Not Even My Wife Reads This

DC Randonneurs Many Rivers 600 km Brevet Ride Report

This one is no fun to write because it's the first time I've failed to finish an organized ride.

Friday night, I did some last-minute work on my bike (which I should have done days before so I'd have time to make sure it was right). Finished about 9. Got to bed around 10. Fell asleep around 11. Alarm was supposed to go off at 2. It didn't (I set it to PM instead of AM), but I woke up anyway around 2:05. So I didn't get nearly enough sleep before the ride. The forecast was for 90 degrees and a 40% chance of thunderstorms Saturday, 82 degrees and a 50% of storms Sunday. So I brought my raincoat and my Camelbak.

I drove to Warrenton, arriving about 30 minutes before the start. Tech inspection and registration went perfectly, thanks to the volunteers and the nice facilities at the Hampton Inn. (They gave us the Continental breakfast room in the lobby, so we had light to work with, plus some food.)

Over 40 riders turned up, a great turnout for such a long ride. We rolled off at 4 a.m. I resolved to not chase the fast group, and ended up in a slower group of about 11 riders. Then fairly early in the ride we reached a group navigation crisis. The cue sheet said to bear left. There was a left turn there. The signage was ambiguous. About seven people decided to turn left, and four of us decided to go straight. I think everyone still thinks they went the correct way and the other people got it wrong. The two routes converged so we'll never really know, but our group rode an extra mile.

I was riding with Stan and Nick and George W. Nick was on a mission. He had expected times for every control and was trying hard to stay on schedule. I figured Nick was pretty sure to finish so my goal was to stay with him and I'd finish too. George fell off the back of our little group, and we were three. A couple miles later we caught up with Larry, who'd been in the group of seven. Which told us for sure that we'd been the ones who'd taken the longer way. We were four again. The sun came up, I made myself eat and drink, and eventually we reached the first control at mile 52 in Wolftown.

I bought a couple of bottles of Gatorade at the control, refilled my bottle with one and drank the other. While I was drinking, Nick and Stan left. (Like I said, Nick was on a schedule.) I eventually finished my drank then decided to chase them down. (Probably a dumb idea.) I rode off at a pretty good clip and caught them around mile 61. George M. caught us a couple of miles later, and we were four again. George was faster than the others, and I decided to follow his pace rather than hanging back (you can always fall back to a group if you want, but it's harder to catch up to one), so I rode with George to the information control at mile 78. A bunch of other riders were there already so we were briefly in a group of about 8. But eventually George and I rode off the front of that group too. It was starting to get hot and I was worried about whether I had enough liquid, so I stopped at a store at mile 84 and let George go.

I wasted a lot of time at that store, and Stan and Nick and Michael caught me, so I was in another group of four. We continued into the heat. Michael fell off the back and I rode with Stan and Nick for quite a while, to the Ashleys Market control at mile 103 and beyond. Then I made a bad wrong turn. On a long easy climb, Nick was pulling ahead and Stan was falling behind. I decided to chase Nick (easy to fall back, hard to chase forward) but I missed the downhill turn onto Old Roberts Mountain Lane. Badly. After a bonus mile of climbing, Nick was gone. I rode for a while by myself, and eventually caught up to Stan and Michael, both of whom were going slowly. I said hello then continued past them, knowing I needed to go faster than that, but the heat got to me and I needed to take a bathroom break at the next store at mile 120. I dawdled there for too long and Stan caught up and said Michael was going to abandon there. So we waited for Michael to arrive and we made sure he was okay and had a ride before continuing. And then I rode with Stan for the rest of the day.

Stan told me that he hadn't missed a turn all year, so we immediately missed the next turn and did a couple more bonus miles. The next 50 miles or so were kind of a blur of endless rollers. We were both hot and tired but we eventually caught up with Al, who didn't look so good and immediately made a wrong turn at a T intersection. I yelled at him to get him back on course, and he confirmed to us that he was going to abandon. So we rode with him to a grocery store in Palmyra, and wasted a lot of time there before continuing. Michael eventually came out to give him a ride back to Warrenton; it was 90 miles and he didn't have the energy to make it. So Stan and I set off again. We reached the Louisa control at mile 182 at sundown. We ate in a little Italian restaurant that had pretty good food, but it took a while to eat it, and it was fully dark when we left. Then Stan had some lighting problems that took some time to resolve.

The last 70 miles or so were kind of a blur. Stan was really tired and also short of water. I had plenty, but it's not easy to dump water from a Camelbak to a bottle. The convenience stores were all closed so we only had vending machines, which were all sold out of water so he had to settle for soda. I had pain in my hands and left foot and saddle area. Some pain is normal on a long ride, but this was far more than normal. I think I had sweated a whole lot during the hot part of the day, and my own acidic sweat was attacking my skin.

We dragged into Warrenton about 4 a.m. To have a good chance of finishing we really needed to start riding again almost immediately. I asked for a 5 a.m. wake-up call, showered, and went to sleep. Seconds later the wake-up call arrived. My hands and saddle area still hurt, so I decided to go back to bed. I think it was the right choice; it would have been a really painful last 200 km. Better to try for the 600 again on a cooler day.

Anyway, what I learned from this one is that my sweat is evil and can eat my skin. So I'll be bringing extra gloves and socks and shorts on any future long, hot brevets. But I did manage to drink enough to avoid dehydrating in the heat. And I ate enough to avoid bonking. And I didn't fall asleep on the bike, despite not getting enough sleep the night before.

And I did quite a bit wrong. I repeated the mistake of working on the bike right before the brevet. (It had been popping out of the easiest gear. I fixed that, but in the process loosened the front derailleur's low limit screw too much, so it could drop the chain to the inside on a hard downshift. I think that happened four times on the ride.) I stopped too long at the controls. I made a couple of large navigation errors.

Oh well, maybe I'll do the ROMA 600 in September.

2010 06 08

DC Randonneurs Frederick 400k ride report

Last year's 400 was really hard for me. I got lost and I had stomach problems and I dehydrated and I bonked and I had 4 flat tires (1 blowout, 1 puncture, 2 bad fixes). But I finished. So I was a bit worried this time, even though I had a pretty strong 300 a couple of weeks ago.

The things that went wrong for me in the 300 were arriving a bit late, minor mechanical issues (badly adjusted brakes and chain problems, on a bike I rarely ride), not bringing enough warm clothes, and ridiculous levels of wind.

So for the 400 I made sure to arrive on time, I rode my usual bike, and I brought a wool jersey and wool socks in addition to the synthetic jersey and cotton socks I usually wear in warm weather. I also brought more food than usual: Clif bars, Gu, and Gatorade instead of plain water in my bottles. I didn't bring my Camelbak even though I got dehydrated last year, because I hate wearing one and it wasn't supposed to be very hot. I just resolved to completely fill my bottles at every opportunity and also to drink heavily at the controls. (Not that kind of drinking heavily; that'll make you crash your bike.) I think a bike with space for three full-sized water bottles is in my future. I couldn't do anything about the weather, though. The forecast was for a 50% chance of rain in the day and 60% at night, so I figured we'd probably get rained on some. (This is called foreshadowing. I learned about it in middle school English class. You probably did too.)

The group left Frederick at 4 a.m. and I started off near the front. Most of the fast riders seem to want to do a couple of miles at 15 mph to warm up, then speed up to over 20 mph. I prefer to do the first couple of miles at 17 mph and then gradually slow down to 13 mph. (Well, "prefer" is the wrong word. I'd prefer to ride at 25 all day. But that ain't gonna happen, ever. I didn't win that particular genetic lottery. I think my ancestors were the ones who tricked the mastodons into falling off cliffs, not the ones who ran down the gazelles.) So I often end up leading the brevet very briefly, then getting rapidly shelled out the back. At least it gives me a brief chance to see all the fast riders who I'm unlikely to see again all day.

