The three saddest letters in a racer's vocabulary. DNF. Did Not Finish. I guess I've been somewhat lucky that it's taken me this long to encounter them, but unfortunately my luck ran out on Saturday.
Saturday was the third and final installment of this season's Chilly Cheeks winter duathlon series, and it lived up to its name. It started snowing Thursday and didn't really let up, so I was already not too thrilled about racing. Nonetheless, I got up and headed down to Cherry Creek to freeze my tush off for a couple of hours. A few hundred hardy (or
stupid) racers showed up, although many of those made the decision to switch
from the 10 mile bike/4 mile run duathlon to the run-only option. The racers
started in waves of 5-10, and I was in the second wave. Due to the icy road
conditions, I opted to ride my mountain bike rather than my road bike, which made for a long, slow ride. The bike ride was absolutely miserable,
between the freezing cold and the icy roads. My hands, especially my
fingers, were so cold that I could barely work my shifters, and thank goodness I never needed to brake, since I don't know how well I would have
been able to. I spent most of the ride fantasizing about taking a DNF and
skipping the run, all the while knowing that I'm far too stubborn to
actually do such a thing.
I came into transition dreading the four mile run
ahead of me. My feet and hands were both numb. I got my bike up on the rack
and was promptly dropped to the ground with excruciating hand pain like I've
never felt before. I spent a minute or so crouched there, crying, before
another racer noticed and asked if I was ok. She escorted me over to the
ambulance, where the paramedics thought I had fallen and smashed my hands, I
was in so much pain. They kept me in the ambulance for about half an hour,
warming my hands up. I feel kind of silly that my first ever DNF was a
result of cold hands, but I know that my hands were in pretty bad shape.
They remained painful and swollen for several hours after the race, even
after getting warmed up. As I've been reassured by many friends since,
frostbite (or worse) is nothing to fool around with. I was wearing
full-finger cycling gloves, but obviously should have been wearing something
*much* warmer.
The pain of the DNF has faded a bit over the past couple of days, but it's still disappointing. And of course, I wish I had a better story to tell. You know, where I wiped out on ice and injured myself or something. Not badly, of course, it just sounds better than "frozen hands"!