Big Bear Endurance almost 50 miler

Sunday was the US Cup Big Bear Endurance 50 miler.  I wasn't planning on riding this but Hoffman was thinking about it and antsy boy wanted someone else in the car with him on the drive.  That was really all I needed to get me to commit.  A couple weeks before the race, I bought a power meter (I had to get one so I could train smarter since I needed to use my limited time more effectively to keep up with Hoffman) and I realized that I've been racing (and riding) way too hard.  It made sense that I always end up cramping and bonking.  So the plan for this ride was to go in Zone 2/3 the entire time.  My idea was that by going slower, I wouldn't need to stop as much (I stopped for 1:30 in Julian due to cramping and bonking) so my time should be better.  When the race started I put myself in the back of the pack right away with my Zone 2 pace.  I was actually getting dropped on the neutral start but the pacing was going according to plan.

During the race I was feeling good and this is done in two laps.  When I got to the end of the first lap it was 3:30 when I started my second lap.  I remember thinking why I do this but put my head down and went with the fact that I was half done.  I was going slow and getting tired but I wasn't too bad at altitude and the pacing worked out.  Unfortunately I was last since the three people I knew were behind me must have dropped out.  When I came to this 4 mile loop for the long course, the volunteer told me that I had to take the medium course.  I just followed directions but after the race I was getting pretty tweaked by it.  I paid for the race and I want to ride the entire course.  This was made worse since I was going slower on purpose and I didn't cramp or bonk.  I could have picked up my pace if I had known there was a time limit which there isn't.  The volunteers and race director wanted to be done and do their sweep before it got too late.  Of course, it was only 4:30 which is a 50 mile race is not late in my book but I'm not responsible for riders on the course.

In the end, I'm happy with how things turned out.  My total time was 6:27 and my moving time was 6:13 which meant I only stopped a total of 14 minutes for water stops and peeing which is awesome.  I didn't cramp or bonk.  My nutrition was good and I had no intestinal issues.  The best part was the scenery.  The only thing that could have been better would to be do the entire course.  I emailed the race director about my experience so hopefully a time limit clause will show up on the next race.