4am "Beer Can Hands"...

I've been riding and racing mountain bikes since 1990, and in 17 years, I thought I'd had arm pump in just about every form imaginable... until I tried solo 24 hour racing at the recent 24 Hours of Landahl.  As I mentioned in my earlier post, I started the race with a too-high saddle that forced me to over-use my upper body on the ultra-rough and rocky course.  Well, that over-use came back to me in some very strange ways around 4am as I exited the roughest back-side section of the Landahl course. 

As I approached the "mile 8" sign and turned right onto the smooth fire road climb into the clearing, my grips felt as if they were inflating, and felt like they kept getting larger and larger until they felt like I was holding onto grips roughly the size of two Old Style tall boys.  Strangely, when I grabbed the brakes, both brake levers felt pretty normal... Hmmm???  What's going on here?  The handling of the bike even seemed to take on a more floaty, almost ATV-like nature.  Weird.  I still felt like I could hold onto the bike through bumps, but it had a certain "larger than life" quality that was pretty unique, but also a little scary because I didn't know why it was happening.

Luckily I was near the end of the lap, so I took an hour off and timed my next lap to coincide with the absolutely beautiful sunrise, and by that point, my "beer can hands" were long gone.  I put two more laps into the books and called it a race.  Then, I put a real beer can into my hand -- a cold one this time.  And it never felt, or tasted so good.

Cheers!