SIR Spring 600k: Put a Forks in it

Welcome to Olympic National Park

It was on the road between Forks and La Push that I first noticed the moon. It was last Saturday night, and I was about 380 kilometers into the Seattle Randonneurs’ Spring 600k. The night was dark with few stars visible, the only light for miles coming from my trusty headlight and taillight and the running lights of Chris Cullum, my Canadian riding partner who I had been riding with off and on for the past 300 kilometers. Suddenly there it was: the full* moon shining through a gap in the clouds like a saucer of vanilla flavored Ensure Plus®. Then it all clicked in my head (by this point nearly as cloudy as the night we had been riding through). The full moon… The nearby town of Forks… Vampires! Werewolves! What was I doing out here!? I didn’t actually read any of the Twilight saga, but I saw the movies (well, part of the first one anyway)! I know what evil, wrapped in sparkly skin and designer jeans lurks in this damp corner of Washington state!

Ward and Gary on the road near Matlock

A few minutes later the wave of panic passed as I realized that even if vampires were real, they would probably do their best to stay away from Forks. Way too many Twifans hanging around these days. A more well-founded panic returned a little while later as I realized that it was Saturday night and Forks was the only town around with a bar. It was rapidly approaching the drunk driver witching hour, not a good time to be on a bicycle.

In spite of vampires, werewolves, drunk drivers, bad convenience store sandwiches, occasional headwinds and lots of lactate in my thigh muscles, I managed to complete the SIR 600k brevet last weekend. It was an incredibly beautiful route that circumnavigated the Olympic mountain range in a huge clockwise lumpy circle beginning and ending at the ferry dock in Kingston.

Shadow riders

Riding a single speed bike throughout the SR series this year has often made it difficult to find well-matched riding partners, but this time I managed to ride with others at a very compatible pace for about half of the distance. Chris in particular turned out to be an excellent riding partner, happily pulling me through endless rolling hills.

The view from Kalaloch

Every long brevet has it's warts and imperfections, but I really can't think of much about which to complain. Yes, there was a brief rain shower or two. But come on, we were riding through miles of Pacific Northwest rainforest in early June! What do you want? Maybe that last stretch of highway 104 from 101 to Kingston with the hills that took a couple of cheap shots at me when I was down on the ground? But that's not the hills' fault. They were there long before we decided to ride our brevet and they'll be there long after my trusty Trek has turned to dust and returned to the earth. Honestly I have to say this was my favorite 600k yet, and maybe my favorite brevet ever.

Some highlights for me:

• The excellent homemade chocolate chip cookies at the Hood Canal control (Jennifer's recipe and Kole's execution).





It was steeper than it looks, honest



• The lovely rolling, car-free back roads between Matlock and Humptulips, especially that steep dirt section that forced me to use my "granny gear" (i.e. get off and walk).


• Okay, this is for real: In the Matlock General Store the clerk found $40 on the floor and asked if it was someone in our group who had lost it. None of the group I was with thought it was ours. Then at the very next stop in Humptulips, 45 miles down the road, as I was walking to the cash register there on the floor at my feet... two crisp $20 bills. They weren't mine. I asked if anyone in my group had dropped them, but none of us had even come in with two twenties. Weird. I left them with the cashier and walked out wondering if the same $40 would be following us all the way around the Olympic peninsula.


• Chris and I helping a woman with a flat tire along 101. I'm convinced that woman would still be there trying to figure out how to fix that flat if we hadn't stopped (not exactly a whiz bike mechanic). She said she was riding to San Francisco. She'll either develop some bike mechanical skills along the way or continue to depend on the kindness of strangers.





"Dinner" at Kalaloch



• Celebrating the first real view of the ocean at Kalaloch with a dish of soft-serve ice cream.





Leaving Forks at 2:30 AM



• Making the most of the Forks control by stopping there not once but twice. The first time for an excellent bowl of homemade chicken soup to fortify me for the out-and-back to La Push. Then for a fiery bowl of chili and a couple hours of sleep before setting off again at 2:30 AM for last third of the route.


• The quiet and lonely slog from Forks up to the control at mile marker 218.7 in the wee hours (Chris and I had parted ways at Forks and from there on I rode alone). Perhaps I saw three cars in an hour and a half. A great time for introspection and loud off-key singing.


• But even better was the oasis at mile marker 218.7 with hot chicken soup and friendly faces.





