Last year I did my first gravel race at Freedhem 46, and I decided to return this year to see what I could do. My wife was also racing and so we packed up the car early and did the hour and forty minute drive to the tiny general store in Freedhem, MN.

This year I was riding my new Otso Fenrir Ti bike and was excited to put it through its paces at a gravel event. I’ll talk more about the bike in a different blog post, but I’m happy to state that the bike performed great. I’ve got a couple little tweaks to make, but overall the ride feel was amazing.

However, a new bike can’t save me from myself, and the story of this race is a lot of lessons in how I could have done things differently, both in the race, and in my prep before.

We lined up and launched at 9am heading east into the sun. Despite being a neutral roll-out the pace is usually pretty solid. I pushed hard in this section and ended up with a PR on the leadout segment in Strava. I eventually fell into a nice even pace that matched, or slightly beat, last year’s effort.

I didn’t realize it, but throughout this first section I was actually pulling over a dozen riders behind me. I had no idea until my wife caught up to me and asked if I wanted her to pull for a while. I had mentally already prepared for a long day solo in the farm fields and the idea of being in a pace line completely overwhelmed and short-circuited my brain. She hopped in front for a bit and started asking if I wanted the pace slower or faster. I just mumbled something about not being sure, and then she asked if I wanted anyone in front of me, to which I replied “No”. Thus ended the pace line!

As the field broke up more and I ended up more and more alone I settled into some solid 5-mile segments. My second 5 miles was a little slower than last year, but I was making concerted efforts to push on the uphills and keep my speed up as I climbed.

Miles 10-20 passed along without issue and although I was a little bit slower than last year, I felt pretty good. I had my first waffle around mile 12 and made sure to keep drinking. This section was mostly northbound into a slight headwind. It wasn’t a huge headwind, but just enough to be noticeable. Thankfully, we soon turned westward and got a bit of relief.

For the long westward segment I managed to mostly match last year’s effort. However, temps were about 10°F (5°C) warmer than last year and so the heat was getting to be annoying. I made it to the infamous Sandtrap MMR (minimum maintenance road) and decided to see if the new bike, with beefier tires, could keep me riding the entire time.

Sure enough I was able to downshift and keep on the bike for all but one small section. I ended up on a slight uphill with someone walking in front of me and I didn’t have enough momentum to get around them cleanly and so I had to hop off and hike up a small hill before getting back in the saddle. The rest of the MMR passed without issue and soon enough I was turning back to the main road.

Mile 35-38.5 is the final section of pavement on the course and I decided to give one final push while I could. Myself and another rider (Jeremy from Bone Saw) cranked out this section at a solid 15mph pace which was a huge improvement over last year (12.5mph). However, this final push was the last of what I had to give and as soon as we hit gravel again everything came crashing down.

From mile 38.5 to 46 it was a complete slog. My quads were screaming at me in pain and my energy level was completely tanked. I had finished all the food I had brought and my electrolyte drink had long been depleted and replaced with just water at the aid station. I pedaled as best I could until I finally just had to stop and walk for a while.

I felt completely drained and defeated during this section, but I knew that I could walk no matter what. I would hop on the bike and pedal for a bit until the pain in the quads was too much, and then get off and walk some more. It took me 5 different walk breaks to finally get up enough energy to make the final 1 mile push to the finish line. The beauty of the Freedhem finish line is that you can see it from a mile away. That was a huge motivator to just keep moving (along with the lead 76 pack screaming past me… dang that was impressive). Soon enough I was crossing the finish line and looking for a place to collapse. The body was completely done. It took me a good twenty minutes of lying on the ground (and a bottle of Gatorade) before I was recovered enough to find some food and be sociable.

After my rest I was feeling good and so we sat with friends and had some food and beer and enjoyed a beautiful afternoon with other bike people. It also started my internal processing about what happened and how I could do better in the future.

Lessons learned

When you have a blow-up in a race, it’s a good opportunity to look at what went right and what can be improved upon. A day removed from the event I think I’ve got a good idea of what I need to change up to be more successful in future attempts.

• Bring more food. I did not have enough food with me for the level of effort I was putting out. I needed at least two more gels/snacks to be able to fuel myself for the effort. As a side-note I need to deal with my bag situation better because getting at my food was a hassle. This isn’t unexpected as this is a new bike and I don’t have all the storage worked out.
• Bring more water. One more bottle would have been ideal, along with another electrolyte mix. By the time the temps were hitting 85°F (29°C) I was getting dehydrated and should have kept more water flowing. Again, storage needs to be tweaked on the bike.
• Different tires. I opt’d for tires that were overkill for the terrain (Teravail Ehline). They’re great tires, and awesome when things get rocky and tough. But for sandy Minnesota gravel they gave way more resistance than I wanted. This is a simple fix, and I’ll probably look at something like Teravail Cannonballs or Washburns, or WTB Byways shortly, and save the Ehlines for terrain that better matches their capability.
• Don’t overrun my training. More on my training in a moment, but given my current bike fitness I should not have been pushing up the hills as hard as I was. I left it all out there on the course, unfortunately there was still 7.5 miles of course left by the time my body was done.
  

Finally, the biggest thing is that I should have been riding more. My biking volume has been way lower this year than it should have been for this time of the season. Last year by this race I had already had 8 rides over 30 miles, with some hitting 50. This year, I’ve had 2 long rides over 30 miles. I simply didn’t have the quad endurance that I normally have by this time of the year, and that’s all on me.

There have been plenty of opportunities this year to ride, and do longer rides, but I simply haven’t taken them. By this time last year I had nearly double the mileage of where I’m at right now. When you’re training for endurance events, you can’t ignore the need for volume in training, and this year I was too lazy and didn’t get done what I needed to get done. By far, this is the biggest lesson I took away from this entire experience. If you want to ride long distances, you need to ride long distances. It’s no different than running, and it’s a lesson I won’t forget again.

Overall, I’m still perfectly happy with how the race went. I had a good time for almost all of it, and even when I bonked I was able to recover quickly when I got done. It was a beautiful day in the country, surrounded by great people and I loved putting my new Otso through it’s paces. I’m looking forward to some of my gravel events later this year, and putting my learnings into practice.