Last year I somehow stayed with the fast pack all the way to the first control at 39 miles in Airmont. This year, I lasted about 5 miles before I realized that I was going about 23 mph on the flat, which was wasting energy for no good reason. (Maybe trying to keep up contributed to my bonking last year.) So I let the pack go and rode alone. Of course riding alone in the dark is a lot slower than riding with a fast group. Not only do you lose the draft but you also lose the benefit of other people's lights so you have to descend more slowly. And you have to navigate for yourself rather than just following a wheel and trusting that 20 people can't all be wrong. But I think it's still the right choice to let the group go, if they're riding faster than you can reasonably sustain.

I really didn't have much power in my legs on this ride, for whatever reason. Even just a few miles in, I found myself going 15 mph on the flats and coasting on the slight downhills. But I climbed well (by my standards, not an actual good climber's standards) all day. So the power was there when I really needed it, just not all the time. I pondered why I didn't have it as I slowly rode from Frederick down to Brunswick and then over the bumpy bridge into Lovettesville and around western Loudoun County toward Airmont. A few riders caught me from behind. I just let them go and kept riding whatever speed my legs wanted to do. Oddly that meant getting passed on the flats and then passing people on the uphills. Of course I also got passed on the downhills, but I always do, because I'm an overly cautious descender. It doesn't really matter much when you're riding alone because the total time spent going downhill is small, but it matters if you're trying to stick to a group and they accidentally drop you. So I need to work on my descending. But the early morning darkness was not the best time for that, so I resolved to not outrace my lights. (I was using an Inolight 20, plus a cheap LED helmet light for backup / repair / cue sheet reading purposes. The Inolight is reasonably bright but not super-bright, which makes it nice for my mostly bike trail commute because it doesn't blind oncoming traffic, but not so great for fast descending where you really need to be able to see far ahead. I also own an Edelux, which is significantly brighter, which I should have mounted before this ride and will definitely mount before the 600.)

I stopped briefly at the Airmont information control, wrote down the information on my brevet card, chatted briefly with a couple of people, and then started the climb up to Snicker's Gap. The climb was a lot easier than I remember from last year. Maybe my legs were more tired then from chasing the fast people, or maybe I felt slow because I was watching the fast people pull away from me. I made it to the top, climbed on the shoulder of Route 7 to the top of the hill (the shoulder is bumpy but perfectly safe for ascending at less than 10 mph), then moved to the white line for the extremely fast descent on Route 7. This is a scary descent not because it's technical (the road is dead straight and you can see forever), but because there's high-speed traffic on the road and not all of it wants to move to the left lane to pass you. My maximum speed was just over 40 mph and I got passed by another bike on the way down. Didn't even have time to see who, it was just "Uh-oh there's a car I didn't hear coming right next to me, no wait it's a bike, wow he goes downhill fast."

Still riding alone, I turned off Route 7 into West Virginia. I skipped the first store shown on the cue sheet, but my water was running low so I stopped at Charlie Brown's Store (which conveniently sells bongs and handguns so that area cyclists can tell more jokes about West Virginia) to get some Gatorade and use their porta-potty. A couple other cyclists caught me while I was in the store, but in my weird slow-flat fast-uphill mode I didn't think I could fit well into a group, so I just said hi and continued riding alone. The route contined toward Shenandoah Junction. We know it really was a train junction because you have to cross railroad tracks approximately every half-mile in that area, and most of them are diagonal and extra-bumpy, as if the people who built the railroads feared invasion by Dutch bicycle troops and wanted their tracks to also serve as defensive fortifications. (More foreshadowing.)

As part of a personal tradition of always riding more than the minimum number of miles on a brevet due to occasional inability to read a cue sheet, I turned left instead of right onto Flowing Springs Road and then couldn't find the expected turn onto Daniel Road because it wasn't there, it was the other way. Of course I had to ride another mile to make sure, before looking harder at the cue sheet and figuring out what I'd done wrong. Oh well, it was only 2.5 bonus miles, or a mere 1% of the total. And continually trying to get better at navigation rather than just giving up and using a GPS probably builds character.

After crossing a whole lot of railroad tracks without crashing, I made it to the Shepherdstown Sweet Shop, which has lots of really tasty desserts that you'd feel bad about eating if you weren't riding your bike 250 miles. And also sandwiches and drinks and bathrooms. They need to franchise this place and put Starbucks out of business. I had some delicious but messy cherry crumb cake thing, and a donut that had peanut butter in it, and also a greek wrap. Breakfast of champions. Hey, I didn't want to bonk.

I left Shepherdstown and went west, approximately following the Potomac River, but not actually close enough to the river for the route to be flat. Instead it kept on rolling. Downhill, cross creek, uphill, repeat. After 25 miles or so the course got on River Road. River and Creek are usually good words on cue sheets (unlike Mountain and Hill and Ridge and Eagle and Gap and Pass and Highway), but this particular River Road isn't as flat as most, because the railroad got there first and put their train tracks between River Road and the river. It was approaching noon and I saw some sun peeking between the clouds, so I stopped to put on some sunscreen. Apparently that was just the cue the clouds were waiting for, because it started raining a few minutes later, and rained for most of the rest of the day and night. Didn't really need that sunscreen.

Eventually River Road led to the bridge across the Potomac to Hancock, where Maryland is so narrow north-to-south that you can bike across the whole state in just a few minutes. (Even if you don't actually bicycle much and just read ride reports so you can laugh at insane people, if you live in the area you should head out to Hancock sometime and bike from the river to the Mason-Dixon line, so that later you can say you biked across Maryland and impress geographically uninformed people with your athletic prowess. You're welcome.) But before biking all the way across Maryland to Pennsylvania, I had to visit the C&O bike shop control. It's nice to have a control at a bike shop because if you have a mechanical problem they have some bike parts, and if you have a really serious mechanical problem they rent and sell entire bikes. And they also have porta-potties, and drinks, and a covered porch that procrastinating cyclists are allowed to loiter on while hoping the rain stops, and a limited supply of bike food. I bought a Clif Bar (I had some but wanted to try a different flavor) and some water and Gatorade, and drank until all the liquid that didn't fit in my bottles was gone.

The course continued down the Western Maryland Rail Trail for 5 miles, to dodge the Hancock traffic, then turned north into Pennsylvania cow country. Cows and rain and rollers, a winning combination. I slogged on until the Saunderosa Campground, where I got a delicious vanilla milkshake and refilled my water bottles. There were 7 other riders there, hiding from the rain, and I decided to leave with them and ride with the group to relieve the monotony.

There was a pretty big climb immediately after the campground, which featured a really stupid driver who tried an ill-advised pass on a blind curve, almost caused a head-on collision, then honked at us like it was our fault. How hard is it to wait until you can actually see whether you have room before passing? I know it's boring to be stuck behind a bicycle for 30 seconds, but it's a lot worse to be dead. Luckily the oncoming car was alert and stopped, so no carnage, just honking. The rest of the climb was slow and easy. The descent in the rain was fast and exciting. My rear brake wasn't very well-adjusted and brakes and tires and road were wet, so I went down even more slowly than usual to make sure I could stop, and got passed by a couple of guys. We regrouped at the bottom and continued through cow country together.

