It's amazing how quickly time goes. It seems like a lot less than two weeks ago that we were in Arusha but there we go. We've only got six weeks left and that's pretty much the time we had between terms at Easter when at Cambridge - our shortest vacation. In fact, until Lilongwe, there are only three riding days left (one down today) and until the first rest day in Zambia, another five riding days. From here to our duo of rest days at Victoria Falls, only another three riding days. After Zambia we'll hit Botswana and there are some tough days coming - five 160km days, a rest day and then a five day week beginning with a 207km stage! Another three days, a couple of five day sections and then we're in Cape Town.
Whenever anything is so obviously compartmentalised, it becomes seemingly trivial - while I don't doubt the intensity of some of the upcoming stages, there is a clear, bright light at the end of the tunnel. Irrespective of what happens in the next 1.5 months, the end is going to get here quickly and my thoughts are straying to the long summer of 2010. If anyone is planning on entering any team 24 hour mountain bike races and needs a rider, drop me a line!
The ride out of Chitimba was tough and for the first time in a while my quads are surprisingly sore (a call to action for the tube of fake Deep Heat lying in my bag). The morning started with a half kilometre walk through the sandy lane out to the road and a flattish 16km to THE CLIMB. The climb was a 10km ascent of 650m, not as bad as the Blue Nile Gorge but not to be underestimated either. Riding out from camp with Paul, we picked up Jethro, Tim and Kelsey. As we hit the climb, Jethro and Tim moved into their superhuman hill climbing mode and I tried to hold their rear wheels. This worked for about a kilometre before my cardiovascular system blew up as I shifted gears to keep up. My chain disliked gears 3 and 4 on my cassette (where 1 is the easiest / biggest) and I lost some ground. Trying to catch up the twenty metres I lost pushed my heart rate up into the unsustainable 90-95% range and I dropped back when my stomach started feeling like it was on fire and full of ice at the same time. Maybe next time.
To my relief, no one caught me on the rest of the climb and it was soon a case of upwardly rolling hills with a tailwind. My stomach started rumbling at 60km and I had my eyes peeled for lunch. Evidently I wasn't looking hard enough because it got to 75km and I hadn't seen it yet. At 80km I looked at my camera to double check I hadn't missed a turn and was doubly confirmed by the underexposed image taken the previous night and by Eric Dufour overtaking me. At 86km, out of water (timed to run out at 75km) and feeling ravenously hungry, I stopped at a roadside shop and bought three Fantas and a Sprite, filling up both my bottles (insides now stained purple for some reason). The headwind picked up and a PVM bar, I rolled into another roadside shop (well skidded, forgetting that my brakes are now adjusted to work) and bought five more icy cold Fantas, putting four in my bottles and drinking the fifth with such vigor that I suffered brain freeze.
Hitting the road again, it was a 25km slog through rolling hills that only seemed to go upwards. As the day's distance approached, I was on edge, looking for the documented turns with wider eyes than when I skipped past lunch. Less than a kilometre from camp, Stuart caught up and we rode into the Mzuzu Lodge together. A hard day was over and the only side effect of drinking nine sodas appeared to be a mild headache which quickly dispersed.
