Tuesday, August 9, 2016

Post Delirium

April to August is a long while to give a report on the Delirium. But it has taken a while to feel like talking about it. There were/are many questions about what actually happened.
Some things I did very well and others caused problems.
In summary:
Started too fast for too long - Sitting on a HR in the high 130s.
I got it under control sometime after the first hour.
Ate too little - I was so excited I failed to follow  my plan and start eating straight away. I did not eat enough during the ride. I just could not get the food down and felt nauseas if I forced myself to eat.
Drank too much - or so it seemed as I had a full bladder every 30 to 40 minutes. There must have been an ocean in there!
Maintained the prescribed intake of electrolytes.
Kept to my rest stop plans.
Sat in on some great long drafts to boost distance.
Kept away from the very fast packs.
Used good cornering lines to maintain speed and effort.
Second place in my age group. Beaten by about 15 km.
Missed the presentation but received the second place medal in the post.

At around the 12th hour I went in for a two hour sleep. After an hour I got up to pee and promptly passed out and had an atrial fibrillation (AF) episode.
Ambulanced off to emergency where they treated me as a dehydrated cyclist. Trouble is I still argue my fluids were up and I was not dehydrated - something else was happening.

That was the end of my effort at 285 km. I was very disappointed that I had mismanaged my event so badly. I was very despondent about the whole cycling hobby after that and didn't touch the bike for a month.
I started doing small 20 - 30km rides. I went out to enjoy the view and company. I experimented with a higher cadence in a lower gear. I wore my heart monitor to record HR against physical effort so as to know the reasons an AF episode occurred and why I passed out.

Im currently riding around 150 km a week and enjoying cruising around. I have not had an AF episode for two months. On a longer ride I do not have to pee every 30 minutes. Its more like every hour to 90 minutes. I have not taken my electrolytes for two months either. Are all these things related?

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