Finally bonked on a ride

Quoted message said:

Does anyone else have a similar story, where they wanted to ride on but just couldn't?

I have one that almost matches that description. This happened in February 2002, when I was the last
month of a year long bicycle tour and had ridden nearly 17,000 miles the previous eleven months.
Hence, by then I was in ok shape riding.

That particular day I was in South India riding north to a city of Kozhikode. The terrain was
slightly hillier than previous days and distance was ~70 miles. It was also a little warmer than
normal, particularly during the afternoon it was hot and tiring. I stopped a number of times to
purchase water or other drinks and think I was getting enough liquids. However, aside from a banana,
I wasn't eating much. This mostly because I was very cautious of what I was eating (in attempt to
avoid some food illness, was going very simple with breads, peel fruit, rice, etc).

About 60 miles in I stopped again to purchase water. It was accidentally club soda instead of normal
water. I drank some anyways. A mile or two later I started having some sharp cramps in my legs. They
went away but came back again during the last 10 miles from there to the city and a hotel. I felt
very tired as I made it to end of the day.

I decided I was probably missing fuel, so just after checking into a room, went to the hotel
restaurant and ordered a fried rice type dish and a carbonated drink. I was still waiting for the
meal and drinking when felt very sick. Quickly ran back to my room and threw up. I was feeling
painful cramps in my legs again and also in other muscles. Felt like my body was tensing up. The
restaurant called and offered to bring my food as room service.

It was scary. I was more than 500 miles from my end point in a third world country where I didn't
know much about the medical system or even other transport beyond my bicycle travel. I got out my
"Lonely Planet Healthy Travel in Asia" book and tried to read about what dangerous disease I might
be catching. Of course, many of the descriptions start similar and the hypochondriac in me can have
a vivid imagination :-). However, many descriptions also proscribe rest as a good first step.

Not much later my stomach felt a bit more stable and I had a bit of the rice. Fairly quickly my
cramps lessened. I still felt tired, but surprisingly quickly also started to feel better. Within
three hours other than being tired, it felt like any other day of the tour. I took the following day
as a rest day just to be sure I didn't have some terrible disease and fortunately all was well.

I didn't consult a medical doctor and don't know definitively what I had, but my best guess is that
I had a heat exhaustion. India was the setting, but my guess is this could have happened most
anywhere else. What I learned was even in a setting where I'm trying to be extra careful of what I
eat/drink, I need to really make certain I'm getting enough fuel as well as water. Afterwards I also
discovered that bananas, biscuits, coconuts and other roadside things were good to purchase and eat
along the way.

--mev, Mike Vermeulen

Thanks, that's quite a story. In my case I wasn't sick, had eaten enough, wasn't dehydrated, wasn't
overheated. Basically, the last pass just "busted my chops". It was the biggest climb I had ever
attempted, and it came after a day of strenuous climbing. My legs just ran out of gas.

Mike Vermeulen said:

Quoted message said:

Does anyone else have a similar story, where they wanted to ride on but just couldn't?

I have one that almost matches that description. This happened in February 2002, when I was the
last month of a year long bicycle tour and had ridden nearly 17,000 miles the previous eleven
months. Hence, by then I was in ok shape riding.

That particular day I was in South India riding north to a city of Kozhikode. The terrain was
slightly hillier than previous days and distance was ~70 miles. It was also a little warmer than
normal, particularly during the afternoon it was hot and tiring. I stopped a number of times to
purchase water or other drinks and think I was getting enough liquids. However, aside from a
banana, I wasn't eating much. This mostly because I was very cautious of what I was eating (in
attempt to avoid some food illness, was going very simple with breads, peel fruit, rice, etc).

About 60 miles in I stopped again to purchase water. It was accidentally club soda instead of
normal water. I drank some anyways. A mile or two later I started having some sharp cramps in my
legs. They went away but came back again during the last 10 miles from there to the city and a
hotel. I felt very tired as I made it to end of the day.

I decided I was probably missing fuel, so just after checking into a room, went to the hotel
restaurant and ordered a fried rice type dish and a carbonated drink. I was still waiting for the
meal and drinking when felt very sick. Quickly ran back to my room and threw up. I was feeling
painful cramps in my legs again and also in other muscles. Felt like my body was tensing up. The
restaurant called and offered to bring my food as room service.

