Kickstart My Heart.

After 2 litres of Grapefruit juice, 5 hits of oil of Oregano, and 10 solid hours of sleep, I woke up this morning feeling better than I had the night before. The sniffle seemed to be gone.

I realized that after I awoke that today...yes, would be the day to climb Mount Washington. Mount Washington is the venue for the 2007 National MTB championships. I however would be working on the climb to the top of the resort. 20kms of pain. Lance has his Madone, and Vancouver Island has it Mt.Washingmachine. Its the one true test of fitness around. The first time I attempted it 3 years ago, I broke my chain on the ascent. How often to you break a chain on a road bike?

Anyhoo, as I began the climb I shifted up into my 39 x 21, the highest the chain has been up the stack all year. It hadn't even had any grease on it and still gleamed factory new. All new finish vanished after today. I groaned and pushed like no other climb could offer. It was the type of climb that if you stop pedalling.....you start to go back words. Your arms hurt from pulling back on the bars so hard.

So up, and up I went. The road turned from pleasant and dry, to a little bit of snow with gravel, to sopping wet, covered in gravel. A few times when I stepped out of the saddle my wheel washed out on the gravel, and as I ascended. It got steeper, and I rode into deeper and deeper snow.

Toward the top, I was surprised to encounter god damned snowstorm. Jesus. No matter how hard I try to escape the Maritimes, they keep having a way of lingering in these legs. The snowstorm was pretty rough actually, but I couldn't stop climbing only doing 3 quarters, so on I pushed. All the horrible pain is almost worth it, seeing the looks on the drivers faces as they go by.

As I rounded the last corner I pulled on my gloves and a vest that I was carrying and started to eat. as My legs were pretty shaky. Looking down at my heart rate monitor it told me I was at 87% average for over an hour, with a new max for the year at 94%. Meaning only a few beats more and my heart wouldn't physically be able to pump any more blood. It takes a lot of time in the pain train to get that high up.

The decent going down Washington is worse than the climb. Your soaked with sweat, which freezes you for 20 minutes going down at at least 50km's an hour. And in this case dealing with a snowstorm. As I reached the bottom, I had a bad case of frozen fingers, where you cant move your fingers as fast as your willing them to go. Grabbing onto a water bottle or zipping up a jacket is like trying to wrestle a bunch of lesbians in a bathtub full of Vaseline. Its tough.

So I made it home, with a final riding time of 3 hours and I'm pretty wrecked. The cold takes it out of you like no other, and for tonight, I think I'll have a beer.