PBP Ride Report Part IV: Don't Confuse the Bridge with Brest

Gavin and I pulled into the Carhaix control at 5:20pm where I soon found a slightly frantic Kelly who was sure I had died or worse. We hung out far too long at the control eating and yacking and I slathered some of Kelly's secret formula butt salve on and then we eventually got back on the road. Gavin had decided to hang out at Carhaix and take a shower before continuing on into Brest so I said goodbye and thanked him for the moral support.

Although the weather started getting ugly and some rain started falling not long after leaving Carhaix, I was really feeling pretty good on this stretch. By "good" I mean emotionally. Physically, my butt was killing me. My feet were really hurting too, probably because I was spending a lot more time standing than usual. Still, I was enjoying the scenery and Kelly's company and I wouldn't have wanted to be anywhere else. Of course, it helps that I was also a little delirious. We had been riding for well over 24 hours without any sleep and I was starting to feel it. I remember at one point cruising along watching the world go by, seeing a traffic sign in French and thinking, "Whoa, that's weird. That sign's not in English." Then I remembered I was in France and it all made a little more sense.

The climb up to Roc'h Trevezel was a long slow grind, but I found it much easier than the stretch before Carhaix since it never got too steep. And the view from the top was inspiring enough to make it well worth the trouble. After the summit I somehow got it into my mind that it would be just a quick downhill ride into the control in Brest. In fact the control was still more than 50 km away. Still I kept expecting to see the suspension bridge leading into Brest around every corner. After an hour and a half of that I started realizing that my mental calculations of how far we had to go were off a bit. Finally a little after dark we saw the Pont de l'Iroise and crossed the Celtic Sea into Brest.

But wait... Once again, I was a bit off on my calculations of how far we had yet to go. I was thinking that we'd cross the bridge and ride a few blocks and we'd be at the control, cold beer in hand. Instead we had to wind our way through another 10 km of roundabouts and rail crossings before finally reaching the control in downtown Brest.

I attribute my miscalculations about the last leg into Brest to being distracted by my backside, which was screaming at me every time it made contact with the saddle. It's hard to think straight with all that screaming.

When we pulled into the Brest control Sarah, Cody, Adam and my friend Dave were there whooping and clapping for us. It was 10:20pm, a little over 29 and a half hours since we had left St. Quentin. Everyday I'm aware of my love for my family on some level, but I don't think I've ever felt it more than I did when I came around the corner to see them there on the wet streets of Brest that evening. Kelly's family was there too all smiles and high-fives.

After getting brevet cards stamped, we sat down at the control with our families for a quick bite and a cold beer (a rarity in France). I told Kelly then that I didn't think I was going continue on from Brest. Between my butt and my feet I had been doing some serious suffering for the past several hours and I was having a hard time imagining enduring another 35 - 40 hours like that. Kelly was disappointed but I had no doubt that he could make it to the finish without me. Just to be sure, I told Kelly that I would get up early the next morning to see if I felt any different after a good night's sleep. But when we met at 4:30am in the hotel lobby the next morning I was even more sure that I had no interest in the suffering that I'd have to endure to continue the ride.

I spent a day in Brest seeing sights with my family and then we rode the TGV back to Paris. The train seats weren't a heck of a lot more comfortable than my bike seat had been, but I never had any doubt that abandoning in Brest was the right choice for me.

Of course, Kelly finished the ride still riding strong with a time of 74 hours 15 minutes. Congratulations, Kelly!

PBP Ride Report Part III: Trouble in Paradise

Day two and the lonely road

Not long after leaving Fougeres the sun came up to signal the beginning of what I knew would be a very long day of riding. I think it was also somewhere between Fougeres and Tinteniac that I started noticing my deriere feeling a little like I had been sitting on a brick for past 14 hours. My backside rarely feels great after 14 hours in the saddle, but this was far worse than usual. With a full day ahead of me before I'd even get to the halfway point, I decided to do my best to ignore it ride on.

We got to Tinteniac at around 8:40am and while we were having some breakfast, Ryan Hamilton arrived at the control. I was surprised to see Ryan behind us since he's such a strong rider, but it turns out he had been suffering through some of the same problems I had had early on with cramps probably due to dehydration. Ryan said the cramps had forced him to ride "painfully slow" which explained why he was traveling about the same pace as me and Kelly.

Between Tinteniac and Loudeac we were passed by a big group of maybe 30 riders, mostly Italians. They were moving just a little faster than us so it made sense to hop on and take advantage of their draft (Obviously I was a little too tired at this point to remember my first PBP lesson). We hung with the Italian group for an hour or so, and I have to admit it was highly entertaining if not a bit nerve-racking. The group rode as a constantly churning blob of riders taking up both lanes of the two lane road. Every once in a while a car or semi would come in the opposite direction and there would be a bunch of shouting and bumping of wheels and elbows as the churning blob would squeeze down from two lanes into one just in time to avoid getting a few riders stuck on the grill of the on-coming semi. As soon as the truck was past us, the blob oozed outward to take over the entire road again. As this was going on, I hung off the back of the pack where I could just watch as if it were an Italian sitcom.

At the Loudeac control we saw Ryan again, still traveling painfully slow which also happened to be the same pace Kelly and I were riding (though what Ryan referred to as "painfully slow" we were calling "making good time"). I also ran into Ken Carter who I was very surprised to hear had just abandoned due to a saddle sore. Ken is another extremely strong rider, so I was starting to get a bad feeling between seeing two riders, much stronger than me struggling and with my own backside getting to be more painful by the minute.

After Loudeac the route does a fair amount of climbing, some of it pretty steep. The climbing came during the hottest part of the day so I was taking it slow. Even at my best Kelly is a much stronger climber than I am so he pulled ahead and eventually disappeared over the horizon. While I rode on alone I was overtaken by a guy named Gavin from Pennsylvania. He saw my name on the RUSA tag on my saddle as he approached and said, "Steve Frey! Randonoodler! Hey, I read your blog." Who knew that someone other than my mother reads my blog? So Gavin and I rode together for the next hour or so into Carhaix talking about bikes, raw backsides and the like. Gavin was suffering undercarriage problems not unlike my own and told me that he thought he'd probably abandon in Brest. He talked about abandoning in such an easy care free way and had such a great attitude about the whole ride--how even if he abandoned, he still will have experienced this fantastic ride across France with all the hoopla--that without knowing it, he gave me permission to actually consider abandoning for the first time.