Just before the sunrise on Lake Crescent



• Watching the black night turn to grey daylight as I rode along the shores of Lake Crescent.
• East Bank Rd!





Dungeness Spit from the stone bench



• Sitting on the stone bench overlooking the Dungeness spit and reveling in the knowledge that there was little between me and Kingston that could keep me from finishing the ride (but naively unaware of the hills on highway 104 I had yet to ride).


• The feeling of rolling into Kingston shortly after noon having just finished the brevet and a complete SR series on a single speed bike, not too mention it being my second fastest 600k ever. Of course, my spirits fell quickly when I realized I still needed to walk up a flight of stairs to the second floor motel room to get my card signed.

This was really a great ride for me from beginning to end. I felt strong the whole way and was rarely bothered by aches and pains. My bike worked well and nimbly avoided any broken glass and other sharp road debris that conspired to deflate my tires. The route was one I've wanted to ride ever since I started randonneuring. There's something about the remoteness and the idea of going all the way around an entire range of mountains that inspired me. I rode with some good riding partners who shared the hard work, some for a few minutes, others for hundreds of kilometers. Thanks to Chris, John, Gary, Ward and the others I rode with briefly. Most importantly, thanks to Kole and Jennifer, and the many other SIR volunteers for putting on an outstanding event.

*Okay, it wasn’t really officially a full moon until the 5th, but three days away from a full moon looks pretty darn full.

Rode to Work with the Mayor this Morning

I rode in to work with our Mayor, Mike McGinn this morning. Well, actually that might be overstating it a bit. Today being Bike to Work day, the Cascade Bicycle club had organized a special “Bike to work with Mayor McGinn” event. The ride started at the KEXP studios on Dexter Ave at 7:45 AM and progressed up 5th Ave to City Hall where they held a little rally. It just so happens that my normal morning commute goes right by the KEXP studios, so I left a little earlier than usual (I’m usually still reading the newspaper in my underwear at 7:45) so I could join in the fun. In fact, I didn’t actually see the Mayor until I got to City Hall. He apparently hammered hard, or did some “skitching” to get there ahead of the rest of us.

This was the scene at City Hall when I got there.

Not exactly a huge crowd, but all the cool kids were there. Even though the rally didn't draw many people, I have to say I saw like a gazillion people... no make that 10 gazillion people riding their bikes to work this morning. I love seeing so many people out discovering the joys of commuting by bicycle. I realize that quite a few of them will only do it today, but I'm sure for some today is the beginning of something bigger.

I did find Mike hanging out at the rally and talking with his constituents about the benefits of low trail geometry or something like that.

He didn’t look winded at all so at first I assumed he rode there in the back of his big mayoral stretch limo. Then I noticed he was still wearing his official mayoral reflective pant cuff strap.

You definitely don't need one of those to ride in a limo.

SIR Spring 400k: The Ferry Waits for No Man

The running lights of the last ferry of the night may have still been visible from the ferry dock as I pulled into the final contrôle of SIR's Spring 400k brevet. I didn't bother looking for the ferry because I knew I had missed it and besides, there was a slice of pizza and a cold beer with my name on it at the contrôle. My card was signed at 11:53 PM. The ferry had sailed at 11:40 PM. For the most part I rode as fast as I had hoped to ride, but I just dawdled a bit too much at a couple of the contrôles.

We couldn't have asked for a better day to spend riding hither and thither. It was 48 degrees when I left the house in the morning and it got into the low 80's by late afternoon. The winds out of the NE meant we had tailwinds for much of the morning and early afternoon until the route turned around in Raymond and headed back North. On the trip back north, the wind wasn't quite as helpful. It slowed things down a bit, but really not as much as I had feared.

On the Ferry

A crowd of about 55 turned out, and like two years ago when we rode the same route in similar conditions, many were looking to do a time (that's randospeak for "ride really fast"). Not two miles into the ride I realized that I'd have no hope of staying with any fast groups. The tailwinds and early ride adrenaline were pushing many along at 25 mph. That had me spinning my 68 gear inches of single speed goodness at over 120 rpm. It was too early and I hadn't had enough coffee for that sort of thing, so I let the faster groups fly on by and I drifted toward the back of the pack.