After about 20 more miles in the rain we reached Letterkenny, which featured a golf course whose pro shop has snack food and bathrooms. We stopped there and ate hamburgers, which were okay. While we were there Stan told me that the railroad tracks that were coming up were really nasty. (More foreshadowing.) So when we finally left I was third in line, and went over the first diagonal railroad tracks with my bike perfectly vertical but aimed left to cross the track perpendicular. And again with the second set. But then the third set of tracks were diagonal the other way (to confuse those invading bicycle troops) and I swung my bike around but I guess I didn't get it quite vertical, because I was on the ground. Luckily there weren't any cars right behind me to compound the damage. I was okay, just some road rash on my left arm and leg and a bruise on my hip. We checked out my bike, which was okay except that the chain had come off, which someone fixed for me while I made sure none of my bones were sticking out. Then we restarted. I've been warned about railroad tracks for years and have been crossing them carefully for years, but this was the first time I ever actually fell on one. Next time I come up to that kind of metal plate track setup in the rain, I'm unclipping both feet and going over at 5 mph.

After that excitement we'd lost a couple of riders off the front of our group, but they waited for us under a bank drive-through shelter a couple of miles up the road. We continued through lots of mild rollers and then through a bunch of disgusting slippery cow-byproduct-infested mud on Mud Level Road. Nobody slipped and fell in the mud but it was all over us anyway. Somewhere in this section we saw a cyclist up ahead. It was Paul, riding alone, and we merged him into our big group. We got to the control at Kane's in Newville just before dusk. Their fryer was broken but they made a good chicken cheesesteak. (I thought a real beef cheesesteak would be too greasy, especially after the golf course burger.)

While we were in Kane's the rain stopped. Fantastic! Unfortunately, a few minutes after we left, it started again. We went up Big Flat (the easy part but still a big climb). As it got darker I noticed my headlight was barely working. I figured the connector to the generator had come loose in my crash, but I didn't want to stop to fix it until someone else stopped. So I followed Joel's headlight until I saw Bill stop to fix something, then I stopped to fix my headlight (it was just a loose connector, probably knocked off in my crash on the railroad tracks) and rode with Bill up the rest of the hill and down the descent and then through the rollers of Michaux State Forest. Two lights are definitely better than one, especially when my one was my Inolight rather than my Edelux. We made it to the next turn and the group all waited to have a navigation discussion, since half our cue sheets were soaked and the rest were under fogged-up plastic. We came to a consensus and turned toward Gettysburg.

Just before Gettysburg Paul left our group. Not sure why, but whoever talked to him determined that it was okay for the rest of us to press on to the control. The remaining 8 of us stopped for a while at the 7-11 control. They had the air conditioning on so it was freezing inside, and then it was cold again for a while when we got moving again. But the remaining 40 miles was mostly flat to downhill and so not that hard even in the dark rain. Except that I couldn't read my cue sheet, so staying with the group was imperative. Luckily Bill had the route pretty much memorized. We took almost two hours to make it to Thurmont, stopped again at the non-control 7-11 there, then took a long time to make it to the end in Frederick. We arrived at 3:15 a.m. My utter disaster of a 400k last year took 22 hours; this one took 23:15. There was definitely a time penalty for riding with a big group because we rode at the speed of the slowest rider and took a long time at the controls and occasionally stopped to wait for each other. But there was a huge navigation and safety benefit to sticking together. Lots of lights.

When we got to the end my brevet card was soaked. I had it in a Ziploc baggie but some water got in there somehow. A volunteer dried it in the microwave, but the signature from one of the controls was illegible. Luckily I went through that control with a whole bunch of other riders so our RBA was able to verify with them that I did indeed stop there. Another benefit of riding with a group. But next time I'm double-bagging my brevet card. And bringing 3 cue sheets instead of my usual 2.

2010 05 24

DC Randonneurs Frederick 300k Ride Report

My favorite road bike was sometimes making a funny creaking noise that sounded like handlebars but wasn't (because it continued when riding no-hands). And it had a slow leak in the rear tire that I didn't feel like fixing. And my rear brake pads were pretty worn and I didn't have any replacements handy. So I decided to ride my touring bike, which I hadn't ridden since last August. Hey, it's got a triple, so the climbs would be easier. You probably already know where this is going…

The night before the ride I installed a new chain, and a cyclocomputer, and lights. This should have taken 30 minutes but it ended up taking longer. I packed everything in my car then went to bed, so I could wake up and drive to Frederick for the 5 a.m. start.

I woke up at 3:30 and somehow wasn't at full speed on 5 hours of sleep, and managed to get to the start at about 4:58. It took me a few minutes to get my bike ready, and then the big pack had already left. The volunteers at the start checked my lights and gave me a brevet card and a cue sheet, and I was off into the darkness about ten minutes behind almost everyone else. At the first turn I caught a guy (Chris, I think) on the lowest tadpole trike I'd ever seen. First time I've seen a trike on a brevet.

Since I still had delusions of catching the pack, I kept going without slowing to chat, checked my cue sheet and computer for the distance to the next turn — and noticed that my newly installed bike computer was set for kilometers rather than miles. Now, I've got nothing against kilometers. As a matter of fact, I'd be thrilled if the US would go 100% metric tomorrow to avoid the inefficiency of needing to constantly convert stuff between the US and the rest of the world, making our imports cheaper and our exports more competitive. But the cue sheet is in miles, and constantly multiplying and dividing by 1.6 in my head is not much fun. Worse, I knew that switching the computer to miles involved hitting some micro-button on the back a bunch of times in a sequence that I'd probably not guess without the manual, and would also end up resetting elapsed distance to zero. So I just left it in metric and navigated without really using the computer all day.

I kept riding into the pre-dawn darkness, and eventually met up with Hank from New York. He'd forgotten his water bottles and had to go back to the start. Neither of us were going really fast so we just rode and talked until we started catching the slower riders who were off the back of the main field. As we started the climb into Catoctin Mountain Park, Hank caught up with his friend Tom and slowed to his pace, and I went ahead.

The first climb of the day through Catoctin was not very steep, but it went on for a long time. And it started raining. Our route didn't actually go up Park Central Road (probably because it gets closed whenever the President is at Camp David or the Secret Service just feels like inconveniencing people) so we took the loop around. With the rain came some wind and dropping temperatures. I had arm warmers and a cycling cap but no tights or jacket or heavy jersey, because the forecast hadn't called for cold and I was momentarily too stupid to remember that weathermen are often wrong. So I was a bit chilly, but it wasn't too bad as long as I kept moving.

Eventually the climb ended and we had a secret control. When I'd plotted the route on Google Maps I'd noticed that the known controls allowed completely bypassing Catoctin Mountain Park and skipping a whole bunch of riding and climbing, so I'd figured there'd be one. George and Tyler were there and they had food. I didn't take any because I'd stopped to eat a banana and some Vanilla Bean Gu one corner before the control. I said hello, got my card stamped, and took off.

A bit later I caught and passed Dave from Potomac, riding his first brevet. And then my helmet light (a cheap Princeton Tec 4-LED AA-battery model that I use as a secondary light for reading cue sheets) fell off going down a hill. I reversed and picked it up (right in the middle of the lane) and it still worked. LEDs are a lot more durable than bulbs, but I still think I got lucky. That's why you always bring at least two headlights and two taillights. It was light by then so I put the helmet light away and just used the one on my handlebars for the rest of the early morning. I eventually caught up with Lowell and Cheryl on their tandem, riding with Cliff. I said hi and then passed them but then a downhill came and my poorly-adjusted cantilevers (oh yeah, now I remember why I never ride this bike on brevets) scared me so I descended even slower than usual and they descended faster and flew away from me. I caught them again at a store around the 30 mile point and we'd continue to pass each other all day.

