Century the first: wet
Sep. 25th, 2006 10:07 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
fredrikegermanThanks to ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
nuclearpolymer I finally got 'round to doing a formal century---the Sea Coast Century---this Saturday. The verdict? Wet!
We started in southern NH at Hampton Beach, where there's a big beach parking area which can accomodate the cars of a zillion cyclists. We arrived at 6:30 for a 7AM start. The drizzle started promptly at 7, and continued through much of the day. We hastily changed into rain gear before setting out. It was learned that you can tape your number to your raincoat and avoid sticking pins through it; just be careful if you make a bathroom stop...
We bicycled up the coast to York, Maine, and then back again (the first 82 miles) and ended with a 20-mile out-and-back to the edge of Newburyport Harbor. We had rest stops at around 25, 50, and 82 miles. The ride up hugged the coast as closely as possible. This meant that long stretches of beach alternated with little excursions along quite oceanfront roads (with very pricey-looking houses). By the first rest stop at 25 miles, we were soaked through (rain gear and all), and my cue sheets were pulped. Next time, a bag.
Oddly, we saw an awful lot of surfers in the upwards trip. This was odd not just because it was raining (they wear wetsuits, after all) but because it was 8AM in late September, there wasn't much surf to speak of (two-foot waves! Tubular!), and it didn't look like the tide was in (from flow under bridges).
Though we got rained on through the rest of the day, it did brighten up for the last 20-mile leg and we actually dried out and took off our rain jackets because we were getting warm.
The unfortunate part was that our feet were soaked. Ten hours in soggy shoes is really nasty.
And yes, it took us the whole ten hours, from start at 7AM until finish at 5PM. Having well-established break points really helped; casual rides tend to a lot of random stopping-and-futzing, and I'm not so fond of that. This was especially true in the rain, where I started losing body heat really fast when we stopped. The 25mile stop was pretty brutal in this respect, and I was keeping a careful watch for trouble.
My last long ride had me running out of electrolytes on a hot day. This time I wish I'd put nothing but gatorade in my bottles, rather than water in one and 50/50 mix in the other. The rest stops had bananas and gatorade (and peanut-butter and pig's fly bread sandwiches, yum), so I had no troubles this time. Plus I'd eaten and slept much better the night before, and had insisted on a fairly easy starting pace so we wouldn't end up hosed later in the day.
My philosophy: find a comfortable, easy pace for a long-distance ride (say a 50-mile ride) and drop a gear from it.
I still wish we'd worked up to a higher gear, but I don't think I could have managed it.
Worst aspect of the ride: the brisk ocean-front headwind on the southward leg. This was a known problem with the route, but brutal nonetheless. Absolutely a relentless slog when you were on the beach stretches (which went 5-6 miles at a go). Luckily, they cleverly added inland stretches just about where your legs were hammered. At mile 65, we were worried we wouldn't make it; an inland turn for 18 miles allowed us to recover our strength. Gentle hills is nothing compared to flat-and-windy.
This also emphasized the importance of drafting. The lead rider definitely bore the brunt of the wind (though riding behind wasn't easy either). I'd been lettingnuclearpolymer set the pace for much of the ride, because I tend to lose followers, but I definitely did my turn in the windy sections.
The route recommended starting south; we did the north stretch first in case we wanted to bail early due to freezing to death, soaking, etc. The downside to putting it off was the headwind; early in the day there's not much wind, and this 20-mile stretch would have been a much easier ride.
Next time, perhaps a stronger pace. And need to figure out a way to bring more small snacky meals along; I'm not so much for a normal lunchtime on a long ride, I prefer lighter snacks and shorter breaks along the way. Bananas and oranges are great.
