Right now it’s about 32 degrees in the shade, and has been during each stage. Apparently it’s a heat wave, unusual for this time of year say the Spanish, and even they find it too hot.
Yesterday’s stage was too hot to handle for me. I did the dire thing and bailed, at 60km, halfway through the 119km stage. Not experienced anything like it before, but I guess it was simply heat exhaustion, an unquenchable thirst met with nausea and vomiting. Anyhow, despite my ego saying otherwise, I couldn’t go on and left Max to finish it alone. Of course it’s not a nice feeling, not to mention embarrassing, of course I was pretty upset about it. But that is done and Max did a cracking job despite the heat and a further two thousand metres of climbing! Strong as an ox, and the admiration of many Spanish men.
It also meant that I couldn’t ride today, I hadn’t eaten anything substantial for 24 hours. Fingers crossed the solid stuff is going down and tomorrow is scheduled to be cooler. As a novice to stage events, it’s the hardest thing I’ve ever done. There’s a few things that I would do differently – more gears on the bike! More preparation too – this was a relatively last minute idea! But I’m not sure I could’ve prevented yesterday’s episode. I’ve been drinking loads and passing urine well, with good colour! Perhaps just a combination of everything.
Onwards we go, hoping I can join Max tomorrow. 3 more stages until we meet the Atlantic coast.
Verity Appleyard 