Long Bike to Bear Mountain: 108.6 miles

Another milestone achieved today. Let’s say a huge milestone :-). The goal was to put in a long bike today to test out my nutrition. The most I’ve biked was about 70-75 miles. Today I conquered the century. Today’s ride called for extensive preparation. Route choice, nutrition! nutrition!……Nutrition was by far the most important aspect of today’s goal. I purchased some Ironman perform drinks from GNC yesterday as that is what will be provided on the IMLP course and I needed to try them on this long ride. The only flavor they had in stock was the “lemon-lime” I bought all 10 bottles. My bikes current hydration config is 2 bottle racks on the frame, a broken seat post “profile design” hydration cage with only one cage left (need to replace soon) and my aero bottle (got musclemilk splashed all over my bike, sorry man). I used accelerade, Ironman Perform, MuscleMilk and offcourse water for all those 8 powergels I would consume. I also carried 2 powerbars of which I would only have 1/2 of one. That stuff is hard to take on the bike. I pretty much just stuck with liquid fuel.

A God sent was a Toga Bikes at about mile 31 of my route. This bike shop would come in handy on my way back. I reloaded on 2 Ironman Performs (orange-mango and mixed berry) and water to take the remaining 4 gels on my way back to Astoria. My initial goal was to do 100 miles (century), but along the way I met a fellow triathlete who is also doing Lake Placid (I initially met him while volunteering at Lake Placid last year) and he persuaded me to summit the “Bear”. Why not? We triathletes love challenges. We spoke for a while and met at the summit for more Ironman conversations. I also met some of his friends who are triathletes themselves (all part of Tri Latino). The summit was well worth it. Took a few pics and decided to head back home asap (didn’t want to get Anh P. worried) The goal again was to simulate race conditions (race in on July 24th – 8 weeks away). I couldn’t afford to recover for too long. The legs needed to feel the burn as much as possible. All is all an excellent success and great ride. Thanks again Charlie T. for all the tips you gave me yesterday.

P.S. The heat killed me out there. I was in desperate need of ice water being poured on my head to cool down my core temperature. Thank God race day will have plenty of ice to pass around. Even contemplated dipping my head in a creek I saw 🙂

Nutrition:
4 x Ironman Perform 175 x 4 Total 700 calories
2 x MuscleMilk servings 300 x 2 Total 600 calories
8 x Powergels 110 x 8 Total 880 calories
1/2 Powerbar 240/2 Total 120 calories
2 x Accelerade servings 120 x 2 Total 240 calories
Total = 2540 calories

Calories burnt, approximately 3661 calories. 1121 calories short.

Total elevation gain was 7,362 ft.

Welcome to Bear Mountain State Park