In three years of randonneuring, three SR series, 30-some brevets and permanents, I had never DNF'd a ride (DNF = Did Not Finish). I never even considered the possibility that I would DNF a ride. But right then and there Gavin's great attitude about the whole thing helped me get over myself and realize that it's just a bike ride and the point is to have fun. I didn't decide to abandon there on the road with Gavin, but for the first time in my randonneuring career, I allowed myself to consider it as a possibility.

PBP Ride Report Part II: Riding the River

Lining up for the 80 hour start

It was hot and humid for the start on Sunday. Or at least it was hot and humid for this Seattle boy who hadn't seen the thermometer go much above 80 degrees all summer. I met my riding partner Kelly at about 2:30. While waiting for the start I ran into some other Seattle Randos (Ken Carter, Ryan Hamilton and Jan Heine) who were also doing the 80 hour start. We were all hanging back so we could stay in the shade for as long as possible. That put us all in the third wave which finally took off at about 4:40pm.

Kelly and friends chilling before the start

I had heard horror stories about sketchy riding and lots of crashes early on in the 80 hour start as everyone is scrambling to stay with the lead group. But back in the third wave it was all calm and civil, although it was a little like being swept away by a fast moving river. The river flowed smoothly through the Paris suburbs and I think I was probably 25 km into the ride before I even noticed I was pedaling. I'm sure it was just adrenaline, but I could have sworn the first hour was all down hill.

After a couple of hours we were out of the 'burbs and into the country and the peloton had started to thin out a bit. I started coming down from my adrenaline high and settled into the task at hand, that being to ride a hell of a long distance. Also about that time I started realizing that with the heat, humidity and excitement of the start, I had let myself get dehydrated. 50 km into a 1200 km ride and I was already getting cramps and feeling nauseous, telltale signs of dehydration. So I told Kelly I needed to back off on speed some and do my best to get caught up on fluids and look forward to the setting of the sun and the cooler temperatures the night would bring.

Kelly and I arrived at the Mortagne-au-Perche food stop, about 140 km in, just after the sun had gone down. I was still feeling pretty crappy at that point, but taking a couple minutes to down a Coke helped a lot. Not long after we left Mortagne-au-Perche I started feeling better.

The night was a blur. Riding at night is always a blurry affair for me. The darkness becomes a tunnel surrounding me and the patch of road that's illuminated by my trusty B&M IQ Cyo headlight. When there's nothing else around for reference, that illuminated patch of road could be in France, Washington or on the moon (except that I'm pretty sure there are no paved roads on the moon). It all looks the same. But every once in a while we'd roll through a small village looking like it had been in suspended animation for three or four hundred years. No Circle Ks or 24 hour Safeways. Nope, we were definitely not in Kansas anymore, Toto. And amazingly, no matter what time it was (2:00am? Sure! 4:00am? Why not!) there would be someone cheering us on from the front door of their house. "Bonne Route!" "Allez, Allez!" they'd say, as if they had nothing better to do. Don't they have late night TV in France?

At 1:26am we arrived at the first control in Villaines-la-Juhel, about 222 km into the ride. I think we were there for about 30 minutes, but as I mentioned before, the night was a very blurry affair for me so I'm really sure. I remember thinking that I was feeling a little more beat up than I normally do after 200 km, but generally all systems were go, so after some food and coffee we pressed on.

It was still dark, but the sky was beginning to blush when we arrived at the Fougeres control around 5:30am and 310 km into the ride. At Fougeres we met Kelly's friend, Dave who had started with the first wave. Dave had tried to stay with the lead group as long as possible which turned out to be for the first two hours before he was spit out like like a wad a gum with all the flavor gone. Dave was in good spirits none-the-less and seemed to be getting his flavor back. Based on the stories Dave told of riding with the lead pack, I would have been dropped before most of the other lead riders had broken a sweat.

PBP Ride Report Part I: Never Follow the Italians

Okay, here's one way to look at it... I just rode the most amazing 600 kilometer ride of my life. I crossed the French countryside, passing through beautiful little centuries-old villages and quaint farms with French families along the road cheering me along. I rode with a strong and entertaining riding partner and met and rode with a bunch of other great folks along the way. I ate well at the controls and finished the ride in good spirits. Never mind that the ride was supposed to have been 1200 kilometers... a minor technical detail. Anyway, here's part I of my 600k Paris-Brest (I'm going to break this into at least a couple installments since I know I have a tendency to blather on once I get going on these things).

My first PBP lesson was learned the day before the ride. On Saturday I had to get myself and bike from our hotel in Versailles to the start in St. Quentin-en-Yvelines for the mandatory bike safety check and to get my packet with the brevet card, frame number, etc. Out in front of our hotel I met two guys from Milan who were heading to the same place. I had directions and a map printed out to get me to the start, but since the two Italians said they knew how to get there I figured I'd just tag along. It was a beautiful day as we rode together through Versailles and on along the Rue de la Division Leclerc that took us toward St. Quentin.

About 20 minutes into the ride we passed the turn-off that I had marked on my map, but the Italians kept going straight. I asked if they were sure they knew the way and they laughed and said "naturalmente" and kept riding. About 5 kilometers later I was sure we were way past St. Quentin and I shared my thoughts with my two new Italian friends. They were still convinced they knew where they were going so I bid them arrivederci and did a quick U-turn. After back-tracking for a while I found my way back to St. Quentin and eventually to the start. At the start I ran into some Seattle Rando friends and told them about how I hadn't even started PBP yet and already I had gotten myself lost. From two different people I heard the exact same advice. "Never follow the Italians." Okay, lesson one for PBP could be checked off.

Paris-Brest-Paradise

If you checked the tracking page on the PBP web site, you've already figured out that I abandoned the ride before making my way back to Paris. I developed saddle sores starting around Tinteneac and decide to give it up after I got to Brest. While the last 150 miles or so before Brest were pretty painful, I have to say that overall the ride was nothing less than amazing. I didn't finish PBP, but I was able to ride a bike through nearly 400 miles of the beautiful French countryside and experience much of the indescribable spectacle that is Paris-Brest-Paris.

My backside is now mending as we vacation at a friend's house in Talloires in the French Alps. Talloires is about as close to paradise as one can get on this side of the great divide. We've been having too much fun for me to take the time to sit and write my PBP story. But in a few more days we'll be back home and I'll give a full report. And it will be a challenge. The PBP experience is one of those that can't begin to be captured satisfactorily in words.

