I've been trying to get as much road racing done as I can before really getting 100% focused on Ironman CDA. My window isn't very long: racing starts in early March, so that gives me 5 or 6 weeks. I've done two road races and one time trial so far and have been having fun.
On this weekend's menu was the North Shore Circuit Race, up in Bellingham. Bellingham is about 90 minutes north of Seattle, near the Canadian Border. One of my best friends lives about 2/3 of the way up there, in Burlington, so we headed up last night and had dinner with him. It snowed in the Seattle area so we knew the weather wasn't going to be ideal. But North Shore is a more challenging course than the others I've done and I was looking forward to a good, hard race to see where I was at fitness wise.
When we got up this morning, the weather in Burlington was cold and damp but not really raining. As we drove north, we started seeing flurries right away, and some good snow as we went up and over a small pass. When we got to Bellingham, the roads were almost dry and it looked like it was going to work out. The race course is just a few minutes east of town.
By the time we got to the parking lot, it was starting to snow pretty hard. There were a surprising number of folks from my team that had made the trek, but everyone was still in their warm-ups standing around near registration, wondering what was going to happen. See, it was snowing well there, but the tops of the climbs were still 300' higher in elevation. The cars coming down the hill had plenty of snow on them. Not good. The folks running the race were discussion options: cancel, delay, change course, or some combination of those. The snow was coming down harder. It's March 29. This is not normal. It's really bad too because teams depend on these races for generating funding. I felt bad for all the WWU guys that worked hard to organize the race to have it screwed up by such weather.
There's a bit of a back-story here for me. Back in 2006, many of us were focusing on a major race here in the Seattle area called Tahuya-Seabeck-Tahuya (TST). It's a large loop classic with lots of hard climbing. We had a race plan, jobs for each rider, the whole works. The race started in the low-40s with a downpour. Our plan didn't survive the first climb when it became clear how bad things were out there. After that first climb, we noticed a lot of riders coming the other direction. "That's wierd." After that first sequence, the course has about 10 miles of rolling downhill to the next climb. I'm starting to shiver uncontrollably, and am purposely lagging behind the group so I can do work to catch back on and get some heat going. I'm trying to slyly see if anyone else is shivering like I am. There isn't much talking. See, in a race, no one has fenders, so if the road is wet you get water from every direction imaginable and it's very difficult to stay warm. Near the top of the second climb, I lose contact with the group and all of a sudden I'm all alone - no cars, no other riders, nothing. That's when it starts snowing. I fear that I've gone off the course and am really working hard to just to keep moving. I come upon some folks working a corner and stop there - they become concerned about me when they see how blue I am. Until they get a look at the chaps that show up after me. Long story short, the race turns into an APB for people at the start finish to go out and start rescuing frozen riders from around the course. I see a truck go by - a flatbed - with a pile of bikes on it and a pile of guys under a tarp. It was crazy. I've never been that cold.
After that day, many of us made a pact never again to race when was wet and below 45 or so. Today certainly met that bar.
Soon the roads started to get slick and there was talk of delay of 30 minutes to re-evaluate. It was clear nothing was going to change in 30 minutes, and we knew that if we loaded up and got headed south I could still get home at a decent hour and...get on the bike.
Which we did. The trainer seemed like a much better option, but to add insult-to-injury the sun came out not too long after down here in Kirkland.
Snow. At the end of March. Seriously.