Then there was a big climb which turned out to be Big Flat in Michaux State Forest. I climbed it last year on the 400, but I guess I'd suppressed the memory, because I forgot about the false summit. So I climbed a lot (and it was much easier with a triple and only 40 miles in my legs than with a compact double and 150 miles), and eventually reached the top and started tearing downhill, only to see the real summit up ahead. By this point the rain had stopped, but the wind had started to pick up. The wind wasn't so bad on the climb, and I got to the top feeling pretty good, but on the big descent the combination of badly-adjusted screeching cantilevers and occasional 30 mph crosswind gusts was a wee bit scary. I was happy to reach the bottom, even though it meant I had to pedal again.

The first control at mile 67 was a Uni-Mart convenience store in Shippensburg. It had a clean bathroom and food and drinks for sale so I give it an A. I ate a gigantic Rice Krispies Treat bar and a Macadamia Nut Clif Bar (my new favorite flavor) and probably some other stuff, and drank a big Gatorade (now that they have low-calorie G2 Gatorade, the "sports drink" for drinking while you watch sports on TV, you have to be careful to get the real stuff if you're trying to fuel up and avoid bonking) and filled my bottles with the rest. I saw a bunch of people who had been ahead of me at the control, but I didn't manage to get through fast enough so I ended up leaving alone. I got confused by the cue sheet leaving Shippensburg and ended up making a bit loop back to the Uni-Mart and trying again. And a young man in a Mustang decided to blow through a stop sign right in front of me and test my brakes. There's a reason not to ride through college towns.

I got back on course, and then suddenly my pedals refused to spin forward. I coasted to a stop off the side of the road and found my chain outside my rear derailleur. How the heck did that happen? There's a little tab that's supposed to keep it from slipping out but somehow it had. I jammed it back in there, but the chain starting skipping once per revolution, like I had a bad link. So I pulled over again and got out the chain tool and removed the problem link and replaced it with an extra SuperLink from my bag. Surprisingly, that didn't really fix the problem. The brand-new chain continued skipping for the rest of the ride. I decided it was good enough and that I'd rather ride than continue working on the bike, and I found that it didn't happen as much in the big ring, so I rode most of the ride in the big ring.

After zipping through Newville, the next control was at Young's Deli in Bloserville. No bathroom and slow service, so I give it a D, but they did have sandwiches. I ate one and took off again. A bit later the ride went down Creek Road, a beautiful low-traffic road that was actually right next to a creek, and more importantly with the wind at my back for a change. A 25-mile-per-hour tailwind is a wonderful thing. Unfortunately the road turned again and it was a crosswind or a headwind for most of the rest of the ride.

I stopped again at a Subway in Mount Holly Springs, because they had a bathroom. While I was there I got a footlong BMT and two cookies. This was probably the biggest meal I'd ever eaten on a brevet, and it did a great job keeping the bonk away. The time I spent at Subway let Hank and Dave catch me, and we rode together for a while. We eventually reached a decent-sized hill that I wanted to climb faster than they did, and I pulled away. We met again at the Rocco's Pizza control in East Berlin at mile 129.

Rocco's had okay pizza, but I only ate one slice since I'd just had a big sub. I hung out at Rocco's for a while, then left with Dave and Hank. Riding as a small paceline helped with the wind a bit, though it was often coming from the side and it's not always possible to ride echelons if there are cars about. Then we just kept riding as it slowly got darker and colder. It started to rain a bit, but not too bad. The wind never went away. We stopped twice more, once at a Getty in Bonneuville around mile 144, and once at a 7-11 in Thurmont around mile 168. I didn't get anything to eat at the last stop, and so I finally started wearing out as we rolled into the last control at the Motel 6 in Frederick. The ride took us 18 hours.

So I had a decent day legs-wise (not fast but never really in any trouble), a great day nutrition wise (eat before you're hungry, drink before you're thirsty, repeat), and a lousy day equipment wise. Riding a bike I hadn't written in months on a 300k brevet was dumb. So was not bringing enough warm clothing. So was not securing my headlight very well. So was arriving late and missing the big group, maybe. It may have been a blessing in disguise, by removing the temptation to waste energy chasing the fast people early. Anyway, the 400k is coming in a couple of weeks, and I'll be going back to my usual reliable bike (but with new rear brake pads), and I'll be sure to be prepared for colder-than-expected weather.

2010 05 15

DC Randonneurs Old Rag 200 km brevet ride report

I biked to work all winter, except for a couple of weeks when record snowfall made the W&OD Trail nearly impassable. But I hadn't done a ride longer than 35 miles since November. And I was still carrying way too much winter weight, which would make climbing hard. So I was a bit worried about yesterday's 200 km brevet.

I did this ride a couple of years ago, so I thought I knew what to expect. Mostly flat and fast early, from Warrenton down to Madison, then a big climb after the second control in Syria, then some rollers, then another big three-part climb, then more rollers, then a really nasty climb over Piney Mountain west of Warrenton right before the finish.

But this time the ride was in April not July, so there was cold to deal with in the morning, but fortunately less heat in the afternoon. Plus that extra April weight and lack of fitness.

So I decided to take it seriously and try to do everything right. I got to the start half an hour early. And I dressed for the 36F start temperature — thermal tights, wool socks, heavy jersey, balaclava, lobster claws — but wore shorts and a short-sleeved wool jersey underneath for the expected afternoon warmth. (The forecast high was 64.)

I started at the front of the group, but resolved not to work very hard to stay there. (There's no chance of me finishing the brevet first, but if I work at it I can stay near the front for the first half of the ride — and then die in the second half.) When the first serious descent happened and a dozen people passed me (I'm still a cautious descender), I let them go rather than chasing them down like I wanted to. And rode by myself for miles, between the first and second big groups. When the second group caught me, I let them go too. "Do not waste energy early," I boringly kept telling myself.

I stopped once to water some trees, and again to take off a layer of clothes, and made it to the first control at 55 miles. Yoder's Country Market is pretty much the perfect control. They have a wide variety of good, cheap food. And picnic tables, some in the sun and some in the shade. And a clean bathroom. And free water. What more could you want?

I ate lunch pretty quickly and left by myself. "Don't waste time in the controls," the boring guy on my shoulder told me. By that time the temperature was near 60 and I was riding in short sleeves, lightweight full-finger gloves, and still had the tights on.

I proceded through Madison, still riding alone. Got to the 71-mile control at Syria Mercantile (Note: the Virginia town of Syria is not pronounced like the country Syria. The first syllable has a long I sound, and you have to say it with a pronounced Virginia hill country accent. sigh-REE-uh.) Not nearly as nice a control, but I bought a Gatorade, and filled up my bottles from a half-full gallon jug that a faster rider had left for slower riders. (Thanks fast rider!) I also took off my tights and switched to fingerless gloves and cotton socks and put on some sunscreen. And crammed all those winter clothes into my Carradice bag.

There's a climb after the Syria control that I remembered as being nasty, but this time it wasn't so bad. It was steep for a bit, but it wasn't that long. There were some rollers afterward. At this point lunch finally kicked in, and my legs came back, so I started climbing faster and passed a rider ahead. I remember thinking that everything was going so well that I wouldn't have anything to put in my ride report.