Keeping Track

If you're interested in tracking my progress between Paris, Brest and Paris, the official PBP website will tell you when I checked into each control along the way. Go to the tracking page and enter my frame number (#1501).

The plan is to sleep in Brest, then again in Fougeres on the return trip, so don't be surprised if it looks like I'm stuck in either of those places for a long time. Here's a graphical representation of the plan:

Of course plans and Randonneuring go together about as well as Champagne and Cheetos.

Packing for Paris-Brest-Paris

Ok, first off I should point out that if you found this post by googling “packing for paris-brest-paris” and you’re looking for some helpful advice, you may not find it here. I’m sort of stumbling through this. You see, I’ve never taken a bike on a plane before and I’ve never done a randonneuring event outside my home state. I’m used to waiting until the night before the ride to finalize my packing list, when I have a reliable weather forecast in hand. That way I can bring the absolute minimum of clothing necessary to avoid hypothermia. I’m tempted to bring all the bicycling clothes, tools and other gear I own so I can make the final call the night before in France, but if I did that I’d need one of those Victorian steamer trunks to pack into. I’m thinking the airline my charge a bit extra for that.

The bike is already packed up, and it wasn’t too much of an ordeal. I ended up buying myself a fancy bike travel case. It wasn’t cheap, but I’m hoping this won’t be the last time my bike and I travel together by air. And if it turns out I don’t need it again, I can always sell it and get some of my money back. Fitting the bike in the case was a little like trying to put the parts of an Ikea bookcase back in the original box after you’ve assembled it. Eventually it all got in there and I’m able to close the lid and latch it, but it took a few tries. Reassembly in the hotel room in France should be fairly easy as long as I didn’t accidentally leave any parts out and I remember to bring all the right tools along. I’m thinking a bottle of French wine will help the process too.

The weather in France over the past few weeks has been pretty consistent and Seattle-like. So, I’m going to assume that’s what I’ll be riding in and pack my bike clothes accordingly. Basically I’m figuring I need to have just enough clothing with me on the bike to comfortably survive nighttime temperatures down to about 50 Fahrenheit. That doesn’t take a lot, though I have noticed that later in a long ride when I’m really wrung out it’s a little bit harder to keep myself warm. Here’s what I’m planning on wearing/carrying on the bike:

• Wool shorts/Poly Shorts (depending on weather)
• Leg warmers
• Poly base layer
• Poly Jersey/Wool jersey (depending on weather)
• Arm warmers
• Rain jacket
• Reflective vest
• Cycling cap
• Bike gloves
• Wool gloves
• Socks
• Reflective ankle bands
• Sun glasses
• Helmet with headlight
• Bike shoes

For tools and other supplies I tend to bring the same things whether I’m going out for 200k or 1200k, so I didn’t have to put too much thought into this list. This is what I’ll have in my handlebar bag, on my bike or in my pockets:

• Tool kit (multi-tool, chain tool, tire irons, tire patches, tire boots, fibre spoke, knife)
• 2 tubes
• pump
• 2 water bottles
• Sunscreen
• Lip stuff
• Clear glasses
• Space blanket
• Chamois goo
• Phone
• Camera
• Passport
• Money
• Cue sheet
• Spare taillight
• Spare headlight
• Nuun tablets
• Enduralytes
• Ibuprofen

For food, I'm used to mostly foraging in convenience stores along the route. In France I'm not expecting to find convenience stores or if I do find them, I doubt they'll have the kind of food I'm used to eating, so I'll be carrying more food than usual. Well, not food exactly. Call it fuel. But mostly I'm planning to subsist on whatever they have available at the controls and the occasional sandwich jambon from bars along the route. In my bag I'll start with:

• 8 Packages of Shot Bloks
• Enough Sustained Energy for 4 bottles
• 4 Clif Bars

Sarah will bring a bag to Brest with a change of socks, shorts, jersey, gloves and replacements for the Shot Bloks and Sustained Energy. I'll also put a couple spare tubes, tools and few other odd bike parts in there just in case, but I'm hoping I won't need any of that.

That's it. I'm sure I'm forgetting something important, but no doubt it will come to me about 50 miles outside of St. Quentin.

Dreams of Paris-Brest-Paris

The other night I had a doozy of an anxiety dream that just might have had something to do with my upcoming Paris-Brest-Paris experience. It reminded me of dreams I had around finals time in college, you know the ones in which you realize you have a final exam in 15 minutes for a class that you never actually attended. And then as you’re running across campus to the exam you suddenly realize you’re naked…

So in this dream I’m riding on a bus—like a big tour bus—packed full of men in their 40s, 50s and 60s, most sporting gray beards and all wearing full-on randonneuring gear. And it’s not summertime gear they’re wearing; it’s long-sleeve wool jerseys, Showers Pass rain jackets, wool tights or rain pants and neoprene shoe covers as far as the eye can see. Everyone has big warm gloves. They all have helmets on too, with rear-view mirrors clipped on the side and tail lights blinking from the back. Some of them blind me with their helmet headlights when they look my way. I notice that everyone is dripping wet and the air in the bus is thick with the smell of wet wool, sweat and Gatorade. The windows of the bus are completely steamed up.

The bus stops and everyone stands up in the aisle waiting to get off. I’m one of the last in line to get off the bus. When I get off, I see that the bus is parked in a gravel parking lot in front of a very small and plain-looking convenience store. There’s no 7-Eleven or Circle K signage on the front, it’s just a white box looking more like a 1960s Russian grocery store than a modern U.S. convenience store. Inside the store, Randonneurs from the bus are milling around, looking for something to buy and some are already beginning to form a long line at the cash register. I walk up and down the two narrow aisles of the tiny store looking for something to buy, though I’m not hungry at all. There’s almost nothing at all on the dirty metal shelves. I finally grab one of two remaining Reese’s peanut butter cups and get in line. Once in line I notice that everyone around me is speaking a language that I don’t recognize at all and they are all handling some sort of money that I’ve never seen before. I have some of the money too. It has no numbers on it.

Next thing I know I’m outside sitting on the ground near the bus with a large three-ring binder in my lap. The binder is filled with forms that need to be filled out and it’s divided into numerous sections, presumably with one section for each control. The forms are long and tedious and require that I look up information on other forms in the back of the binder, and sometimes I have to find stickers on other pages in the binder and affix them to the correct places on the forms like the Publisher’s Clearinghouse sweepstakes entry forms that Ed McMahon and Dick Clark used to send to my house when I was a kid. Then I realize that some of the forms need to be signed by the clerk in the convenience store. I can’t bear the thought of going back in the store and revealing the fact that I’m the only person on the bus who doesn’t speak whatever language it is that the convenience store clerk and everyone else speak.