It was scary. I was more than 500 miles from my end point in a third world country where I didn't
know much about the medical system or even other transport beyond my bicycle travel. I got out my
"Lonely Planet Healthy Travel in Asia" book and tried to read about what dangerous disease I might
be catching. Of course, many of the descriptions start similar and the hypochondriac in me can
have a vivid imagination :-). However, many descriptions also proscribe rest as a good first step.

Not much later my stomach felt a bit more stable and I had a bit of the rice. Fairly quickly my
cramps lessened. I still felt tired, but surprisingly quickly also started to feel better.
Within three hours other than being tired, it felt like any other day of the tour. I took the
following day as a rest day just to be sure I didn't have some terrible disease and fortunately
all was well.

I didn't consult a medical doctor and don't know definitively what I had, but my best guess is
that I had a heat exhaustion. India was the setting, but my guess is this could have happened most
anywhere else. What I learned was even in a setting where I'm trying to be extra careful of what I
eat/drink, I need to really make certain I'm getting enough fuel as well as water. Afterwards I
also discovered that bananas, biscuits, coconuts and other roadside things were good to purchase
and eat along the way.

--mev, Mike Vermeulen

Gary Smiley <[email hidden]> wrote:
: Thanks, that's quite a story. In my case I wasn't sick, had eaten enough, wasn't dehydrated,
: wasn't overheated. Basically, the last pass just "busted my chops". It was the biggest climb I had
: ever attempted, and it came after a day of strenuous climbing. My legs just ran out of gas.

Not surprising then, as you were doing something you hadn't trained for. Climbing is supposed to
task the muscles differently than riding the flats. Possibly you would have been ok climbing more
slowly, ie. in a lower heart rate zone.

I recall a story from one guy last season. He had began riding that season, trained hard and made
tremendous progress. Then he went to ride a century, and before midpoint it was becoming harder and
harder, and despite all the motivation and strength of will he finally had to quit. His typical
training ride had been 20 miles.

--
Risto Varanka | helsinki.fihpv.htmlOpen ↗ varis at no spam please iki fi

Quoted message said:

I recall a story from one guy last season. He had began riding that season, trained hard and made
tremendous progress. Then he went to ride a century, and before midpoint it was becoming harder
and harder, and despite all the motivation and strength of will he finally had to quit. His
typical training ride had been 20 miles.

I did something like that at the beginning of this season. I'd done gym workouts religiously,
sometimes 4 hours of cardio, but my longest ride before the early-season century was just 30 miles.

By easy pacing and doing the tried-and-true ample feeding and watering, I finished the 105 miles
strongly, but it hurt for the entire second 50. Also, my leg muscles got dehydrated but that was
because of the cool day that deceived me into drinking less. (A massage therapist helpfully rubbed
them down and pointed out their "dry feeling" during a rest stop.) I guess my watering wasn't
"ample" after all, until I got that tip. A blast of Gatorade took care of that for me though.

I can't say I've ever really bonked. I've run down big time on rides and hurt pretty bad, but I
don't know that I've ever matched the classic bonking symptoms. I wonder if my metabolism takes care
of me by consuming fat.

--
--
Lynn Wallace xmission.com~lawallOpen ↗ "I'm not proud. We really haven't done everything we
could to protect our customers. Our products just aren't engineered for security." --Microsoft VP in
charge of Windows OS Development, Brian Valentine.

What the originator of this thread describes can be due to a virus. You suddenly run out of gas even
though you're not hungry etc. It's happened to me a few times, sometimes on easy rides. I usually
become unwell for a day or so.

I've had that happen to me too. But in this case, I was just unable to do such a large climb so late
in the ride. I've read that many riders who try to climb Mont Ventoux also have to get off of their
bikes and walk.

Gearóid Ó Laoi/Garry Lee said:

What the originator of this thread describes can be due to a virus. You suddenly run out of gas
even though you're not hungry etc. It's happened to me a few times, sometimes on easy rides. I
usually become unwell for a day or so.