Then I turned onto Round Hill Road, and remembered the three nasty hills. And felt something hit me in the small of the back. I pulled off the road to check, and noticed my bag was open and the flap had bounced up to let me know. Whoops. I closed it and continued, hoping I hadn't lost anything. (I didn't actually bother taking inventory, because I wasn't going back regardless. It was 8 miles since the last control, and I didn't feel strong enough to add up to 16 hilly bonus miles to my ride.)

I climbed the three nasty hills without needed to stop to catch my breath (the last time I rode this route I needed to stop, but it was July and hotter). And continued over a bunch more rollers and then a fast section of US 522 until I reached the 95 mile control, the Laurel Mills Store. The guy who works at this store is very nice, but I still don't like this control because it lacks a public bathroom. Also, the Klondike bar I bought there was frozen solid, a serious dental hazard. So I had to hang around for a while while it thawed, answering questions from a kid riding his bike around the parking lot while wearing a cowboy hat.

While I was waiting, a rider showed up and asked me if I'd dropped anything. Whoops. He had my arm warmers and my gloves. Another rider who arrived a couple minutes later had my balaclava and one of my wool socks. They said a motorist had seen my reflective vest, but they couldn't find it. Or, predictably, the other sock. (Everyone loses one sock, even in their own dryer at home.) So the good news is that the total punishment for forgetting to close my bag was one lost sock and one lost vest. And it was a $15 Nashbar vest that I didn't like much anyway because the shoulders tended to ride up and block my peripheral vision. Thanks again to the riders who recovered my dropped stuff, and anyone else who helped look for it. Sorry if my absent-mindedness made your ride slower.

Embarrassed at my silly mistake, I left the control slowly. Whatever energy had gone into my legs after lunch was fading again. I just trudged through Flint Hill and into the control at mile 114. I wasn't feeling horrible, but I wasn't going fast. Probably a touch of bonk. The Orlean Store is very nice — clean bathroom, nice selection of food and drink, even a real restaurant adjacent. I bought some water and some iced tea (I was getting hot in my wool jersey, even though tempertures were still in the 60s) and then left pretty quickly to do the nasty last ten miles.

Right after Orlean the cue sheet had two turns back to back, one after 0.1 miles and the next after 0.2. I made the first but then zoned out and didn't check the cue sheet until I'd gone by the second, for my only bonus miles of the day. I kept going about half a mile before I realized my mistake, so it was more like one bonus mile. No big deal, but another sign that I was a bit cooked. I had two full bottles for only ten miles of riding, so I resolved to drink more than I wanted, just in case dehydration was affecting my legs or my brain. (In hindsight, I don't think so. I think I was properly hydrated but slightly bonked, just not quite enough food. I had some Gu and some Jelly Belly Sport Beans but didn't eat them for whatever reason.) Soon enough, the climb up Piney Mountain began. But it didn't seem as bad as last time I did this ride. While I didn't have any speed (I was climbing at 5-6 mph), I didn't have to stop either. When I reached the summit I was very happy. Until the next hills, which I'd forgotten about. They're just rollers, but when you think you're coasting into the barn, any hill is a bad hill.

I rolled into the final control in Warrenton in 10 hours 12 minutes. Last time I did this ride it took 8:59. So my spring unfitness cost me over an hour. But I finished and didn't hurt myself and had fun (other than being annoyed at my slowness and at forgetting to close my bag), so it was a good ride. I'm a bit nervous about the upcoming 300k, though.

2010 04 11

W&OD Trail Conditions redux

They plowed the W&OD Trail! Woo-hoo! It's now rideable with a road bike, without studded tires, at least until the next time it snows. Great job by the park maintenance crews, and thanks to whoever made the decision to finally do this.

And all the fallen trees I saw on Wednesday were gone by Thursday. (Well, not quite gone — you can see what's left of them on the sides of the trail — but they're not blocking the trail.)

Be careful out there, though — there will be black ice in the mornings as the melted snow from the sides of the trail refreezes, and there are still some large low-hanging branches.

2010 02 26

W&OD Trail Conditions

If you somehow haven't heard, the Washington DC area got about 30 inches of snow in early February. Too much to bike through. They plowed the big roads, and then the small roads, and then most of the very small roads. But not the bike paths.

My commute is from Ashburn to Herndon, Virginia. Exurb to outer suburb. It' s about a mile of nice calm local roads and nine miles of W&OD Trail, each way. Usually takes me about 35 minutes when there's no snow. Less with a tailwind or if I'm really trying hard, more with a headwind or if I'm sick or on the mountain bike.

Today, I tried it for the first time since the big snow. I didn't know what the trail would be like. I have alternate safe road routes for about 90% of my commute, so if it was really bad I could take roads for most of the way and just walk the bike down the W&OD for the mile between Loudoun County Parkway and Route 28, where there are no bike-safe roads. (There are two stream crossings there, and no bike-friendly roads bridge them. Only the W&OD and big high-speed highways like 7, 267, 606, and Waxpool. 267 is a limited access toll road and actually illegal to bike on; the others are unsafe to bike on in my opinion, at least during rush hour with their shoulders unrideable due to piled snow. So if anyone from VDOT or NVRPA reads this, if you can only afford to plow one mile of the W&OD, it should be that mile.)

Anyway, I took local roads to Wild Meadow, which has a small paved side trail leading to the W&OD. That side trail was covered with several inches of uneven refreeze, so I walked the bike over it. But the W&OD in Ashburn was actually plowed! Awesome. It was only about 5′ wide, but that was more than enough.

Around the Ashburn Village Road underpass, the trail went from perfectly plowed to doubletrack. There were two slushy pickup-truck tire tracks, and then a bunch of footprints. And a mix of snow, slush, ice, crust, black ice, and occasional bare pavement. This is rideable with skill and studded tires. I don't have much icebiking skill (it's like mountain biking, with fewer trees to hit but much worse traction), so I had to put a foot down in places, but it wasn't bad.

After crossing Smith's Switch Road, the tree-lined section of trail was plowed, with evidence of much recent tree work. Looks like some trees fell and blocked the trail there, but the work crews already got out there and cleared them away, and also got rid of some snow while they were at it. So I stayed on the trail rather than detouring through the adjacent commercial area's parking lots and roads.

The stretch between Loudoun County Parkway and Route 28 was double-track with lots of melted snow, slush, etc. again. Rideable with studded tires, but not easy. I was getting hot at this point (it was about 40 degrees, and the mix of low-speed cycling and scootering and pushing the bike that I was doing is hot work and does not provide the cooling headwind of normal cycling) and removed my balaclava.

Once I crossed 28 I could have taken my road detour (Ruritan, Church, W Holly, E Holly, S Lincoln, Crestview, Herndon, Ferndale, Vine, Spring), but I wanted to see how the trail was. Bad idea. Just west of Sterling Road, the trail was blocked by several stopped work crew vehicles. I pushed the bike around and saw that the crew was removing 3 or 4 large fallen trees. I should have turned around at this point, but pressed on, walking the bike. Once I got past where they were working, the double-track went away, showing that no vehicles had gone through. So the snow in this part of the trail was mostly 4-6″ deep refreeze, with footprints and a few refrozen mountain bike tracks but no vehicle tracks. So I had to mostly walk rather than ride.