Now, I’m back on the bus and the bus is bouncing along down the road and it’s dark out. I’m still filling out the forms from the last control when the bus driver announces that we’ve arrived at the next control. Everyone is up again standing in the aisle waiting to head into the next convenience store. It’s then that I remember that my bike is still back at the last control and that I won’t get credit if my bike isn’t on the bus when I cross the finish line…

PBP: Kind of Like the Tour de France for Old Slow Guys from Seattle

If you're riding in Paris-Brest-Paris and you haven't found your way to the PBP Wiki yet, you should definitely go take a look. It has some great information and tools that can help with your planning.

One section I found to be particularly interesting is the statistics on who from the U.S. is registered. They have a complete list of all U.S. riders along with a bit of demographic information about them. You can go there and see all the details for yourself, but I thought I'd pull out some of the highlights here just for fun. (Yes, I'm one of those nerds who think statistics are big fun. Woohoo!)

In total, 438 U.S. riders have registered for PBP. Not surprisingly, the vast majority are men.

Ages of the riders cover a wide range from 21 to 70. The average age is 50, and a sizable majority (about two thirds) fall between the ages of 45 and 60, clearly supporting the stereotype of randonneurs as a bunch of grumpy old men.

Notice the large anomalous spike in the chart at age 49? I wonder how many of those are people trying desperately to do something meaningful as they cross the half-century mark and begin the long decline into senior discounts and vacations on cruise ships. I suppose you could put me in that camp.

One of the things I've agonized over and still stress about is the choice of a start time. I'm now locked into the 80 hour start, so I might as well get used to it. Here's how the other U.S. riders are lined up for start times.

U.S. PBP riders will be coming from all over the country, but clearly a disproportionate number are from the west coast. California has the largest number of riders with a fifth of the total. Not too surprising since it's the most populous state and much of it has an excellent climate for cycling. But how about this? Washington State is a fairly close second with 12%. Almost every one of those Washington riders is a member of my club, Seattle International Randonneurs. Since the California riders are divided among several clubs, SIR has the largest number of riders by a landslide (64). The next closest club is San Francisco Randonneurs with 43 riders.

I was curious how disproportionate Washington's number of randonneurs is compared to other states, so I compared the number of registered riders in each state with the state's total population. Washington state has 9.37 randonneurs per 1,000,000 of total population (call it "Rando parts per million" or RPPM). That's the highest rate in the country by far. Next is DC (the other Washington) with a RPPM of 4.99. Impressively Alaska ranks third with 4.22 RPPM (but since that's based on only 3 riders total, I'm not sure it means much). Colorado, Montana, California, Oregon and Minnesota all have RPPMs of 2 or more. In the rest of the states, a PBP rider is literally one in a million or less. Ten states had no riders registered for PBP (Delaware, Hawaii, Idaho, Louisiana, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota, Oklahoma, West Virginia and Wyoming).

So what's going on in Seattle that makes randonneuring so popular compared to other parts of the country? I sit here in the middle of the Seattle Rando scene and honestly I have no idea. I mean, the club is fantastic. We have great leadership, volunteers and members. But why here in Seattle where it rains 367 days of the year? I have no theories...

PBP: Rain or Shine

As with all Randonneuring events, Paris-Brest-Paris is a rain or shine proposition. Past PBPs have experienced a wide range of weather. The last PBP in 2007 was probably one of the coldest and wettest on record with near constant rain and night time temperatures in the 40s. The 2003 event on the other hand was warm and dry with temperatures in the 60s to 80s.

Since the weather can be such a huge factor in randonneuring, I've started keeping an eye on what it's doing along the route. Of course, when it comes to weather you never really know what you're going to get until you're in the middle of it, but if Brittany is experiencing a particularly warmer/dryer or cooler/wetter weather pattern than usual over the next month, it may be a somewhat reliable predictor of what we'll encounter during PBP.

To that end, thanks to Weather Underground (www.wunderground.com), below you'll find "Weather Stickers" for each of the PBP contrôle towns. Click on one to go to a more detailed weather report and forecast. But don't blame me if you get rained on in France.

Yakima Heat Camp 400k: "Heat" is a Relative Term

A couple weeks ago I mentioned that I would be riding a completely gratuitous 400k night start brevet. I say "completely gratuitous" because I've already ridden all of my necessary qualifying rides for PBP. This one was purely for the fun and educational value that comes with riding all night over mountain passes.

This ride was part of the Seattle Randonneur's "Heat Camp" which is a collection of rides all starting from a hotel in lovely Yakima. It's usually pretty warm in Eastern Washington this time of year, so the idea was to spend some time getting acclimated to riding in the heat. Nice idea, but as I descended from Blewett Pass at 3:30 am Saturday morning, shivering uncontrollably in the 37 degree wind, all I could think was, "h-h-h-heat c-c-camp my a-a-ass."

Twenty-some people showed up for heat camp, but only four of us chose to ride the 400k. On my drive into Yakima Friday afternoon, I followed the brevet route from Ellensburg to Yakima just to get familiar with it. It was a bit disconcerting since the wind was howling the whole way and I found that for about half the distance between Ellensburg and Yakima the road had just been covered with a brand new coat of chipseal. With fresh gravel a couple inches deep in places, riding the Yakima Canyon road would be about as much fun as riding your typical logging road.

The four of us (Me, Jeff, Dan and Matt) set off into the windy gravelly night at 10:00pm and rode together to take turns hiding from the wind. The trip from Yakima to Ellensburg turned out to be not nearly as bad as I had feared. The wind had died down a bit with the setting of the sun and the chipseal's bark was worse than its bite. We pulled into the first control in Ellensburg at about 12:30.

As we headed out of Ellensburg for Blewett pass, the wind picked up a bit and we were faced with a long slow slog uphill into a cold headwind. The moon had set and we were far from any artificial lights, so all I could see was the rectangle of road lit up by my head light, and about 10 gazillion stars overhead. With the darkness and the headwind, I couldn't really tell how steep it was, or if I was even going uphill at all. I only knew I was in a very low gear moving very slowly and that none of that seemed to change for a very long time. I didn't bother turning on my helmet light to check my speed or the time. I knew it would only depress me.

