HITTING THE WALL – PART 2

At about mile 45 in the 100 degree heat, that the ride all started to unravel for me. We had just left Carnation and I was crawling up Tolt Hill.  The other riders had taken off at a brisk pace and I was so slow that by the time I finally did get to the top, they had taken off on the next hill. Uh oh.  For the first time, I lost sight of them in front of me, my worst fear. Tolt Hill is a monster of a hill but I had no idea what was coming after that on 244th . The 244th hill turned out to be the real killer for me.

With the other riders long gone in front of me, the first thing I began to notice was that I felt a tad bit dizzy and my calves were beginning to to cramp up.  I noticed that there was the slight feeling of having a sword stuck into my right side. But I pressed on, desperately trying my best to catch up with the other riders. But it was an inch at a time and I was heaving and groaning out loud with the lack of oxygen and the heat coming up off the asphalt. But I kept going, one pedal stroke at a time, one breath at a time, slowly grinding my way slowly up the hill.

Halfway up, I noticed that along with everything else, my right foot was beginning to hurt. I had been stung by a bee the day before and now, when I looked down at my foot, I noticed that my ankle had actually disappeared.  In its place, there was a mound of flesh creeping slowly up over the outer edge of my cycling shoe. It reminded me a bit of the Woody Allen movie “Sleeper,” where the bread dough is starting to take over the kitchen. “Yikes!” I thought, “This doesn’t look so good here.” And honestly, I did not know what to do.

By then, the pain in my side was getting much worse, as the sword dug deeper and deeper, until it was a total, blindingly painful stomach cramp. Salt crystals were forming on my upper lip and the hill was so steep I did not even have the strength to reach down for my water bottle. I was also having trouble getting my legs to spin up this steep elevation hill.  And my right foot was slowly turning to lead.

At this point, my inner voices screamed out in terror, “Uncle! Enough! Enough hills! We’re scared you’re going to fall off our bike and be run over by oncoming traffic! Stop right now this instant! We cannot go another inch!” they protested. “We’ll help you even if we never bike another hill. Just don’t let us DIE out here!”

I honestly did not know what to say to my terrified voices. I had never experienced any of this before. And, quite honestly, I began to panic. At that moment I looked up to see just how much farther the crest of the hill was and I noticed this biker with one of our red and black club jerseys coming down the hill in front of me. I was sweating so hard, it wasn’t until he got within a few feet that I recognized the huge smile of Jean-Phi looping back down the hill from above, coming to find me.

I looked up at him, and in an instant, I could see his eyes register the gravity of my current situation. He clearly knew I was in trouble. He asked gently, “Mary Anne, are you OK?” As I tried to suck the tears back in that were beginning to rim along my lower eyelids, I choked out a feeble, “Uh. Nope.” Then I smiled as best I could and wheezed, “Thank you (wheeze)… for… (wheeze) …(wheeze)…coming…(wheeze).”

But I was too proud and just plain stubborn to stop, get off my bike and walk it up the hill. So I just kept pedaling, paddle stroke by paddle stroke, trying to reassure the voices in my head., “Hang on just a little longer. Jean Phi is here. We’re not going to die out here. Don’t give up the ship!” I begged of them.

(To be continued…)