15 days!

I wanted to share George's Heartbreak Double Century report. As I said in the last post, despite suffering much of the day, he managed a 5th place finish! This earned him a spot on the "short list". Only ten people completed the Planet Ultra King of the Mountains series by riding the Mulholland Double and Heartbreak Double. These are two of the toughest doubles on the calender in any given year!

Heartbreak Double Century 202 Miles and 17,000 feet. I had a bad day on the bike. It was my worst race day on the bike this year. I went out with the lead group and suffered quite a bit. By mile 25 I was dropped and 6 riders went away. It continued to get hot during the day and I knew I was going to meltdown eventually. It happened sometime before the lunch stop. I was overheating and feeling miserable. Mile 104. 6 --At the lunch stop I soaked my head twice. Once when I got in and once before I left.

I stopped consuming calories after my first century. I then started drinking sodas. I had a Mountain Dew at lunch, at Mile 119--Vanilla Cola at the base of the Heartbreak climb and then 1 bottle of water over from Mile 126.7 until Mile -171.4 where I had 1/2 an Orange Sunkist (knock-off).

The last 30 miles I hooked up with another rider who helped me get through the next 14 miles and then I helped him get to the finish. I was not feeling good all day and lost valuable time climbing Old Ridge Route --two years in a row I have faded there.

My goal was sub 14 hours I finished 13:28 for 5th place. I'm quite happy with the end result but the process to get there was one of the most challenging days on the bike in recent memory.