During the endless climb toward Blewett Pass I slowly pulled away from the other three riders. I slowed to wait for them at one point but I was getting so cold that I decided to keep moving for warmth. I wouldn't see any of them again until I was back in Yakima many hours later.

Eventually the wind started to die down and not long after I found myself on the summit of Blewett Pass. I flipped on my helmet light for a minute to note the time (3:29am), answer the "info control" question on the brevet card (Q: "What's the elevation of Blewett Pass?" A: 4102') and put on my wool gloves. Then I was off for 20 miles of downhill toward Leavenworth. If not for my violent shivering making it difficult to control the bike this section of the ride might have been a lot of fun.

As I approached Leavenworth with visions of a hot breakfast dancing in my head, the sky was beginning to show signs of life.

 

After a slow cruise through L-worth I had to temporarily give up on my hopes for a hot breakfast. Nothing was open. What kind of town doesn't have a 24 hour convenience store?? A Bavarian theme town, that's what kind. So, I pressed on knowing that there was a gas station another miles up the road at Cole's Corner that would be open by the time I got there.

The trip up Highway 2 toward Stevens pass was beautiful with the sun starting to light up the peaks around me. It was still early enough that the traffic was nearly non-existent.

At Cole's Corner, still a long, slow twenty miles away from Stevens Pass, I stopped for that overdue breakfast and to refill my water bottles. Now, I'm not that picky about what I eat when I'm randonneuring. I mean, even a foil wrapped sausage muffin sandwich from under the heatlamp is a very adequate breakfast as far as I'm concerned, still the Cole's Corner Shell station was a big disappointment.

With some "food" and hot beverage in my belly I pressed on for Stevens Pass, feeling quite good and happy to have survived the night.

The climb to Stevens Pass from the east isn't terribly steep but it does run on a bit. The day was in full swing and the Highway 2 traffic was starting to pick up by the time I finally made the summit, about 8:30. It was cold, but not nearly as bad as Blewett had been the night before. This was the turn-around point and halfway to the end of the ride, though I kept my celebrations pretty low-key since halfway still meant over 125 miles and another 4,000 ft. mountain pass.

The trip back down to Leavenworth was fast and fun, though I'm not terribly fond of Highway 2's lack of shoulder. Cars come flying by at 60 - 70 mph, not willing to give an inch to some crazy guy on a bike trying to find a safe haven between the crumbled shoulder and the speeding traffic.

After an honest-to-goodness sit down lunch in Leavenworth at the Subway with a tankard of their finest Mountain Dew it was time for Old Blewett Pass, the last big climb of the ride. The sun was finally above the hills and the day was starting to feel like July in Eastern Washington.

As I mentioned in my earlier post, I've been looking forward to riding Old Blewett Pass for a while. It didn't disappoint me one bit. The road is barely wide enough for two cars and it winds around ridges and gullys as it climbs at a fairly consistent 5% - 6% through the trees. I was passed by maybe two or three cars the entire time I was on old road.

Paul and Noel, two SiR volunteers had set up a nice little rest stop at the top of the pass and offered me water (which I needed desperately), a bite to eat and a few minutes to sit without having to turn the cranks. But I didn't sit around for long. I knew from Old Blewett Pass the rest of the route was almost all downhill and I was anxious to get on to it.

After a long gentle downhill run, there's a little ridge that the highway climbs over before you get some more downhill into Leavenworth. The climb only lasts three miles, but it seems like a lot more after 200 miles and three mountain passes. And just to rub it in a bit, about halfway up, the Washington Dept. of Transportation remind you that you still have a good chunk of riding ahead before you'll be back in Yakima with a cold beer in hand.

On top of the ridge outside Ellensburg is one of those enormous wind farms that seem to be popping up like dandelions across eastern Washington. Of course, they put the wind mills there for a reason. As I topped the ridge, I was blasted by a warm wind. Luckily the road and the wind were both heading for Ellensburg so I was able to ride like a pro for the next 15 miles, easily averaging 30+ mph all the way into town.

After the penultimate control stop in Ellensburg, the wind continued to push me on through the freshly chipsealed Canyon Rd nearly all the way back to Yakima. I rolled into the finish at the Clarion Hotel at 5:49pm feeling darn fine all things considered.

Over the last few miles I thought a lot about my upcoming trip to France. This 400k was a good test of what the first part of PBP might be like. I rode through the night just like I'm planning to do in France on the first night. I maintained a pace of about 5 hours per 100k, which is what I'm shooting for in France. I finished feeling like I could probably maintain the same pace for another 200k if I had to, which I'll need to do to get to Brest. So, I think it bodes well for my PBP plans.

Thanks to Maggie and Eric for hosting the Yakima Heat (snicker, snicker) Camp! I had a fantastic time. And Thanks Paul and Noel for feeding and watering me on a mountain top in the middle of nowhere!

Looking Forward to a Bumpy 400k

The past month, since I rode the Tahuya Hills 600k, has felt like a vast empty Randonneuring desert. This time of year is generally pretty densely packed with brevets. Just as I'm beginning to feel recovered from one brevet I'm usually gearing up for the next. But for the past three and a half weeks I've been staying close to home and doing just enough riding to keep myself from getting fat.

So, it feels good to finally have another brevet on the horizon. On Friday, July 8 at 10pm I'll be starting a 400k over in Yakima (aka, "Yaki Vegas"). Yes, the ride starts at 10pm. At night. I guess the idea is to get some practice with a night start since most of us bound for PBP this summer will be starting in the late afternoon or evening. I've done a couple long rides that started at night and thoroughly enjoyed them both. Of course, I mean "enjoyed" in the Rando sense of the word, which is to say I finished the rides alive and didn’t suffer too horribly. I usually have enough adrenaline pumping during the first few hours of a ride to keep me from getting sleepy, and by the time that wears off the sun should be up. Also there is something magical about riding on remote roads in that space between when the last drunk has finally made it home (or at least has passed out in the back seat somewhere), and when the darkness loses its grip on the night to the sound of birds and the eastern glow. Many of my fondest Randonneuring memories come from times like that.

