Projectile vomiting

Some of you are wondering what's up with the title of this posting.  We'll get to that.

Today was the first real test for the week.  37 miles and around 4300 feet of climbing.  Today was the Colorado Trail stage.  I never knew before why IMBA was so passionate about saving the Colorado Trail.  Now I know.   That's some of the sweetest singletrack . . . IN THE WORLD!  But before we got to the rippin' trails, we had to do some climbing.  And that's where we come back to the title of this post.

We showed up to the start this morning to find that we were 6th out of 7 men's open duo teams.   A little disappointing, but we are riding against an open class which contains a lot of really strong riders.  And at least we weren't last. The ride out of Breck was like being in "Le Tour".  The neutral start followed a police car, and the car traffic had to stop and wait for us.  Once we hit dirt, the police car split off, and then the climbing began.   The climb went on and on, and in some places was about as steep as the Link.  It was good terrain though, so it was ridable.  When I got to the top, I looked back and didn't see Jon, but I figured he had to be close since he's been so strong this year, much stronger than me.  I started the decent casually expecting Jon to pull up, but it turned out to be some other teams.  I pulled over and waited, and when Jon finally showed up he puffed, "My cats are killing me!".

I rode behind him for a while thinking, "Crazy F__king British."  Finally, I had to know what the hell "Cats" had to do with anything.  So I asked again.

And he replied, "My cats are killing me!"

The English may have been credited for the language, but they sure don't know how to communicate with it well.  

"What?!"

"My CATS are killing me!"

Oh, what the hell!  Do I really care?  When we finally slowed down a bit, I tried one last time.  

"What?"

"My GUTS are killing me!"

OOOOOOOOhhh.  Now I get it.

"I have to shit."

"Now?"

"At the Aid station"

"Dude, if you gotta go, you better just go now.  I see a nice patch of poison ivy to wipe with."

So we pulled over for about 5 minutes while Jon went into the foliage to do his business.  Then I hear gagging and coughing.  I don't usually associate shitting with coughing, so I turned around to see what was up.  And that's where the projectile vomiting comes into the story.  It was coming out both ends with a vengeance.  Poor guy.  

But Jon's a tough bastard.  He got his ass back on the saddle, and we rode on.   I actually felt pretty good, so I took the lead for a change.  Jon's insides were all twisted up, so we rode at a pretty reasonable pace, which allowed me to stay under threshold.   Despite that, I still managed to cramp up because I ran out of water.  But I rode through the cramps and we made decent time.  In fact, we even managed to move up a place in the standings.   (One of the teams in front of us changed categories).  But hey, now were in 5th place!  We just need 4 more teams to change categories, and this thing is in the bag.

Jon seems to have recovered.  We refueled right away, and we've got our compression stockings on.  (Thanks, Drew!).  Early to bed tonight.  Each stage gets harder.

out.