I should have turned onto Sterling Road, but I didn't. Just on the east side of Sterling Road was another large fallen tree that the work crews hadn't reached yet. I pushed my bike around it. The next chance to get off the trail (without turning around, which would have been admitting defeat) was at the Oak Grove Baptist Church. I didn't know where the road there went, but I took it anyway, hoping it hooked up to Crestview. Nope, it connected to 606, which was crawling with bumper-to-bumper traffic. I could have ridden in that mess (it's no fun, but the cars are moving slowly enough that it's not that dangerous), but instead I turned around and rode back to the trail. Then I pushed the bike up to the trail until I reached the largest fallen tree yet, which was big enough that it completely blocked the trail. I had to climb the snowy embankment on one side to get around it, which would have been slightly annoying even without a bike to push.

That was the last fallen tree until I reached Crestview. By that point I was hot, tired, and late for work, so I took roads the rest of the way in. The roads were fine.

Temperatures have been in the 40s lately, so it's all melting. The parts that are kind of slushy and icy should be clear by the end of the week, if it doesn't snow again. And the work crews are working on the fallen trees, though I'm not sure how long it'll take them to remove them all. I recommend taking roads instead of the W&OD through Sterling, at least for a few more days.

2010 02 24

DC Randonneurs Flatbread 200k Ride Report

When the Flatbread 200k was announced, I thought it sounded like fun. A brevet with no hills? Like Florida, without as many dangerous ancient drivers? Sign me up. I'll choose between just setting a personal best time, or riding it on my junker fixed gear, or just goofing off.

Then it rained last week. Hard. The weather forecasters kept guessing that the rain would stop soon, and they kept being wrong.

So I got up at 4:30 a.m. Saturday morning to head for the ride, expecting only a dozen or so of the most hardcore randonneurs to be there. (It's not nice to call people insane, so we have polite codenames for it, like "R-12.") It rained most of the way to the start.

But then, as the sun came up, the rain stopped. And when I got to the start, I saw about 40 people there, way more than expected for a November brevet with iffy weather. It appears a lot of people like flat rides, and nobody was afraid of the weather. Also, this ride was closer to Baltimore and Philly and New Jersey than most of our rides, so a bunch of people from the northeastern branch of DC Randonneurs showed up. (It was a two-hour drive for me, since I live in the western exurbs of Northern Virginia, but that's the price you pay if you want to ride in the flatlands.)

Another concern was flooding. The downside of doing a flat ride at low elevation right after a week of rain is that half the route might be underwater. But ride organizer Chip re-scouted the route at the last minute and rerouted around the washed-out areas. So now there are two cue sheets for this ride, Low Water and High Water. Thanks Chip for going above and beyond.

I was on my junker fixie with 52×20 gearing. I'd just put a new chain on the night before, and the chain had about a tenth of a mile of testing on it. So I was a bit concerned about whether the chain tension was correct. (It was; no mechanical problems all day.)

The weather was low 50s with a bit of mist in the air and a lot of puddles on the roads, so I chose my Lake winter boots over my summer mountain bike shoes. I went with cotton socks, wool socks, tights, short-sleeved jersey, long-sleeved jersey, light windbreaker, and full-fingered gloves. I had a balaclava, arm warmers and lobster gloves in the rack trunk. This was almost correct. My feet got a bit hot near the end, but I think that if I'd gone with summer shoes they would have been really cold and wet. So maybe I should have gone with just the wool socks without the cotton socks underneath. And I got hot with three layers on top near the beginning and should have started without the jacket. Finally, my hands got cold near the end, but not cold enough to justify stopping to change gloves.

At the start in Centreville MD I was near the front of the pack. Unfortunately the usual hammerfest ensued and I wasn't in the mood to spin 120 RPM, so a couple dozen people passed me, and I was on the back of the front group, going 20 mph. I fought for a while to hang on, then realized I didn't need to spend all that energy, and slowed down to 18. (My newbie dumbassitude may be slowly receding.) In theory, 20 with a draft is probably easier than 18 without a draft. In practice, drafting really closely on a wet road means you get a bunch of road spray in your face. Also, on a fixie, the faster you go the faster you have to spin, and being outside your cadence comfort zone isn't fun.

There was an info control at a wooden bridge around the 8-mile point, where I stopped to write down the bridge's load limit and also pack away my jacket. Then I realized that there were still a bunch more riders behind me, as they blew past failing to stop for the control. I yelled out "control" and some of them turned around and came back to the bridge. I hope nobody got disqualified 8 miles in for not listening to the pre-ride speech or reading their cue sheet.

Just after the first control someone told me my bag was tipping over. I guess the extra weight of a damp jacket on top was too much for the Velcro straps on my $15 Nashbar rack trunk. (I have a fancy Carradice on my usual brevet bike, but it just wouldn't match the junker fixie.) I recentered it and continued. It was lopsided all day but didn't fall off. At some point I realized that, despite hardly drinking anything due to the cold and wet, I wouldn't be able to make it to the bathroom at the first control. The woods and cornfields are less common in the Eastern Shore than further inland, but I eventually found a suitable (except for the thorns) stretch of woods and watered a tree. Then reminded myself to drink because you can dehydrate even in the winter.

I ended up in a small group with Chip (the other one) and George and a tandem and a couple of other single bikes. (Having so many new-to-me riders on one brevet really stretched my name-recollection ability; sorry.) We stopped at a non-control store in Greensboro at the 28-mile point. Normally I'd just press on, but the constant motion required by the fixie was already getting to me a bit, and it felt like a good idea to rest off the bike for a few minutes. I ate a Clif Bar.

The route went through Greensboro MD, then turned into Delaware. The second control was at the Dolce Bakery in Milford. The staff were extremely friendly. I hadn't eaten much and figured my blah performance might reflect a bit of bonk, so I got a breakfast cookie, a chocolate chip cookie, and a ham and cheese croissant. I was slightly confused when the total came to exactly $4.95, then remembered that there's no sales tax in Delaware. That really simplifies small retail cash purchases, since most will come up just short of an even number of dollars, rather than a bit over. All the food was delicious. While eating my carb-feast outside, an older gentleman walked up and started telling me that he couldn't ride a bike. That every time he'd tried, he'd crashed and bled, until he'd stopped trying. Ouch.

Continuing through Delaware alone, I got my first bonus miles of the day. The (revised-at-the-last-minute-in-the-dark) cue sheet said "BR Cabbage Pond Rd". Unfortunately the turn onto Cabbage Pond was unmarked, but the cue sheet was missing the usual "UM." Also, in my opinion it was a full right turn, not a bear right. That said, I kind of thought that was the turn, so I only went a bit farther to confirm, and saw Paul coming back the other way. So it wasn't that much extra riding. There were a lot more unmarked turns than usual on this ride; maybe Delaware doesn't spend as much on signs as other places, since the road grid in such a flat area is more like the simple grids you see out West, less like the random mess we get in most of the mid-Atlantic. (Heck, maybe in the future when GPS is everywhere, localities will stop bothering with road signs. Just like most phone booths have gone away.)

The next control was at the Iguana Grill in Milton. The place was empty except for about a dozen cyclists; it's probably more of a night spot. I think there were only two people working there so the food delivery was a bit slow, but the service was friendly and the burger and fries I had were okay, and I needed the break, so no problem. Got to chat with a few more cyclists from the far northeastern branch of DC Randonneurs.