Yakima 400k Route

This definitely won’t be an easy 400k course. It’ll start in Yakima and head north through the Yakima Canyon to Ellensburg. I’ve ridden the Yakima Canyon before and it’s a beautiful road along the river, deep in the canyon, that climbs ever so gently as you head north. This should put me in Ellensburg around midnight when hopefully most of the drunk drivers are still safely in bars (or behind bars). From Ellensburg the route climbs up and over Blewett Pass to Leavenworth. I’m really looking forward to the run down the north side of Blewett in the wee hours with no cars on the road. If all goes well, the eastern sky should just be beginning to blush as I roll into Leavenworth. From Leavenworth it’s on up Highway 2 to the summit of Stevens Pass, definitely not my favorite cycling road with semis and motorhomes blasting by every few seconds. At Stevens Pass summit we’ll turn around and head back to Yakima basically doing the same route in reverse, except that we’ll use the Old Blewett Pass highway on the return trip. The old highway is a little shorter, but also a bit steeper and windier. I’ve never ridden the Old Blewett Pass highway and I’ve wanted to for a while, so that’s the other part of this ride I’m really looking forward to. I should be pretty wrung out by then, but at least from the summit the remaining 65 miles into Yakima are nearly all downhill.

Ride Profile

I’ll consider any finish in less than 27 hours (that’s the limit) to be a win for this ride. With three big climbs (over 12,000 feet total) I definitely won’t be trying to do a time or keep up with any fast groups. This will be an at-my-own-damn-pace ride.

PBP: Registered!

I did it! Yep, just moments ago I submitted my registration for PBP 2011. A few mouse clicks, a little typing, a 110 euro charge on the old Visa card and it's done. The PBP organizing board immediately sent me an email confirming my registration, saying something about being allotted a "frame badge" (whatever that is) and wishing me, "a good training, and a safe and enjoyable PBP!" Wow, those guys must have been just sitting there at their computer waiting for my registration!

After lots of agonizing and discussion with fellow randonneurs, I decided to register for the 80 hour start. I also talked my friend Kelly--who I rode most of the Cascade 1200 with last summer--into doing the 80 hour start with me. Why on earth choose an 80 hour start when you can wait a couple of hours and have an extra 10 hours to complete the ride? Well, for all of the reasons I discussed in my previous post about start times. I still think a night start will work best for me. We shall see.

The ride plan at the moment is to ride straight through from Paris to Brest without a sleep stop. Assuming nothing catastrophic happens, we should make it to Brest in the late evening, a good time to sleep. We'll eat, sleep for a few hours, then set out early the next morning, probably before sunrise for the return trip. Again, barring disasters or horrendous headwinds, we should have enough time for another generous sleep stop somewhere on the return trip.

It wasn't long ago that I was seriously worried about my ability to finish the qualifying rides, but they're all done now and there's nothing left between me and PBP but 65 jours 18 hours 26 minutes 15 seconds. But then who's counting?

Tahuya Hills 600k: There's Always Plan B

First the good news: This weekend I finished the Tahuya Hills 600k brevet. This 600k completes a Super Randonneur series for me, but far more importantly it means I’m now fully qualified to ride in PBP 2011 (good thing since we’ve already paid for plane tickets). Ironically, I rolled into the final control exactly three months (give or take an hour) after the FOOSH on the beach that nearly derailed my PBP plans.

As I mentioned last week, I was planning to ride with the Charly Miller team on this ride. The team had a detailed schedule worked out that included riding through the night and got us through the 600 kilometers in about 25 – 26 hours. With lot’s of rolling hills similar to the PBP route, this would be a great test of what the group was capable of.

The ride started in downtown Seattle near Safeco Field at 6:00 AM. The sun was already up and there was nothing but blue sky from horizon to horizon. After a few quick twists, turns and a drive-by of the people already lined up to get into that night’s U2 concert at the stadium (and people think randonneurs are crazy) we were on our way across the I-90 bridge. Early on everyone was bunched up and riding fast, so the team got scattered and wasn’t able to work together. But by the time we were into May Valley, about an hour into the ride things had sorted out. The team was riding together and consisted of Robin, Greg, Bob, Bill, Ken, James, Alex, Ian and me. For the next couple of hours we were moving along well, using a rotating pace line whenever the traffic would allow it. We got to the control stop in Buckley a little before 9:00. We were right on schedule and we did a good job getting in and out of the control quickly.

Not long after Buckley we found ourselves on quiet roads that allowed us to use the rolling pace line well. Unfortunately for me, we were using it a little too well. We were moving along for long stretches at well over 35kph (22 mph). I think that’s when I first started to realize that this group was a little over my head. I knew I couldn’t keep a pace like that for 600 kilometers. I suggested to others in the group that maybe we were going a little too fast, but they all seemed pretty comfortable with the pace, so we blazed on.

We maintained a similar pace most of the way to Packwood, 200k into the ride, arriving at about 1:10. Seven hours ten minutes is the fastest 200k I've ever done, so definitely not a good way for me to be starting a 600k. After a "leisurely" break at Packwood--about 13 minutes during which I wolfed down a convenience store mini pizza and a chocolate milk--we were back on the road. With a light tailwind and a long slight downhill for the next 30 miles to Morton we were quickly back to a... um, spirited pace. After Morton we turned south and did some climbing on Centralia-Alpha Road. It was somewhere along that road that things started turning bad for me. My stomach was the first to protest. Maybe the pizza back in Packwood wasn't such a good idea (do you think?). Maybe I was low on electrolytes. Whatever the reason I started feeling nauseous. And then I started getting cramps in my thighs whenever I hit the slightest incline or tried to accelerate. We were now about 300k and eleven hours into the ride. We had a control stop in Centralia, about 20 kilometers away, so I did my best to hang on and not throw up until we got there.

In those last 20 kilometers I decided that I would let the team leave Centralia without me. So after they had all filled their bottles and grabbed a quick bite to eat they were off and I sat down for a few minutes to take stock. 15 minutes of just sitting did me a world of good. I was finally able to eat a little, drink a coke and get back on the bike. I took the next 50 kilometers to the overnight control in Elma at a very comfortable pace. My legs were still cramping badly whenever I tried to push hard, but I was able to keep moving. I arrived at the overnight control in Elma at about 8:35pm.

When I arrived in Elma, the CM team was still there but getting ready to get back on the road to ride on through the night. I had actually been looking forward to riding through the night, but since I was still having bad cramping problems, I decided it would be safer to stay Elma for a few hours to try to get some sleep. Gary, Bob and Bill had arrived with the rest of the team but had all decided to stay for some sleep and then head out at 4:00am the next morning. I ate, showered, set an alarm for 3:30am, and then tried to get some sleep.

Bill, Gary and I left in the dark at 4:00am (Bob left early because he wasn't able to sleep). I was feeling much better than the night before, but I was still pretty rung-out. Obviously the previous day's pace was a too much for me.

