Seagull Century

We headed out to Salisbury, Maryland for our last cycling event of the year, the Seagull Century.  The ride winds 100 miles through eastern Maryland with a stop at Assateague Island.  It is a pretty big event, drawing around 3,000 riders for all three routes, but after RAGBRAI, it didn't seem nearly as crowded.  We arrived in Salisbury on Friday night to pick up our t-shirts and stayed in a nice little cabin in Pocomoke River State Park a few miles south of Salisbury.  The cabin was really basic:  just a few beds and a table, but it held three of us comfortably.  It was nice to sleep in a bed the night before the ride and not to have to take down a tent in the morning.

The ride started off a little rough for me because something I ate at dinner the night before disagreed with me, leaving my stomach a little jumpy for the first leg.  It passed, though, and the weather was beautiful, if a little windy.  For the first and second legs of the ride, we had it mostly to our backs.  We made it to the second stop in good time, took a short break, and continued to Assateague Island.  That is when things started to get tough.  The wind had picked up, so crossing the bridge to Assateague Island was an adventure in holding the bike steady in a very stiff crosswind.  My legs started cramping shortly before the second rest stop.  By the time we reached the rest stop on Assateague, they were screaming.  We took a long, pleasant break on the beach and I drank water and ate bananas to try to calm my muscles down. The last 35 miles of the ride were pretty much straight into the wind and my leg cramps never did settle down.  I finished the ride, but it was a slow, painful struggle.  This was the first time I've ever had problems with leg cramps and hopefully, it is the last.

This morning, I woke up and my legs felt better, which was good as we had another 43 miles ride planned with a crab feast at the mid-point.  I drank a lot of water last night, hoping to correct whatever hydration problem I had the day before and it seemed to work.  Today's ride was much better.  We had headwind all the way to the restaurant, but it wasn't horrible.  On the way back, it was mostly tailwind, so the ride flew by.

Pictures (click to enlarge):

Sunrise on the Pocomoke River.

The bikes at the third rest stop.

Assateague Island.

Two of the Assateague Ponies.

Toes in the sand.

Cyclists crossing the bridge leaving Assateague Island.

A pile of crabs on our table.

Garret County Gran Fondo: The Savage Century

A friend sent me the link to the Garret County Gran Fondo several months back.  A Gran Fondo is basically like other supported charity cycling events.  This one had four options for length of ride and our friend called thinking the metric century (100 km) sounded like fun.  I talked us into doing the full century, which was named the Savage Century.  It was listed as 102.5 miles and 12,700 feet of climbing (SSW Spouse insists that he was deceived, having assumed it was just titled after someone named Savage).  I'm not sure what possessed me to think that was a good idea, but we went ahead and started training, spending a lot of time climbing hills on Skyline Drive in Shenandoah National Park. 

The forecast was pretty good:  cool and cloudy in the morning, followed by sun and a high in the 60s in the afternoon.  When we arrived in the parking lot, it wasn't cool, it was downright cold (probably in the low 50s) and windy, especially when we are used to the heat and humidity of the DC area.  I bought arm warmers and threw in my tights and long-fingered gloves at the last minute.  I was glad I did.  I didn't want to spend energy being cold that I would need later in the ride.

We started at 7:30 a.m., pretty much assuming that it would take all day.  The only requirement was that we finished by sunset at 8:45.  The first leg had a few climbs, one of them fairly steep, but was mostly downhill.  The route wound through beautiful wooded valleys and pastureland on the hilltops.  It rained for a little while, but stopped by the time we reached the first checkpoint.  By that point, I had warmed up enough to drop off my tights and long-fingered gloves.  I kept my arm warmers just in case, which turned out to be a good decision.

The next leg was fairly brutal.  Our friend dropped us within the first few miles.  We wouldn't see him again until the next checkpoint.  This leg had 3,700 feet of climbing and basically regained all of the elevation that was lost on the first.  The first leg had taken us about 90 minutes.  The second took us almost 2 1/2 hours for 21.3 miles and we weren't the slowest riders on the course. The second checkpoint was at the top of a hill at a stockyards.  It was cold.  Our friend had waited for us, so he was freezing.  We grabbed some food and continued.

The first few miles of the third leg were a nice downhill, which brutally ended in a two-mile long steep hill.  Watching other riders, I decided to try zigzagging back and forth across the road.  It helped, even thought it looked ridiculous.  At mile 48, we had a decision to make.  We were all cold and tired and we reached the turnoff for the metric century.  It was very tempting to finish in just 14 more miles, instead of 54.  Most other riders were only doing the metric, which only made us think harder about bailing.  After much debate and looking at the elevation profiles, we finally decided to continue with the century.  We were rewarded with easy riding for a few miles followed by the steepest hill that I think I have ever climbed on a bike.  It is the only hill (labeled on the map as the "Killer Miller") that I've ever found myself thinking that I might just fall over backwards or stall out and tip over. Fortunately, the third checkpoint wasn't long after that hill.