The big group leaving Iguana Grill was dawdling, so I decided not to wait any longer, figuring they'd catch me soon enough. They did. And most of them eventually dropped me, but then I caught up again at the next control at 85 miles in Bridgeville. Where I grabbed a big Gatorade, didn't wait in the long line for the bathroom, and left early again, trying to make up for my slow riding speed with fast control speed. This time Chip followed me and caught me right away, and we rode together for a while, with me navigating. (For the first brevet ever, I made no navigation errors on this ride, other than the minor bobble I already described, which I'm not counting because the cue sheet was confusing and I was just double-checking both options, not actually lost.) Then we heard the big group coming up behind us, led by Chuck and Crista on the fast tandem. We were absorbed into the group, but the 18 mph pace was too fast for me on my fixie while digesting a meal, so after a couple of miles I dropped off the back and resumed riding solo. So yet another ride where I failed to finish with the C&C group, which I consider to be "par" for brevet speed. (They're consistently fast, but not crazy win-the-brevet fast.) Though I think that if I'd been on my usual brevet bike, I would have stuck to the group. (Normally I fall off the back on either a big climb or a big descent, but there were none of either.)

The route turned back toward Maryland. There was another confusing cue in Denton where we were supposed to skip the marked turn onto Gay St., then later take an unmarked turn onto Gay St. (I wonder if someone stole the second sign, and it's hanging in a fraternity house somewhere?) The unmarked turn looked like a big highway because it featured a big high bridge over a small river. (Possibly the biggest climb on this ride, maybe 30′ vertical. I stood up to climb it.) But there was a "No Outlet" sign if you went straight there, so I figured that was the correct turn. And it was. A couple of miles later I saw a rider going the wrong way, who stopped when he saw me coming. It was Mike, who'd had the same questions I had about the previous turn and was doubling back to check. I was pretty confident that I was on the right track and that our next turn was 0.7 miles ahead, and I guess I convinced him that I knew what I was doing, so we rode together for the rest of the way. (And I was right once again. I am going to get so seriously lost of the next brevet to make up for this one ride's worth of good navigation.) Mike's done a bunch of brevets in the past but not much lately, since he'd been training for an Ironman. So I got to grill him about swimming and wetsuits and getting kicked in the head underwater and whatnot for the last 20 miles of the ride, to distract both of us from how much our legs were hurting. (Me because of the unfamiliarity of spinning at a constant rate for so many miles, him from not having done many long bike rides lately while he worked on his swimming.)

We made it to the end before dark, and there was pizza and beer. So I think despite the horrible weather preceding the ride and the last-minute rerouting, this was a very successful brevet. Turnout was impressive for a November ride, and it drew people from far away. Kudos to Chip for organizing it so well.

So why did I do this one on a fixed gear? Well, I'm no super-hardcore fixie rider who can climb mountains on one, so this was just about my only chance to do a brevet on one. I'd never ridden my junker fixie more than 40 miles before (and that was just an easy out-and-back on the W&OD Trail), so I wanted to see if I could do it, and if it was as easy as on a multispeed bike with a freewheel. Looks like the answers are yes and no. The ability to coast once in a while, or vary your cadence without varying your speed, are helpful for maintaining comfort and controlling fatigue on a long ride. Even if there are no hills where you really need an easier gear. Of course there are superstar riders who can do 1200 km rides on a fixed gear, but I don't think your average PBP finisher could just hop on a fixie and repeat the performance, without a lot of fixie-specific distance training first.

Beyond the self-inflicted handicap of riding a weird bike, everything went perfectly for me on this ride. I had the right clothes, ate and drank enough that I didn't seriously dehydrate or bonk, didn't eat or drink anything that disagreed with me to the point of illness (despite recklessly continuing to eat whatever looked good rather than sticking to a few known-safe foods), didn't get lost, didn't get chased by any mean dogs (there was one dog but he just wanted to play, and actually stopped when I yelled "Stay."), didn't get buzzed by any bad drivers, didn't have any mechanical problems, and finished before dark. My legs are more sore today than they usually are after 200km, but nowhere near as bad as they were after the 400k in May. I have a bit of pain in the outside of my left knee, but not enough to keep me from riding to work tomorrow. Sorry this ride report is so boring; I'm sure I'll do something entertainingly dumb next time.

2009 11 15

Chain gang cleaning up the W&OD

For the second time this week, this morning there was a group of prisoners clearing brush on the W&OD Trail in Sterling. They were wearing what looked like pajamas with green-and-white horizontal stripes, like in old movies. (Okay, they're usually black-and-white in old movies, but then so is everything else.) The work crew appeared to be well-behaved and well-supervised, at least while I was there.

I wonder if this is an attempt to teach prisoners a useful skill, or an attempt to save money on park maintenance?

2009 10 08

DC Randonneurs Civil War Tour 200km Brevet Ride Report

I tried signing up for the Baltimore Bike Club's Civil War Century last year, but it was full. I thought of trying again this year, but then DC Randonneurs announced this 200k brevet, with the same theme (ride around Antietam and Gettysburg battlefields and the nice rural Maryland and southern PA roads between them) but 30 more miles of riding, a much smaller crowd, and a lower price. (At the usual cost of no SAG wagon, no T-shirt, convenience stores instead of staffed rest stops, and more paperwork.)

On my last couple of brevets, I went too fast too early and had food and drink issues. So my goal for this one was to pace myself early, eat and drink the right amount of the right stuff at the right time, and finish in a reasonable time feeling okay.

I went through my brevet checklist the night before and remembered to pack most of the stuff on it. (Somehow I forgot my spare tire but didn't need it.) Highs were predicted to be in the 70s, so there was no need for a CamelBak. (Lots of riders had one anyway, but I prefer bottles.) I also drove my car for an errand the night before, since I hadn't driven it in two weeks and wanted to make sure it would start.

I woke up at 5 a.m., ate a very small bowl of cereal for breakfast (eating too much before the ride in an attempt to ward off bonk may have contributed to stomach trouble on previous brevets), and left the house by 6. The drive up Route 15 to Frederick at 6 a.m. was uneventful, with little traffic. I didn't get lost, arrived 15 minutes early for the start of the ride, and was preregistered so I just needed to sign the waiver and the emergency contact sheet and grab a map and a backup cue sheet. I didn't end up needing the map, but I appreciated the overview it gave of the route, and it may have been useful if I got seriously lost like on the 400k.

About 35 riders left together at 7 a.m. There was an information control right off Urbana Pike, only three tenths of a mile from the start. I guess that was the "make sure you didn't forget your pen because you'll need it later" control. There was a monument there saying that this is where the Lee wrote the order to split his forces so that he could both invade Maryland and capture Harpers Ferry simultaneously. Some Confederate officer (it's not conclusively proven who, though many historians and Civil War buffs have a prime suspect) lost the order (which was not encrypted), some Union troops found it and were smart enough to read it and figure out that it might be important and pass it up the chain of command, and then even McClellan was able to figure out that he should attack half of Lee's army while the other half was away. Which led to the Battle of Antietam / Sharpsburg.

So after we all wrote down the answer we remounted and proceeded west as the usual large early-brevet group. A small group of fast riders split off the front and I managed to stick with the plan and avoid chasing them. By the time we reached Mar-Lu ridge, the steepest climb of the ride (yay for having the steepest climb near the beginning) I was with about 20 riders. Of course the climb fractured the group. I'm not a good climber by randonneur standards, and I didn't have my climbing legs that day, and I was supposed to be taking it easy early. So I went over it nice and slow (7 mph) near the back of the group. I was pleased to note that my bike stayed in my lowest gear rather than popping out of it like it had last time; my cable adjustment had worked. Shifting back up to the big ring at the summit took a couple of tries, but I didn't throw the chain off to the outside, then or later in the ride, so the front derailleur high limit adjustment worked too.

