a cool head, and we focused on setting a steady tempo for the rest of the ride.

We fell in with a small group of single riders, about four or five total, and began working together as a chase group that would ultimately pursue the front pack for the rest of the race. After a few miles we realized that only one single rider remained from the original group and we kept together during the course loops. The racecourse included three laps out on the rural roads surrounding Whitewater; I became thankful for the repetition of the laps, as I began to recognize landmarks and anticipate when we would have a slight downhill, a tailwind, or a gentle rise. Riding in the stoker position is akin to riding with a blindfold on. You cannot see anything that is directly in your path, and it is often difficult to gauge how far away an incline is until you are upon it - and at that point, the momentum can be lost quickly. Having some familiar sights in my peripheral vision was most helpful.

After a few miles Clint shouted, “Atkins rider up!” and we were delighted to see Denny Mattheis ahead of us. He flashed us a big grin, grabbed on to our little paceline, and we kept on trucking down the road. The miles flew by, blurring into the rather disconnected thoughts, sounds, and sights that occur when you are working at race pace. I remember visualizing the pedal strokes as forming perfectly symmetric circles, hearing fragments of the melody line from “I Will Survive” in the background of my mind, giving a push of effort up a slight hill and seeing a bemused Jersey cow looking on, chewing its cud. It wasn’t really until halfway through the second lap that I really felt like we had settled into an optimal rhythm. Although the pace was very steady and there wasn’t much time for focusing on anything except pressing on, I found moments to reach down and grab the bottle of Gatorade to drink and hand some to Clint, or to take some Gu (a gel with carbohydrates and electrolytes that athletes use during events), figuring that if we didn’t keep hydrated we would eventually begin to cramp up.

As we headed into the final third of the race, it became clear that things had not gone smoothly for everyone. There had clearly been accidents on the course, and it seemed like a battlefield - we hadn’t witnessed the mishaps, but every few miles it seemed we passed another fallen soldier who had been waylaid by a crash. We recognized Darrell Pope, who had been involved in a crash and was walking his bike back towards the start site. Thankfully he was unhurt, but his rear tire was useless due to a hole burned cleanly through the tire from skidding as he braked hard to avoid the pile-up and ended up in the ditch. Our little paceline pressed on into the final stretch, and as we neared the final corner Clint motioned to the left. Our intention was to lead Denny out towards the finish line, as the third rider in our group was not a teammate, and we couldn’t tell if he was in Denny’s age group or not. As Clint gestured, the other rider said, “What does that mean?” Clint replied that we weren’t going to pull anymore. The reply was an incredulous, “Why not??” It ended up being a rather amusing situation - we didn’t want to be nasty at all, but at the same time wanted to help protect our teammate in any way possible after pulling for some 20 miles. Nevertheless, the other rider would have none of it; he stuck to our wheel like Superglue.

As we headed into the final turn, a most confusing sight greeted us. There were four tandem teams in the event, and to our knowledge all of them had been behind us - or at least, we hadn’t seen any pass us in the beginning few miles of the race, and certainly hadn’t passed any during the long pull to the finish. But the red Cannondale tandem was at the base of the hill just before the finish line….without a front wheel….and one of the team members was attempting to run up the hill with the bike. Apparently they had had a couple of flat tires and had been SAG-ed to the base of the hill. As we approached the finish, Clint was disoriented by the running tandem team and I started standing and sprinting without calling out my intention to him, so we must have looked pretty amusing. I kept yelling “Gear, gear!”, wanting a harder gear so we could get some momentum, and (since normally if I request a gear shift on a hill, it is for an easier one), he shifted down before shifting up. No matter, in the end we crossed the line without mishap to the cheers of our teammates and the realization that we had finished first in the tandem division. Our final time was 1 h 5 minutes 43 seconds, for a total of 25.2 miles, with an average speed of 23 mph. The front pack had finished in just about 1 hour flat.

Afterwards we cheered on the rest of the incoming riders, including a large second pack that came in a couple of minutes behind us. Other teammates filled us in on the events of the day; some had been involved in the crashes, which were very nasty. Three people had been injured (none of them from our team), and one rider ended up with a broken collarbone and dislocated shoulder. That rider ended up waiting in the parking lot for an ambulance to arrive, as all three of the city ambulances were on runs; he must have been in agony but remarkably was holding up well given the circumstances. We hope that all the riders who were injured recover as quickly as possible.

After the race, we cheered on other Atkins riders during the awards ceremony, including Muriel Nagle who did a fantastic job and kept pace with the lead pack to win her age group and overall 1st place for women. It was a good event for the team, with several members placing in the top three among their age categories, a few new riders gaining valuable racing experience, and - most importantly - no serious injuries.

Next up for us is the Badger Challenge race in Leland, WI on May 10. See you on the road!