Went for my second Audax event last Saturday. The 300km Brevit. Finally got 5 friends to join me, went solo on my 200km.
It's funny how things can go wrong just when you forgot something. For about 16 years, I have always carried a chain cutter on my rides (any rides) and used it twice helping total strangers. Last weeked, I forgot to pack it with me and guess what? First time in my life, I broke my chain, not once but twice in the same ride.
First break was 20km into the ride. A friend who was behind stayed to help, he didn't have a chain cutter either but had a Leatherman tool. With his tool and a couple of stones, we managed to fixed it. 17km later, the chain broke again. This time, the chain snapped right in the middle of the link, and only a chain cutter can save us. But Santa Clause came along. 3 fellow Audax partcipants who were cruising along at a liesurely pace (200km Brevit and first timers) lend us a chain cutter. Looks like we're saved... would you believe, we broke the chain cutter? The chain cutter snapped off right after the screw part, luckily we had already removed the snapped link. So with the Leatherman and 2 stones, we managed to fix the chain again. It took us 3 hours and 15 min to reach the 50km Control Point (we could have done it under 2 hours at that time). We got the chain fixed with missing links this time and off we go. We also regrouped.
You think that's done. Nope, my right pedal broke a bearing, for 15km, my pedal kept slipping off it's spindle. Until we got to a small town and I had a pair of $3.75 new pedal installed. It was the only pedal the small bike shop had. We managed to waste over 2 hours because of these mech problems.
We pretty much reach the turn around Control point (approx 165km) just minutes before cut-off time (2:02PM). We were the last to reach there before they packed up and leave. We pedaled back 5km and stop to take a very late lunch. Then we realized we only had 2 hours to do 60km to make cut-off time at the next Control Point. And we were pretty much "Go, don't wait anymore." It's better if one or two finished in time than none of us making the cut-off. I was second and alone, wanna guess what happened? I overshoot the Control Point. And I mean totally, I only realized it when I saw the arch that's telling me I'm already leaving that town. Man, that was like 10km away. I didn't have a choice but to press on.
For the next 40-45km, I was pedalling alone in the dark. And there were several long streches were my head light is the only light there is. No moon, no stars, no street lights, not a vehicle passing by. And I kept hoping it won't rain. On the last Control Point, I decided I'm not doing that anymore and waited for my friends. Two showed up in the next 10 min. We waited for another 10 min for the other 2 would arrive. They didn't made it in time, the last Control Point had packed up and left. So we left too.
The 3 of us reach finish line with 14 min left. The first guy had 30 min to spare. The 5th guy was 5 min too late and listed as DNF. The last guy never made it to finish line. He suffered 2 flats at approx 50km from finish, he figured it take him 3 hours to reach finish line after cut-off time. And decide to take the bus home. Audax allowed me the missed Control Point, partly because the guys manning the station did see me.
Despite all these misadventures, it was a great experience and we were pretty much laughing about it the next day... in between muscle and joint pains of course.