 Leaving Bremerton and being left behind

Of course, sometimes getting left behind is a good thing. For instance, not long after the picture above was taken, two of the riders in that group ahead touched wheels and the guy in back went down hard. If I had been in that pace line, I might have been taken down too. I quickly stopped along with a couple of others to help out. The rider who had crashed was still on the ground and looking pretty rattled when I got there. He had road rash on his face (ouch!) and knees that I could see but he seemed to be coherent and otherwise intact. Luckily one of the other riders who had stopped was Andy Spier, a retired fire fighter with mad EMT skillz. We got the rider and bike out of the road quickly as cars were still flying by at 60 mph, and Andy checked for serious injuries. After a few minutes we concluded that he had nothing more than bumps, scrapes and bruises and his bike seemed rideable, so we cancelled the 911 call and soon everyone was on the road again.

Hugh and Dave

In the rolling hills between Bremerton and Shelton I'd team up briefly with other riders, but it never lasted more than a few minutes. I'd catch up on the climbs and then the tailwinds would whisk them away as we descended to the next roller. Clearly the rhythms of a single speed on a windy day don't fit well with the rhythms of geared bikes. So, I quickly settled into my own rhythm and accepted the fact that I'd be spending much of the day alone.

Tailwinds

The morning was beautiful and the riding was easy. Even though I wasn't able to find a group that I could ride with, the tailwinds were still pushing me along at a good pace. Being alone allowed me to enjoy the scenery, which beats staring at the wheel in front of me on such a lovely day.

Blue Slough Road

Panda with gratuitous Ibex product placement

The road to Westport

On a typical brevet, riders tend to get scattered across the route like a one-dimensional version of the expanding universe. The start is the big bang and once into the ride, a rider's velocity relative to you is a function of how far away they are from you. The riders a quarter of a mile ahead are moving away from you ever so slowly while the ones way out there at the front are leaving you in their dust at what might as well be approaching the speed of light. As a result, once you've settled into your pace you don't have many close encounters with other celestial objects (a.k.a. riders) because they're all moving away from you.

On this ride I was finding that a single speed bike throws a monkey wrench in my cosmological model of brevets. The gearing of a single speed bike essentially limits your top-end speed like a governor (this kind of governor, not that kind), while on a geared bike your top speed is usually limited only by your ability to convert Clif Bars into watts. Hence the different rhythms that I mentioned earlier. As a result I was finding that even though I was riding alone, I was seeing a lot of other riders on the course as I'd pass them on a climb and then later they'd pass me on the flats. I had a lot of 15 second conversations "in passing" (literally).

I doubt that any of my observations are going to cause Einstein to turn in his grave, but at least it gave me something to ponder as I rode.

I got to the contrôle at Westport, a little over 100 miles into the ride, around 1:30. I was still feeling good so I decided to not stay for long. I quickly scarfed a sandwich and got on my way again eager to keep riding the tailwinds as long as they'd last.

Finally, the ocean

From Westport to Raymond is only 30-some miles, but along that road I encountered one of the temporal anomalies that always pop up somewhere during a long brevet. Time stood still. I'd pedal for what seemed to be hours, and my cycle computer would register the passing of only two, maybe three minutes. I wasn't able to come up with a cosmological model that adequately explains the temporal distortion between Westport and Raymond, but I know it's real.

The never-ending road to Raymond

After Raymond, the route heads north up highway 101 and goes over a series of hills. I've ridden this stretch of road a few times now and I've decided to name it Sisyphus Lane. The hills are so similar that it really feels like you ride up and down the same hill over and over again.

Near Elma

Maximum security prison near Shelton with me happy to be on the outside

The trip from Raymond to Potlatch was long and I was starting to feel a little like I was dragging an anchor behind me. My attitude was good, but my legs definitely didn't have quite the snap to them that they had had in the morning. My speed kept dropping off and might have dropped to zero if I hadn't encountered Brad Hawkins. We were approaching Potlatch State Park as the sun was setting and we worked together and seemed to give each other a little boost as we knocked off that last few miles. Brad burst into song at the sight of the contrôle.

Brad pulling me into Potlatch

The Potlatch contrôle run by Shane and his wife was the best setup I have yet to encounter on an SIR brevet. And that's saying something. They were making fresh homemade french fries (with lots of salt - yum),  soup, an espresso machine... In retrospect, I might have made that last ferry if I had just filled my bottles at the contrôle, grabbed a couple of cookies and got back on the road. But it was far too easy to stay and enjoy the party. I was there for over half an hour.