Now I need to take my bike in to get my derailleur re-lubed and re-adjusted; all that water left everything coated in sand, and I couldn't shift properly after the first rest stop. And I really should just acknowledge the truth and either get road tires, or a road bike (which might make my shoulders hurt less after a long ride, too). But two bikes really seems a bit too much, and I do love my old steel Trek frame.
nuclearpolymer I finally got 'round to doing a formal century---the Sea Coast Century---this Saturday. The verdict? Wet!We started in southern NH at Hampton Beach, where there's a big beach parking area which can accomodate the cars of a zillion cyclists. We arrived at 6:30 for a 7AM start. The drizzle started promptly at 7, and continued through much of the day. We hastily changed into rain gear before setting out. It was learned that you can tape your number to your raincoat and avoid sticking pins through it; just be careful if you make a bathroom stop...
We bicycled up the coast to York, Maine, and then back again (the first 82 miles) and ended with a 20-mile out-and-back to the edge of Newburyport Harbor. We had rest stops at around 25, 50, and 82 miles. The ride up hugged the coast as closely as possible. This meant that long stretches of beach alternated with little excursions along quite oceanfront roads (with very pricey-looking houses). By the first rest stop at 25 miles, we were soaked through (rain gear and all), and my cue sheets were pulped. Next time, a bag.
Oddly, we saw an awful lot of surfers in the upwards trip. This was odd not just because it was raining (they wear wetsuits, after all) but because it was 8AM in late September, there wasn't much surf to speak of (two-foot waves! Tubular!), and it didn't look like the tide was in (from flow under bridges).
Though we got rained on through the rest of the day, it did brighten up for the last 20-mile leg and we actually dried out and took off our rain jackets because we were getting warm.
The unfortunate part was that our feet were soaked. Ten hours in soggy shoes is really nasty.
And yes, it took us the whole ten hours, from start at 7AM until finish at 5PM. Having well-established break points really helped; casual rides tend to a lot of random stopping-and-futzing, and I'm not so fond of that. This was especially true in the rain, where I started losing body heat really fast when we stopped. The 25mile stop was pretty brutal in this respect, and I was keeping a careful watch for trouble.
My last long ride had me running out of electrolytes on a hot day. This time I wish I'd put nothing but gatorade in my bottles, rather than water in one and 50/50 mix in the other. The rest stops had bananas and gatorade (and peanut-butter and pig's fly bread sandwiches, yum), so I had no troubles this time. Plus I'd eaten and slept much better the night before, and had insisted on a fairly easy starting pace so we wouldn't end up hosed later in the day.
My philosophy: find a comfortable, easy pace for a long-distance ride (say a 50-mile ride) and drop a gear from it.
I still wish we'd worked up to a higher gear, but I don't think I could have managed it.
Worst aspect of the ride: the brisk ocean-front headwind on the southward leg. This was a known problem with the route, but brutal nonetheless. Absolutely a relentless slog when you were on the beach stretches (which went 5-6 miles at a go). Luckily, they cleverly added inland stretches just about where your legs were hammered. At mile 65, we were worried we wouldn't make it; an inland turn for 18 miles allowed us to recover our strength. Gentle hills is nothing compared to flat-and-windy.
This also emphasized the importance of drafting. The lead rider definitely bore the brunt of the wind (though riding behind wasn't easy either). I'd been letting
nuclearpolymer set the pace for much of the ride, because I tend to lose followers, but I definitely did my turn in the windy sections.The route recommended starting south; we did the north stretch first in case we wanted to bail early due to freezing to death, soaking, etc. The downside to putting it off was the headwind; early in the day there's not much wind, and this 20-mile stretch would have been a much easier ride.
Next time, perhaps a stronger pace. And need to figure out a way to bring more small snacky meals along; I'm not so much for a normal lunchtime on a long ride, I prefer lighter snacks and shorter breaks along the way. Bananas and oranges are great.
Now I need to take my bike in to get my derailleur re-lubed and re-adjusted; all that water left everything coated in sand, and I couldn't shift properly after the first rest stop. And I really should just acknowledge the truth and either get road tires, or a road bike (which might make my shoulders hurt less after a long ride, too). But two bikes really seems a bit too much, and I do love my old steel Trek frame.
