12hr North American Championship - Calvin’s Challenge

With Unbound XL (an A goal for the year) only two weeks away, this race was meant to be completed around 80% capacity to not disrupt fitness prep. 

My wife had a conference in Indianapolis the same day so we were split up for the first ultra race ever. My dad came along to crew me and capture media. 

The drive was 24 hours over 3 days to allow time for training as well. 

Only three weeks from the 7-day world record, this was a mixture of coming back from recovery and building for Unbound. 

The weather was not great. We had winds of 10-16 mph and gusts up to 30 mph. The course was similarly foreboding with uneven pavement, hills, and tight turns. 

I had a power goal of 240 W, figuring that should make it easy enough to recover and keep the fitness build up. What I didn’t fully anticipate was the up-and-down nature of that power over the course of the day.

With a headwind on course to the South and a tailwind on course to the North, this meant a power disparity to push into the wind with a little bit less when the wind was at my back. I ended up pacing it mostly by heart rate, riding 140 bpm into the wind and 130 beats away from the wind. This meant averaging about 240 W every lap and managing a very consistent lap pace over the 12 hours. 

The wind did change in intensity and direction throughout the day, although it was mostly from the South, at one point it was blowing from the West to the East, which was significantly slower because it was a crosswind going both North and South, which was the majority of the route.

One of the interesting battles of the day was with my radar/rear light. Even though it said that it was charging overnight, when I went to turn it on in the morning, it would not turn on and when I plugged it in, it said it had 3% battery life. So I went with my spare light that was not charged overnight and only had 25% battery life.

This was enough to last no more than 2.5 hours with the light on but nearly 5 hours if the light was not on. So, I spent the first five hours with the light screen on changing it between off and on when I needed to alert vehicles and riders behind me. So most of the first half of the pacing was done by feel because I couldn’t see power data while controlling the light on and off.

It also meant that I needed to stop sooner than my six hour plan, so I ended up eating my nutrition faster. What I planned to be 150 g/h ended up being 200 g/h, which I have done both in training and the indoor world record so I knew it would be OK.

Also, at the start line I had to put my spare Wahoo computer in my bag, so Chris Stevens took off ahead of me for a little bit. Not too long into the course I passed him as we were passing the other riders who started just before us.

As we made our way to the front of the pack, I watched Chris in my rearview mirror hold pace pretty steady with me for a good portion of the first lap. Over the next two or three laps, we would hold pace pretty steady together, but as laps four through eight started to come I started to build a gap of about two minutes per lap.

Like I said, my lap times were extremely consistent so I just held to my program, especially because I was trying to not overwork for my upcoming race.

As the day went on, I would build the gap between Chris and I from 10 minutes to 20 minutes and by the end, I rode 20 more miles.

I had one stop during the day at about 5 hours and 20 minutes where we changed my light, nutrition bladder with my additional carbs, and a water bottle. We also did three water bottle handoffs after that throughout the day as it heated up and I was taking in more water.

Each of my hydration bladders had 200 mg of caffeine as well as an additional electrolyte booster from Formula 369. The source of all of my energy throughout the day was Formula 369 Endurance mix.

As for the bike set up, I was on the Cruzbike V20C with ENVE wheels, both front and back. The rear wheel had a disc cover on it from EZ Gains.

I was running Continental Archetype tires in 30mm both front and back set to 50 psi. Although the wind was high for the day, because it was mostly a straight headwind or tailwind, the disc wheel ended up being the right choice.

Other components and gear that helped throughout the day included Intake Nose Band, Bont shoes and shoe covers, Hyperthreads kit, Rudy Project Wing TT helmet, Cruzbike race cage, IGPSPORT computer and lights, SRAM drivetrain with Silca wax. 

It was my dad’s first time doing the crewing solo so he also handed off bottles for the first time. We managed each bottle handoff. He did miss me once but got me the next lap. 

While I was concerned about the water and wind, I was also excited to get more practice on the bike in these conditions and felt way more comfortable on the bike after the windy record attempt weeks earlier.

The wind really did not bother me at all, and I took the turns a lot slower in the wet and was cautious, but I had no issues. It felt especially good to put up a good result on a course like this and in these conditions. Showing both my ability growing on the bike and also the bike's true potential.

In addition to my own efforts, I had lots of friends on the race course including Laura Crawford celebrating her 65th birthday by winning her age category and beating her husband by a couple miles. 

There are many great performances despite the adversity of the weather and Larry Oslund always puts on a great event.

It was also the Elliptigo championship so it was fun to see many of them on the course including one woman who went 314 miles and 24 hours.

When all was said and done, I managed 305.2 miles, which is an average speed of 25.2 mph. I burned around 10,500 cal while consuming 7,200 cal. I ended up with an exact wattage of 240 W, meeting my goal.

My feet are still an issue at the higher power numbers, something I’m gonna continue to work on with the recumbent style.

My knee is also continuing to get sore so I’m worried that my pedal length is a little bit too short and my knee is overworking at the beginning of the stroke.

Overall, it was a really pleasant experience and a fun way to keep growing and learning among friends and family.

Our VanDOit made the journey to Ohio nice. I’m able to bring everything I need for races in addition to two different race bikes for very different races. As I write this, my dad and I are driving from Ohio to Kansas City where he will fly home and I will stay in Kansas to start getting ready for Unbound. My wife and kids will fly out in a couple days and we’ll have a week and a half in town before the race happens.

Our VanDOit allows us to travel and experience all of these things together. 

One of the other  great experiences was having a follower drive in just to say high before the race. I signed a picture of my Sebring result and got a picture with him. 

When we all chase our dreams we inspire each other to keep reaching and finding our way along our own path. Thanks John for adding to my life. 

The 24hr had a thunderstorm in the last 2 hours so many stopped riding for a time or stopped altogether. There are amazing experiences to be had if we are willing to take the leap and experience life.