 

Potlatch - best contrôle EVER!

By the time I pulled out of Potlatch I knew I had no chance of catching the ferry so I took my time and savored the last leg. It was soon dark and the roads were becoming emptier with each mile. Deep into the Old Belfair Highway, with no street lights or house lights, and a moonless sky I could hear a chorus of coyotes not far from the road, yipping and howling like frat boys at spring break. Times like this are why I love randonneuring.

As you've already gathered from the beginning of this post, I made it to the finish eventually but missed the last ferry of the night. I actually got a decent few hours of sleep sharing a room with three other randonneurs. The ferry ride and the ride home from the ferry dock the next morning were glorious. It was another beautiful day, and though it was a little painful to be back on the bike so soon, I was happy to be heading for home after such a great adventure.

400k Plans and Grant's in Town

The sun is shining, the birds are out doing their cute little birdy things and rando season is in full swing. This weekend in rando-land, I’ll be riding the SIR Spring 400k. This 400k brevet will follow a fairly flat route. It leaves from Bremerton and heads out to Westport on the coast via Shelton and Cosmopolis. From Westport we head south along the coast to Raymond and then turn north on highway 101 and other side roads up to Potlatch State Park on Hood Canal’s funny bone. From Potlatch, it’s back to Bremerton pretty much the same way we came in the morning but in reverse.

SIR Spring 400k Route on Bike Route Toaster

I rode this same route two years ago, and with such a flat route and good weather quite a few Seattle Randonneurs were able to set a personal best for a 400k, myself included. This year I’ll be riding my single speed so I have no plans to set any new records, personal or otherwise. I do have a goal for the ride, but it’s going to be long shot. The last ferry from Bremerton to Seattle leaves at 11:40pm. My goal is to be on that last ferry. That means finishing the ride in about 16 hours and 30 minutes. That’s a huge stretch for me on a single speed bike. I can only spin those cranks so fast, so the key will be minimizing my time off the bike. I think if I keep my time off the bike to less than 45 minutes, then I’ve got a shot at making the ferry. But it’s amazing how easy it is to use up 45 minutes over the course of a 400k ride.

Luckily it’s not the end of the world if I don’t make it. SIR will have a room or two at the finish so there will be a warm place to nap until the ferries start running again on Sunday morning. Chances are good I’ll be sharing a room with a few smelly, snoring randonneurs Saturday night.

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By the way, to get inspired for the 400k I might try to stop by Free Range Cycles in Fremont on Friday evening to see Grant Peterson talking about double top tubes, flat pedals, long quill stems or whatever it is that he'll be talking about. Grant is in Seattle promoting his new book, Just Ride: A Radically Practical Guide to Riding Your Bike. I don't agree with some of Grant's opinions and design choices, but I definitely plan on reading his book, and I have great respect and appreciation for the "radically practical" influence he has had on all things bicycling over the years. As a matter of fact, if I were to build a momument to the founding fathers of practical cycling, it would probably include the oversized likenesses of Grant Peterson, Eben Weiss and the late Sheldon Brown carved into a mountain side, like three-fourths of Mt. Rushmore but with faces only a bike nerd would recognize.

Some Tricks for Installing Aluminum Fenders

I recently installed some Velo Orange aluminum fenders on my Trek 311. I’ve been riding this bike a lot this year and it’s had a set of Planet Bike plastic fenders on it since I built it up in its current configuration back in January. I tend to think of aluminum fenders as higher quality and more “permanent” than plastic fenders, which is why I made the change. But after I installed the aluminum fenders I got to thinking about the differences between plastic and aluminum and the relative advantages and disadvantages of the two types. I’m not sure one type is any better than the other, they’re just different.

For instance, plastic fenders are probably a better choice if you frequently lock your bike up in crowded bike racks where the bike is likely to get banged around. Plastic fenders resist the unavoidable scratches and dents that would have aluminum fenders looking old and beat up in no time. If a plastic fender gets crunched against a rack or another bike, it will usually just snap back to its original shape while an aluminum fender might end up rubbing against a wheel until bent back in shape.

