Caffeine Detox

I'd like to tell you about the great ride that I did Saturday. I'd love to tell you about the great weather, and the incredible scenery, and the friends with whom I rode. That's the blog that I want to write.

But I won't.

I won't because, truth be told, the weather sucked this past weekend. It was rainy and windy, and then it was drizzly and cold and windy. And then it was Monday, and it stayed drizzly and cold and windy.

And the roads were wet, and nobody wanted to ride, and I could have put a bike on the trainer, but ... well, that would have sucked, too. I could have at least done a spin class, but I'm sure that would have sucked.

Basically, everything just sucks. Out loud. Big-time.

Oh, come on, you say. Is it really that bad?

No, it's worse. I've had a headache now for three days, too. And I've got no energy, and it's hard to concentrate. And, on top of all of that, everything -- and I mean everything -- sucks.

You see, Saturday -- on top of being a totally crappy day, weather-wise, with rain and wind and yadda-yadda -- I used up the last of my magic beans.

Espresso beans, of course. Lavazza, to be precise. I had my last cappuccino Saturday morning, about 7:15 am.

Ah, that sweet, sweet smell. The lovely crema. The tart bite and rich darkness that can only be coffee. My beloved coffee. Precious. My precious.

And now? She's gone.

I knew that I was running out of beans. I did it deliberately -- can you believe that? I let my stash dwindle to nothing, and all for randonneuring.

Randonneuring. How I hate it so.

You see, the really long rides are coming up. The Bonifay, FL, 400K is March 19, and then my first 600K is two weeks after that. You need to be able to ride all night for those, and that means you may need "chemical assistance" ... like caffeine.

Now, some people get a good jolt out of caffeine, but I don't because I drink a lot of it. I mean, seriously, a lot. I start the day with at least one quad-espresso-shot cappuccino, and usually drink another on my way to work. If I'm biking in, I stop at Panera for at least one refill ... usually two. Then I drink the crappy work coffee most of the morning. When I get home at night, I unwind with another cappuccino.

For most people, drinking a cappuccino after the middle of the afternoon will keep them awake all night. Me? I'm so used to drinking caffeine that I can just about have an espresso as a bed-time snack.

Fortunately, if I get all of the caffeine out of my system, it starts to have an effect again. Thus, on a 400K, at midnight when I (hopefully) have only an hour or two of riding left, I can stop at a convenience store for a big coffee, and it will wake me up enough to finish the ride. I'm hoping to maybe even get off caffeine enough that I could ride that 600K straight through, without sleep.

And that's why I'm getting all of the caffeine out of my system. Once off it, I will avoid caffeine until after Paris-Brest-Paris in August ... other than the above-mentioned convenience store stops in the dead of the night. I do this for the sake of randonneuring.

Randonneuring sucks.