The rest of the ride from Elma, through the Tahuya hills and up and down the Kitsap peninsula was fantastic. The hills were non-stop, and some pretty darn steep, but they didn't bother me much since the pressure to "do a time" was off. The majority of the day was spent on shadow-dappled roads with no cars to be seen.

Bill went ahead at some point and we met up with a couple of other riders here and there, but mostly I rode with Gary. We traveled at a comfortable pace and took time for ice cream, sandwiches, soup, and more sandwiches at several stops along the way.

We rolled into the finish a little before 3:30pm. Our trusted RBA, Mark was there to greet us offering cold beer, hot pizza and congratulations. Lynn was offering massages at the finish, which I would have loved to taken advantage of, but having been away from home far longer than expected already, I decided to pass on the massage and catch the next ferry for home.

Epilogue: My solo ride from Centralia to Elma and the casual pace all day on Sunday gave me a lot of time to think about PBP and the Charly Miller goal. I've decided to give up on the goal and embrace a kindler and gentler PBP. Since this will be my first (and quite possibly only) PBP, I've come to think it would be wrong to spend my time on the ride staring at the rear wheel of one of my teammates when I could instead be meeting other riders, talking to the locals, enjoying French pastries, and snapping pictures of the French countyside. If I ride PBP again someday, I suspect I'll get caught up once again in the idea of trying to make the Charly Miller Society, but for my first time, I'm ready to just ride my own pace and soak it all in.

To my former teammates, I'll be cheering you guys on in France. I think you have a great chance of making your goal. You're a bunch of great riders and good people to hang out with. I've learned a lot over the past few months. I hope to see you on the road in France when you blow by me.

Tailwinds and Sunshine

(Sorry about the photos. I touched the lens with a schmutzy finger and didn't notice until after the ride.)

Pine Canyon Rd. a.k.a "the Orondo Grade"

Yesterday was a good day. Not only did I complete a 200k brevet--my first solo brevet since FOOSHing myself two months ago--but I did it under warm sunny skies, with friends, and with the wind at our backs for much of the last half of the ride. It doesn't get any better than that.

The ride started and ended in Wenatchee as part of SIR's "brevet week" a.k.a Northwest Crank. NW Crank is a several days long cycling orgy with a full Super Randonneur Series worth of brevets and as well as a bunch of other "normal" rides. Sarah, Adam and I just went over for the 200k. Actually, I went for the 200k while Sarah and Adam went for the mini golf in Leavenworth.

It looked like there were about 25 of us at the start of the 200k. Several of the other riders had already ridden a 600k and a 300k earlier in the week. There was a lot of talk about the wind on the earlier rides. Apparently both rides had become horrendous slogs into cold headwinds. I heard stories of riding at 10kph on flat ground for hours at a time. Sounds like fun.

But Saturday's forecast was for calm winds and clear skies. It was chilly as we rolled out at 7:00am, but nothing that couldn't be overcome by pedaling harder.

Bread Pudding 200k

The ride headed up highway 2/97 to Orondo, about 15 miles up the Columbia river. I led the pack for most of this stretch since I was feeling strong and having aerobars on my bike makes it much easier to lead than to follow. At Orondo the route turned east on highway 2 and started climbing up Pine Canyon. Highway 2 climbs 2,000 ft here in about 6 miles, so I knew this would be a good test of how much fitness I had lost in the previous two months. I started the climb with Robin, Bill and Michael. Robin and Bill are on the Charly Miller team, and Michael is someone I've ridden with on previous rides. These guys are all strong riders, but I've never had a problem staying with any of them before. I was dropped like a brides panties on her wedding night. Either these guys were doping or I had taken a big step backward in my fitness.

About an hour later I caught up to Robin and Bill at the first control in Waterville. Thankfully they decided to sit down at the coffee shop for some bread pudding and a cup of coffee. (This 200k is named the "Bread Pudding 200k" in honor of this coffee shop's bread pudding.) I joined them and we had a nice civilized little break, far better than the usual chocolate milk outside a convenience store.

Bill and Robin pulling away as we start up the Orondo Grade

At this point the ride entered a new world of rolling wheat fields. I was reminded of riding through this same stretch last year with Kelly on the Cascade 1200 and how amazed we were by the vastness of it (it's still vast, Kelly). On the rolling hills it was a little hard for me to ride smoothly with Bill and Robin since they were faster on the ups, and the aerobars made it difficult for me to draft them on the flats and downhills. But they rejected my suggestions to leave me behind and were committed to staying with me for the full ride.

Bill and Robin pulling away again. This time Sagebrush Flats.

After a screaming descent into Moses Coulee we headed south toward Ephrata on a beautiful quiet road. There was a bit of a rolling climb before heading down into Ephrata and again Robin and Bill left me in their dust. But again, they were waiting for me at a the control in Ephrata, this time the more typical chocolate-milk-on-the-sidewalk situation.

From Ephrata the ride was mostly flat and uneventful, through farmland, and on roads as straight as an arrow. I was really starting to poop out at this point so I did more than my share of wheel sucking. Robin and Bill slowed down so I could stay with them and happily dragged my unfit butt along. Through this section we had some tailwinds so even though I was dragging, we were often moving at better than 20 mph.

Straight as an arrow

As we approached the Columbia River we were treated to a nice 40mph descent which was a little scary since I'm still getting used to the whole aerobar thing. Once down to the river we had a few more easy miles back to the start at the Inn at the River in East Wenatchee. We rolled in a few minutes before 3:00 making for a sub 8 hour 200k. Not bad for being out of shape (never mind that without Robin and Bill's help I would have finished about an hour later).

Robin and Bill dragging me home

With this 200k in the bag I'm back on track to qualifying for PBP. I obviously have some work to do to get back in shape if I want to make a time at PBP, but at this point my wrist isn't holding me back as much as my general fitness. I'm hoping to ween myself off the aerobars after the 400k in two weeks.

Risk of Cycling: Broken Arm

After six weeks of feeling pretty pessimistic or at least anxious about my hopes for riding PBP this summer, things are looking decidedly up. My cast came off last Wednesday. Initially I was pretty concerned about the soreness and lack of mobility in my wrist, but day-by-day it's getting better. It's far from back to normal, but it's improving enough that it seems conceivable that it could be 100% by the time PBP rolls around.