On the big fast descent down Mar-Lu the last couple of riders in the group passed me (yep, I'm still a wimpy descender), so I got to ride alone for a while. I eventually realized that I hadn't eaten anything yet so I ate a Clif Bar. Approaching Burkittsville I remembered that the descent down Townsend Road is shady and bumpy, so I put my sunglasses away during the climb so I'd be able to see the bumps. I caught a couple of the riders who had passed me on the descent. Once again we rode down Burnside Bridge Road and once again I failed to actually see the bridge, but I wasn't looking very hard.

The first control was in Sharpsburg, and there were a bunch of riders still there when I arrived, so I hadn't been too far off the back of the second big group. I controlled as quickly as possible so that I could leave with people who'd arrived ahead of me. I bought a 32-oz. Gatorade, drank some of it, ate a Gu packet (Chocolate Outrage, which isn't as yummy as the Vanilla Bean, which is why I had some of it left) and refilled my water bottle with the rest of the Gatorade. Then I left following Chuck and Crista and Mark, with a whole bunch of others a bit ahead or a bit behind.

We entered Antietam Battlefield Park and immediately hit another info control. This one was more challenging because there were a whole bunch of statues and plaques and signs in the immediate vicinity so we had to find the right one. Luckily we had a bunch of riders so it only took a couple of minutes to divide and conquer. Mark found the right sign and we all wrote down the answer and took off down the pretty battlefield roads. I found myself at the front of our little group and decided to do my fair share of navigating for the day, while it was flat and I still had energy. Before we even left the battlefield, there was a secret control, Bill and Keith with a DC Randonneurs sign off to the side of the road. Because I'd been leading I made it through this bottleneck first, and I kept going rather than waiting for the rest. So I got to ride my usual too-fast early pace for a while, even though my goal was to avoid that.

I was soon out of the battlefield and onto MD 34 for a long stretch. Somewhere along there I got caught by Chuck and Crista and Mark and Bennett, so I clearly hadn't been going too ridiculously fast on my little solo escapade. We all rode together for a while, then Mark fell off the back. He hadn't said anything about a problem so I figured he was just wanted a slightly slower pace and we'd see him again later. Eventually we reached Raven Rock Drive, for a 5.8 mile gradual climb on a nice, wide, smooth shoulder. Thank you Maryland for putting these wonderful shoulders on some of your highways.

We weren't going all that fast, but long hills tend to separate groups. Bennett went off the front and then I went off the back and then I re-passed Chuck and Crista when they stopped for a nature break, and then they passed me back when I took my turn to water the local trees. And then all the randonneurs were out of sight but I caught a local rider and talked to him for a bit. It's against brevet rules to draft off someone who's not in the ride, but the shoulder was wide enough to ride two abreast, which I figured was okay. Anyway, the guy said he'd had a heart attack two years before and now rode 30 miles per day to keep his heart healthy. And we were having this conversation on a 5.8-mile climb, and he was keeping up with my pace despite being at least a couple of decades older and having the aforementioned heart history (though he did have the advantages of being skinnier than me and on a nicer lighter bike with less baggage), so I've got another guy to add to the people I want to be like when I grow up list.

Somewhere near the Pennsylvania border, I started slowing down due to creeping fatigue, and Mark caught me from behind. I sped up a bit to match his pace, figuring it would be good to have the navigational aid through Gettysburg Battlefield, which features road signs that tend to be pretty rather than usefully placed. (For example, they don't necessarily put them at intersections.) As we entered the park we got caught up in battlefield tourist traffic, lots of people driving really slowly and trying to see the sights without getting out of their cars. Scary. It's weird for me to be on a bike, being held up by cars. (I guess it's common in city traffic but I mostly ride in the suburbs.) It's unfortunately not at all unusual to be on a bike, being endangered by cars who are paying attention to something other than the fact that they are driving two-ton machines that can easily kill people. But here they were doing their stupid dance in slow motion.

While dodging the Sunday drivers on Saturday, we were brought to a stop by a fake World War 2 MPs leading a convoy of WW2-style vehicles. No tanks, unfortunately, just old motorcycles and old Jeeps, all painted olive drab, with drivers and passengers in WW2 US Army fatigues. One of the jeeps had a machine gun, probably fake or inoperable. We're used to seeing reenactors in Gettysburg, but these guys had the wrong war by 80 years. After we escaped from the parade and finished telling all the obvious jokes, we missed the next turn. Luckily Mark figured it out pretty quickly so we only got about a quarter of a bonus mile, and then rode out of the park and into the city for the second real control at a 7-11.

I'd been fading so I decided I needed some real food. Since it was a 7-11 my choices were somewhat limited, but I got a decent-sized Jalapeno turkey wrap (I eat hot food all the time so I didn't think mere Jalapenos would be a problem), some Doritos (because they were free with the wrap, and I needed calories and salt couldn't hurt), a bottle of chocolate milk, and a big jug of water. It took a while to wolf all that down and rest the legs a bit, and then we were off to re-enter the battlefield and be endangered by more tourists. (We heard later that Tyler got hit by one of these menaces. Sounds like it was a low-speed incident and he's okay, but he couldn't finish the ride.) There was of course another information control on the battlefield. The question was amusing: what's the fine for defacing this statue? George caught up with Mark and me around that control, and the three of us continued together out of the park and back toward Maryland.

We must not have been going that fast, because we got caught from behind first by Roger, and then by a couple of other guys. Maybe they were riding fast and controlling slow. Anyway, adding more riders picked up the pace of the group, and eventually I started falling off the back and fighting to catch back up, and then decided to stop fighting and let the group go. I was tired enough that I was coasting on all the downhills and easing up the climbs, and I was spending most of my time riding on the tops rather than the hoods or the drops for comfort, but my head was clear so I figured it was just fatigue, not dehydration or bonk. So I ate a bit more and drank a bit more just to be sure, and made an extra stop for more Gatorade at 110 miles just to be extra sure I wouldn't run dry before the end, and finished 20 minutes behind Mark and 25 behind George. That's a lot of time to lose in just the last 30 miles, but when you're out of gas you're out of gas. And 9h38m was actually my second-fastest finish for a 200k, so I don't think I did that badly.

All in all, it was a good ride. There were a lot of information controls, which we all joked about, but they needed to be there to avoid shortcuts, and with the exception of the one in an overly sign-infested part of Antietam, they were quick on-offs.

My only real complaint was the amount of traffic in Gettysburg Battlefield, and moreover how incredibly clueless and distracted most of the drivers were. Seriously, it was like a gigantic mall or church or elementary school parking lot that went on for miles. I really think they should close the roads within the park to private vehicle traffic, since most of the drivers seem focused on sightseeing not driving, and a two-ton vehicle with an inattentive driver is deadly. Let them walk or ride bikes or Segways or ride in tour buses driven by someone who's already seen the sights. Anyway, I'm not enthusiastic about riding there again on a nice summer weekend. (I hear it's much less crowded on weekdays or away from tourist season.)

Other random stuff:

I saw 5 dead snakes on this ride. Coincidence, or do a lot of snakes die at the end of the summer? (On a semi-related note, I ran over a live snake on the W&OD trail today on the way to work. Saw it right before I hit it, but had no time to swerve. Third time that's happened to me. I hope it's okay.)

In addition to the ubiquitous split-rail fences, I saw one unmortared stone fence in Gettysburg, like the ones you see in upscale Virginia horse country. I had always assumed that such fences were too labor-intensive to economically build without slave labor, but Pennsylvania was a free state, so maybe not. Or maybe it wasn't economically sound but rather a form of conspicuous consumption, the 18th-century equivalent of a Ferrari or a private jet?

2009 09 21