Aluminum fenders tend to offer better coverage which means they keep you and your bike drier and cleaner. This isn't entirely a function of the material. Plastic fenders could be made longer offering greater coverage, but none of the commonly available plastic fenders (SKS and Planet Bike) come in sizes as long as the commonly available aluminum fenders (Velo Orange and Honjo). I suspect that this is partly because aluminum is stiffer and therefore more stable in the longer lengths and less likely to flop around. A plastic fender would probably need to be made heavier or would require additional stays if it were made as long as most aluminum fenders.

Of course there are also aesthetic arguments for aluminum or for plastic. Aluminum fenders just look right on some bikes while plastic looks right on others. It's just as hard to imagine a classic René Herse with plastic fenders as it is to imagine a Trek Madone with hammered aluminum fenders (though I'm sure both have been done).

1950 René Herse porteur

One of the arguments I often hear in favor of plastic fenders is that they're easier to install. In general I'd agree with this, though I think it's not as much a function of the material (plastic vs. aluminum) as it is a function of design. Honjo and Velo Orange fenders are designed to be installed more permanently as an integral component of the bicycle while SKS and Planet Bike plastic fenders are designed to be easily added on as an accessory. You generally won't have to modify much about a plastic fender to get it to fit reasonably well on your bike assuming the bike has room for any fenders. With an aluminum fender, be prepared to do a little bending, drilling, cutting and cursing.

Each time I install a set of aluminum fenders I learn another trick or two that makes the job a bit easier and results in a better quality installation. It still usually takes me more time than installing a set of plastic fenders, but some of these tricks at least remove difficulty-of-installation as a significant factor in deciding which type of fenders to install on a bike, so I thought I'd share some of what I've learned.

• Install one contact point at a time working your way from one end to the other. For instance on the rear fender, attach the fender to the chain stay bridge first, then at the seat stay bridge, then the rear fender stay.


• After each point is attached, work on “shaping” the curvature of the fender to match the arc of the tire from that attachment point to the next. In other words, once you’ve attached the fender at the chain stay bridge work on shaping the curve of the fender only between the chain stay bridge and the seat stay bridge. Once you’ve got that section nicely matched, then attach the fender at the seat stay bridge and begin shaping the fender from the seat stay bridge to the fender stay.


• The curve of the fender can easily be “shaped” by either squeezing the edges of the fender toward each other or away from each other at the point where you want to adjust the arc. Squeeze the edges together to increase the radius of the fender arc (make the curve flatter), and pull the edges outward to decrease the radius or make the curve tighter. A little flexing goes a long way, so go easy. Adjusting the arc in one spot will affect how the fender fits in the adjacent spots so it’s best to make tiny adjustments working along the length of the fender and then go back over it a couple times. It’s sort of like truing a wheel.





Squeeze the edges together to increase the radius






Pull the edges apart to decrease the radius



• Once installed, there should be no tension in the fender. Sprung tension is what causes fenders to crack. In other words, the attachment points shouldn’t be holding the fender in the correct curvature, they should only hold the fender on the bike.


• Use leather washers and rubber spacers between the frame and the fenders to reduce noise and the likelihood of cracks.


• Use nylon lock nuts or locktite on nuts and bolts to keep them from vibrating loose.


• Never, ever embark on a fender installation job without beer.

Those with sharp eyes have already noticed that the rear fender line on my Trek isn't quite perfect. Other than the fact that I'm not a perfectionist and could best be described as a "hack" when in comes to bike wrenching, there are a couple of reasons (or excuses) for this. First, these fenders had been installed on another bike previously and were removed because the rear fender cracked at the seat stay bridge (due to my faulty installation job). I patched the fender back together with a couple of pieces of sheet aluminum and some nuts and bolts as you can see below.

It's not the most beautiful patch job in the world, but it's quite sturdy. While the patch holds things together well, it limited my ability to shape the fender to match the arc of the tire perfectly.

Also, since the Trek has horizontal dropouts, I decided to leave some extra room near the chain stay bridge so that the rear wheel could easily be removed and reinstalled without having to let air out of the tire. I've seen other fender installations that solve this problem by attaching the fender to the chain stay bridge with a spring gizmo so the fender follows the arc of the tire but can be pushed forward when needed to remove and reinstall the rear wheel. I've used this approach before and it does look better, but in my experience it always results in a fender that rattles and eventually cracks. For a randonneuring bike, I'm interested in the simpler, more indestructible approach even if it isn't quite as pretty.

So far this installation seems to be solid and totally rattle free. The 400k and 600k brevets coming up in the next few weeks will be good tests.