Sickness gives you perspective; Mary McConneloug and Mike Broderick diary

By Michael Broderick

Three consecutive weekends of international competition in Rincon, Puerto Rico, the first World Cup in Curacao, and the Sea Otter Classic stage race in Monterey, California.

Feverish, sleepless and puking up stomach bile is a great way to gain perspective on how good average daily life really is. Getting sick after a really depleting race is horrible, and this night was as rough as an unchaperoned prom.

I really can't explain what brought this on except to say after the final (and particularly grueling) day of the Sea Otter mountain bike stage race, my body just rebelled. It took an uncharacteristic trip to the E room for a couple of saline drips, some anti nausea medication and a lot of TLC from Mary to sort it all out. On the positive side it was a good reminder for me that it's really important to enjoy and cherish those days when you're feeling healthy.

I guess it was a lot to ask the body to go into a four day stage race when the energy is less than 100%. Nursing a cold, but more just tired from traveling and competing over the prior weekends had me at a bit of a low point.

This makes Mary's 2nd place overall in the Sea Otter Pro Omnium all the more incredible. The fact that she went through all I did and was still able to come up with a great result is a testament to her fitness and tough mental resolve. I was stoked to rack up my best Sea Otter result as well, finishing 9th in the overall GC.

Mary and I had not planned for Sea Otter to be a high priority (for a result) race, mostly because we knew it would be tricky to pit our team through a muddy 4 stage race. It was pretty clear that we would be at somewhat of a disadvantage not having the help of first and foremost a mechanic, massage therapist and or manager. Back to back mountain bike races in in those conditions mandates lots of extra work! Still as soon as the gun went off we found ourselves triggered into race mode and we went for it with everything we had, instinctively like hyenas to weak buffalo.

Read the entire Mary McConneloug and Mike Broderick diary here.