I asked my Dr. when he thought I might be able to get back on a bike, and he tilted his head in a doctorly way and said, "let's see how it feels in a couple of weeks." Then I told him that I rode 300k last Saturday. I got the tilted head look again, plus a doctorly furrowed brow. Then I said, "Look... I'm going to start riding right away. So what are the risks?" We talked about risks for a while and basically it came down to this: The greatest risk is that I'll crash and re-break my arm. I pointed out that every time I go for a ride there's a risk that I'll crash and break something. My good Dr. didn't really have an argument for that, and more or less agreed that I might as well start riding right away.

I felt good enough on Friday to ride to work as a little test. The test went well so I decided to push it a little harder and went for a ride around Lake Washington this morning. My wrist definitely felt every bump in the road, but I finished the 50 mile ride feeling like I could keep going. A good sign. I was careful to take it easy on the ride and never really put a lot of stress on my wrist. Actually I sort of had no choice other than to take it easy since I seem to have lost some fitness over the past month and a half (anybody seen it?). Luckily PBP is still over four months away. That should be plenty of time to get back in shape assuming I don't crash and break something (which, as my doctor pointed out, is a risk faced when riding a bike).

One of the things I've done to make it easier to get back on the road is, I installed some clip-on aerobars on my bike. The aerobars allow me to take weight off my wrist and put it all on my forearms. I never really thought of myself as an aerobar bar person before. I usually think of colorful lycra and funny helmets when I think of aerobars, you know? But I have to admit that they work quite well once you get used to them. I doubt if I could have done the 50 mile ride this morning without them. So, I guess I'll just try to ignore the cognitive dissonance of aerobars on a 1982 Trek with a Brooks saddle and fenders, and keep using them until my wrist is back in shape.

Still Limping Along Toward Paris

I pre-registered for Paris-Brest-Paris this morning! With my pre-registration and a €30 fee I've tentatively locked in a place at the start in August. Now I just need to complete the four qualifying brevets of 200k, 300k, 400k and 600k.

Ay, there's the rub. At the moment my left arm is still in a cast, and the brevet season is in full swing. I missed SiR's first 200k brevet a couple weeks ago and next weekend is the 300k. I'll still be in the cast next weekend, but I've decided to give the 300k a go anyway. I can't support much weight with my wrist and definitely can't squeeze a brake lever with my left hand, so a normal bike is out of the question. Luckily my friend, Amy has generously offered the back seat of her tandem. We're messing around with the set up, trying to create a position for me that keeps weight off my wrist and is tolerable for 300k. I've never gone into a brevet with more apprehension, but if I want to ride PBP this summer I have to take some chances.

The course for the 300k looks good. It's not too tough, no bumpy dirt roads (which would really mess with a broke wrist), and it covers a lot of familiar terrain.

The weather forecast is pretty meaningless this far out, but for what it's worth it's currently calling for partly cloudy skies on Saturday. I'm hoping for a break (no pun intended) from the velo/weather gods since this ride will be challenging enough without crappy weather.

P.S. Don't tell my orthopedic surgeon what I'm up to next weekend!

FOOSH!

What's FOOSH, you ask? FOOSH is the sound that a big goal or dream makes as it rapidly deflates. FOOSH is also an acronym used by the medical profession that stands for "Fall On OutStretched Hand" and is often the cause of a wrist fracture. And it's a shockingly powerful energy mint.

This weekend Sarah and I went to the Oregon coast with some friends for a fun relaxing weekend on the beach. Saturday afternoon while Troy, Dave and I were walking on the rocky jetty at the end of the Nehalem spit, I slipped on a rock and landed on... you guessed it, my outstretched hand. On impact it made a sickening muffled crunch noise like breaking a 3/4 inch stick wrapped in a piece of flank steak. I knew before I looked at it that it was broken. But I still had to look, and a quick inventory told me that I had one new elbow in middle of my left wrist that didn't belong there.

The next thought that entered my mind a half second after the realization that my arm was broken was the realization that my chances for making the Charly Miller society at this summer's PBP were also broken. I let out a stream of obscenity that caused nearby barnacles to blush.

From where I fell we had to walk a couple miles to where Sarah was able to meet us with the car. As we walked, my friends Troy and Dave tried to convince me that I would still have time to recover from this injury and train for PBP. I appreciated their efforts to cheer me up, but finishing PBP in 56:40 was always going to be a long shot. This injury will probably keep me off the bike for at least 4 - 5 weeks. Then it will take me a while to get some strength and mobility back in my arm, not to mention regaining the cardiovascular fitness and leg strength I'll lose while I'm off the bike. I haven't given up hope completely on PBP yet, but at this point just finishing may be my new stretch goal.

Geeking the Numbers: PBP Training Plan

I mentioned a couple weeks ago that I'm putting together a highly scientific, NASA-approved training plan to try to get my aging carcass in shape for this summer's attempt at the Charly Miller Society. To be honest, it's not really NASA-approved. No men in short-sleeved white dress shirts in Texas or Florida have even looked at it. Yet. And while it may be scientific, I don't really fully understand the science. I just stole a lot of the ideas from others who I'm hoping understand the scientific part better than I do.

Really, all I've done is read a bunch of what other people have to say about training for ultra cycling events and then I mixed it all together in my osterizer of a brain, and I drew a pretty picture.

The basic idea is that beginning in a couple weeks I'll start doing some interval and hill training in addition to my usual daily commute, and my weekend rides will start getting a bit longer and more intense. The intervals will start off pretty easy but they will slowly ramp up in intensity until late July when I'll be doing things that will literally make my head spin.

What are intervals? Basically they are periods of intense activity alternating with periods of recovery. The idea is that you can train at higher levels for greater lengths of time if you break it into small intervals and allow yourself to recover between the intervals. It obviously works well because intervals have been integral to professional athletes' training plans for many years.

On paper it all looks simple and easy and great fun. Of course if it was really that easy we'd all be like Alberto Contador except that most of us wouldn't test positive for clenbuterol.

The Joys of Not Training

As I mentioned a few days ago, I've been putting together a serious racer-boy type training plan to get myself into shape for PBP in August. I'm still researching and figuring out the details, but I have enough figured out to know that it's a little too early for me to be ramping up the hard training yet. The serious training will start in about three weeks. From then until the beginning of August, almost all of my rides will be with a purpose.

So, in the meantime I'm appreciating the fact that I can just go for a bike ride on a beautiful sunny Sunday and ride for the love of riding (and eating of course). I can even stop by the lake for a snack (careful to not let those waterfowl get any of my Fig Newton crumbs) and enjoy the view without paying attention to interval schedules and heart rate monitors.