Puncheur Sportive - The race that nearly broke me

 A 64 mile cycle race in East Sussex and my first Sportive: the weather was good, I'd trained on similar terrain, I was well rested and fed, so what could possibly go wrong? 

Pre-race. Raring to go.

Nothing per se, except what was going on in my mind. The route, starting and finishing in Ditchling, with the infamous climb up Ditchling Beacon at the end was hilly, but not outrageously so - enough though, to keep you on your toes, quite literally on some of the climbs! I started off at a fairly confident pace, increasing gradually as my legs warmed up and felt strong. So much so that I didn't stop or think to rehydrate or fuel properly. 

Pain.

At the half way point I topped up my water bottles, grabbed a handful of jelly babies and carried on as I was keen to keep my pace up. By mile 35 I hit a wall. Every slight incline felt like a mountain, my legs, shoulders and lower back ached and, oddly, I felt sleepy. I pushed through for a mile or so before I had to stop for a 10 minute Pitt-stop. The penny had dropped; I had quite literally run out of energy. So I refuelled properly, and continued to do so regularly.

But from then on, my confidence was shot down and I had to drag myself around the remainder of the course. Only the last couple of miles, up the final, brutal hill, felt easy, possibly because I knew it heralded the end of the race! This was a real learning curve for me - especially knowing the distance I did will be just one leg of the half Ironman. 

Before hitting my 'wall'

It's taken a few weeks for me to fully get back to my training, as I started to question my performance, my motivations, whether or not I could or should actually be doing all this... I have now accepted that sometimes you have an off day or race and that sometimes, a race isn't just physically difficult, it's also a huge mental challenge.

Lessons I learnt:
-  Stay fed and hydrated - preempt 'the wall'! 
- Never, ever underestimate a race, no matter how much prep you have done.
- Sometimes you just have an 'off-day', and that's OK.

Here's more information on the race - I'll be there next year, will you?

Soph x

The route and my splits.