After taking a longer break, we started the best, longest leg of the event.  After a short, easy climb, we had a nice, easy downhill, followed by mile after mile of level riding at 20 miles per hour.  The road, though New Germany State Park, followed, first, a stream lined with blooming rhododendrons and mountain laurel, and then wound along the shore of the Savage River Reservoir.  We blasted through 15 quick miles before finally reaching the longest hill of the ride.  Although it was an easier climb that some of the earlier ones, it was also miles 75-78, so my legs were tired.  I climbed pretty well, but took a few breaks along the way.  Our friend is a stronger climber than either SSW Spouse or me, so we saw the last of him until the finish line.  By the time we reached the top, I was pretty much out of gas.  The final leg of the ride was only 15 miles and most of the hills weren't terrible, but I was ready to be done.  I was not really prepared for how tough the final hill of the ride was.  It was the final two miles of the ride, ending at the top of Wisp Ski Resort.  It was as steep as the steepest hills on the rest of the ride, but because of traffic, I couldn't zigzag.  I had to ride straight up.  I was exhausted, tired of sitting on the bike and ready to be finished.  I had to take a couple of breaks along the way, but I didn't walk, although it was tempting.  In the final mile, people had set up tents and were cheering riders along, which was a nice morale boost.  We finally finished at 6:30 p.m., 11 hours of riding.  Seeing the finish line, and hearing the cheers of people I've never met were a great feeling.  I crossed the finish line with SSW Spouse.  We were relieved to be done and and proud that we had been able to complete the ride. 

All in all, it was a grueling, awesome ride.  It was one of the harder physical things I've ever done.  I discovered that when I can keep my pace above about 5.5 miles per hour (ridiculously slow), I can spin at a reasonable cadence and climb pretty much all day long.  We had trained well for that type of climbing on Skyline Drive, where the first hill is 6 miles long.  When the hills gets steep enough that my pace drops below about 4.5 miles per hour (painfully slow), I really struggle because I can't spin.  Each pedal stroke requires much more muscle strength.  On the really steep sections, my pace dropped down around 3.3-3.5 miles per hour (absurdly slow).  I can walk faster than that.  There were guys who passed me on the uphills like I was standing still, but there were riders who were slower than me as well.  I also discovered that I really can ride all day.

I am so glad we stuck with it and finished the full century.  

Pictures (click to enlarge):

 A great view on the first leg of the ride.

 An interesting stone country church on the third leg.

 A close up of the stonework on the church.

 The view from the top of the Killer Miller on the third leg.

 Hemerocallis fulva (Day Lily) along the roadside.

 A waterfall on the fourth leg.

Satureja vulgaris (Wild Basil), a member of the mint family, along the roadside.

Two Weeks, 275 Miles (Or Another Century Ride in Delaware)

SSW Spouse was disappointed that he did not get to ride in the Shorefire Century two weeks ago, so we signed up for the Amish Country Bike Tour, a century ride out of Dover, Delaware that took place yesterday.  This century promised homemade pie at one of the rest stops and barbecue at the end, so how bad could it be?

We arrived in Dover around 7:30 and picked up our registration packets, which came with about 16 pounds of fliers, all of which wound up in the recycling.  It also came with some energy bars, sunscreen, lip balm, and wet wipes.  At least those things are useful.  The thing it did not contain was a cue sheet.  A cue sheet, for those who are not familiar with cycling, is a turn-by-turn list of roads with the distance to be ridden on each one.  It is basically like the directions that Google Maps or other mapping services provide for driving.  They did include a map of the route, but no distances were marked on it.  The lack of cue sheet meant that we had no idea how far it was between rest stops.  They did mark the pavement at turns, so we wouldn't get lost. 

We started at 8:15 with the mass start.  The Dover Police stationed personnel to block major intersections until we were out of town, which was really nice.  The 23 miles to the first rest stop flew by.  The weather was perfect:  bright and sunny and in the low 70s.  The day started with a mild wind, which would pick up as the day went on.  We arrived at the second rest stop at 42 miles to find Amish women serving pie!  We took off from there, trading off riding in front so the person in back would get a little bit of a break from the wind.  After pulling for several miles, I dropped off to the side to let SSW Spouse take over and realized that we had picked up about five people who were drafting us.  A little while later, they all turned off on the metric century route and we continued south on the full century route.

The rest stops had been quite crowded up to this point.  When we pulled into the third one, there were only about ten cyclists there.  Apparently, most people were doing the metric and shorter rides.  From there, we continued south to another rest stop, just six miles away, and then turned north for what turned out to be the worst leg of the trip.  That 17 miles was the hardest part of the ride for me.  It seemed like, not matter which direction we rode, it was always into the wind.  At this point, we were also riding alone, since the few century riders were very spread out.  We finally arrived at the last rest stop (the same one as the third stop) after what seemed like forever.

With 13 miles to go, we were both tired, but had the motivation of barbecue and being done.  We found some energy and actually rode pretty well on the last leg.  It was a pretty good feeling to see the Delaware Capital building and the finish line.  I finished 45 minutes faster than I did on the Shorefire Century two weeks ago.  I also felt much better at the end of the ride than I did at the end of the Shorefire.  At the beginning of the ride, I was a little concerned about the lack of cue sheet.  I always like to know how much further I have to ride until I get to a stop.  It turned out that it didn't bother me too much.  Overall, it was a really good ride.

When I got home last night, I realized that, over the last two weeks, I have done two century rides, a 40 mile training ride, and ridden to work and back twice (7.5 miles each way) for a total of 275 miles in the last two weeks.

No pictures today.