Brutal. That about sums up yesterday's race in Suamica, WI; the second WORS marathon race. The course was pretty flat and it took about 15 minutes of riding to hit the first of three sections of singletrack. The women started 1' after the men. Four laps of 11.5 miles.

I felt bad from the start. I wasn't breathing hard, but my legs were killing me. They just hurt and never recovered at any point in the race. It was like trying to get logs to turn the peddals over. Not sure what is going on or why, but something is wrong. I have had about four races this year where I just feel bad the whole race. I don't recover after uphills and I have zero power. I wanted to be done with the race after the first lap. I saw Scott sitting in the grass (he started in the men's group a minute ahead of the women) and I knew he felt bad. He won't keep riding if he can't race hard. He was suffering going slow, so he pulled the plug on his race. I wanted to be done, but tried to keep the lead each lap so I could win our entry fee money back. Kind of a lame reason.

I caught up to a few expert riders in my first lap and after passing two guys that decided to race again, we had a nice group for about 1.5 laps until the single speed guy crashed in front of me in the singletrack and the geared bike guy got a gap on me. After a good effort I caught back on to him and rode another lap with him, but I was suffering already. I could do very little work for the group of us two. He got ahead of me before the end of the third lap and I almost caught back on before the end of the single track, but then a group of comp riders needed to get by and I let them pass, opening the gap. Going into the final lap I had to time trial it through most of the lap, not lose my lead, and keep my bike upright. I got really dizzy numerous times while riding. I would take more water, some more quick sugar - I had a total of a bottle of Cytomax, a camelback full of water (2 liters), and 4 gels during the race, but yet I would still get dizzy off and on. I started cramping on the last lap with about a half lap to go. My right Hamstring cramped after I passed a gal in the singletrack. I finally got that to settle down when my right quad started to quiver, then my left, then my left adductors. Another group of comp riders caught me and I jumped in the back of their group. I couldn't believe how much easier it was and my cramping subsided. I finished with the tail-end of the group - which included our good friend and Scott's summer boss, Mike Haag.

I was very happy to be done and all I could do after is lay down. I was so tired.

Scott and I stayed with M&M's good friend from G.Bay. Really nice couple and fun to hang out with.