A century and three peaks

(As emailed out to the Monsters...)

Hi everybody - I hit a bunch of milestones today, so am passing along this quick ride report.

Today I discovered I had some open time, so I rode into New Hampshire from Westminster, summited Pack Monadnock, headed back south, summited Wachusett, then, having nearly hit 100 miles thanks to non-linear routing, climbed 1 Mile Hill and peaked again to knock off that 'century' goal before the end of the month.

Learned a lot about Google Maps and roads that don't exist. (That's a road, but it goes right into that barn. That's not a road, that's a forest. That might be a road, but skip it because that's an unmarked really, really big and snarling dog. ) Learned amazing things about the quality of pavement or the lack thereof, which seems appropriate during Spring Classic season. If anyone else wants to do something along these lines, I can recommend some amazing stretches of road, and then lots of places to not go.

Sergio, you were right. Pack was really hard. Glad you mentioned that last rise. Man. Almost didn't make it. It turns out that yelling at the top of your lungs shaves at least two degrees off the hill slope, but only for as long as you can sustain the yell.

Can't wait to hear how the Quabbin racers did today.

Pooped,
-r'm

The notes from my journal...

7 hours of riding. 9 hours out on the road.

Food / water:

  • First two bottles were Nuun tablets, worked well.

  • Second two were water and gatorade. Gatorade was too salty.

  • Next two were water and poweraide. That was better.

  • Last two were water and water.

  • Had oatmeal at the house before the drive.

  • Had a gu on the way to Monadnock.

  • Had another - blueberry - nasty - just before the climb.

  • Ate 1/2 pb sammich on the top.

  • At the first gas station got a granola bar, which worked well.

  • At the second gas station, got pb crackers, which were fantastic.

  • Also got a twix - not sure I needed that.

  • After, had a banana - awesome.

  • Then had a MAJOR craving so ate chicken nuggets, fries, and a frosty.

  • Overall this seemed to work ok - no cramping, no issues.

  • Except the gap between the first bottles and the first gas station was too long - had to do some special routing to find a gas station while parched. That was bad. Consider adding a water bottle carrier to the back of my seat to get to the 3rd/4th bottles.

Route:

  • Need to go and fill in notes on the route. Google maps was not right about bunches of things.

  • Managed to ride on every kind of terrain...

  • Went slow as I was exploring and unsure. Next time would go faster.

  • Having both the GPS and Google Maps on the iPhone was a huge win.

Tech:

  • ARGH ARGH ARGH forgot to sync the GPS with the SRM, so did not get realtime power data from the SRM.

  • PLUS MY COMPUTER ERASED THE SRM.

  • So I don't have power or cadence data.

  • What I know is that on most climbs I could settle into 60-65 cadence at 2-300 watts. I have no idea what I did on Monadnock.

  • I know I hit 1000 watts several times.

  • Oh well. If I'd done this a week ago I wouldn't have numbers either, so so be it.

Climbing:

  • Climbing up Pack was the hardest thing I have ever done. The first bits of climb were not killers but they were gruelling. Grind, grind, push, push, wheel wanders a bit, just hold on. Then it flattened out sorta midway up and I could catch my breath. Wow... then the last stretch hit. I have never seen anything so steep. I had two themes going in my head - "no way to do this, just walk it, no one will ever know, my legs aren't going to hold out, this is impossible, so so so tired" and "no fucking way am i going to stop here after riding all this way, I will know, I will not know if I can do this, I will think I can't, just do 5 more feet, then another 5". And toward the top was a primal scream. Made it. Don't really know how. Almost passed out or puked. Pushing my body past the point of feedback and past all those mental issues... the hardest thing I've ever done. I have no idea how I could have done that for any longer, which does not bode well for Washington.

  • Climbing up Wachusett, after 90 miles of riding, was comparatively easier. The first stretch was hard, and the second was going to kill me, then I slipped into a 4mph 40rpm 200watt groove and just floated up the second steep patch. The last bit wasn't a big deal - just sprinted/pushed right through it.

Nutrition:

  • Need a better plan for recovery. I guzzled a lot of water and random food (noted above). Need to know what to do to recover better, especially on diet, because after a day like that it feels like I can eat anything I want.

Feelings now:

  • Just thirsty. Not particularly sore.

  • Quietly proud of what I accomplished.