Yesterday I experienced every single emotion that I’ve ever had on a bike. After a disappointing TT, I had given up on myself. I’ve put in so much work to get to this point, yet I’m not any better than I was two whole years ago. And if I’ve hit a plateau at just 21 years old, than what’s the point?
Fast forward to Saturday’s “84-mile” road race; I made it into the winning breakaway with 1 lap to go, and we stuck it to the line – or so we thought.
I followed an attack up the Feedzone climb with just 7 miles to go (don’t worry, feeding was closed at this point, so no unwritten rules were broken), and made it into a group of four riders including my friends Sam Boardman and Thomas Revard.
I was in disbelief that I was actually able to hold the wheel in this group, and even more shocked that we had a gap on the field – but it wasn’t big. If we were going to make this stick, all four of us needed to go all-in – no holding back, no skipped pulls, and no yelling at each other (except for the occasional encouragement).
I was fully committed to this breakaway, but then I remembered that we had Heckler’s Hill coming up – 45 seconds of death, as hard as you can go, fans/hecklers screaming in your ear, dollar bills dangling in front of you, and the crest of the hill seemingly further and further away. This is where I was going to get dropped, surely. We still had 2k to go until the bottom of the climb, my legs were empty, I was hyperventilating, and I was in so deep that I can see the backs of my eyeballs.
As we hit the bottom of the climb, I keep it in the big ring – if I knocked it down into the little ring, I had already given up. Halfway up the climb and I’m still hanging on, just a few bike lengths behind my breakaway companions. As we crest the climb, I can’t breathe, but I’m closing the gap, and I get back on. I look back, expecting to see the entire Elevate-KHS train on my wheel. But no, there’s nothing. Where’s the field??
2 miles to go now, and I look back and see two riders bridging across. But still no field. I try to skip a pull, but Sam pushes me back in and yells, “Come on, Zach, DIG DEEP!”
I yell back, “Dude, you have no idea how deep I am right now!” – I have no idea what I meant when I said that, but it made me chuckle, and it made me forget about the pain. For about 2 seconds.
1k to go and we’re flying towards the finish, six of us now, sprinting for the win. 500m to go, 200m to go, 150m to go… I’m sitting on the front, getting ready to sprint, but no one is coming around me. Why is no one sprinting? I’m still on the front, why is no one sprinting? WHY IS NO ONE SPRINTING?!
As we cross the line, I look up, I hear the bell, and I see that we have 1 lap to go. I look down at my Garmin and see that we just hit 84.0 miles – the race flyer said “Pro/1 Men – 12 laps (84 miles).” This can’t be right, something is wrong. I start asking my breakaway companions, and no one knows what to do. “I guess they added a lap,” was the general consensus.
I am heartbroken. I had gone all-in on this breakaway, and I thought I was riding to one of the best results of my life. But there’s been some kind of mistake, and now I’m riding in the field on the real last lap.
Ecstasy to grief. My mind is racing, but my legs aren’t sure if they still are or not. I drop through the field like a rock in the ocean, but I somehow manage to hang on and finish 36th. This wasn’t what I had imagined happening, but then again, I didn’t think I would ever make the breakaway either. I guess that’s just bike racing.