Tuesday, May 31, 2011

2011 Mountains of Misery

MOM Finish at the Top
Sunday May 29 may go down as the hardest day of biking in my life.  The Mountains of Misery 104 mile ride in Blacksburg VA is a very up and down course with at least 3 or 4 ridiculous climbs, and a bunch of others.  Did I mention how hard it was?

Dan Wolfe and I headed down Saturday afternoon and camped over night.  Perfect night for camping, as the weather got down to around 60.  Surprisingly, I got a good nights sleep.  And I am very fortunate to have slept so well.

The ride start has 5 waves at 5 minutes apart.  Wave 3 was our starting block.  Most days, I'm not even out of bed until close to 8am.  This ride started at 7am and to be honest, I was not at my peak between 7-8:30am.  I started near the front of wave 3, but it couldn't have a been a few miles before I was dead last in the wave.  A look over my shoulder saw wave 4 coming up strong.

I clocked 17 miles that first hour and steadily improved in time.  It was beautiful rolling country side.  100 miles on that terrain would really be a great ride.  The first 60 miles was similar, and then it pretty much comes to a close.  The first ridiculous climb is around mile 60.  To be honest, I think this was the toughest hill I've ever climbed.  There have been steeper ones, like Blue Ridge Mountain Road, but this was longer and at parts steeper.  It took a lot of energy to get up that hill.  Some dude was hurling on the side of the road halfway up.

On the other side was an amazing downhill.  There were several screaming downhills that you really needed to be careful.  I only posted 44 as a max speed, but it could have been quicker.  Too many turns going down the mountain to really stay off the brakes.

Now the up and down starts to drag on you a bit.  There is a gorgeous canopy enclosed country road that goes for miles and miles.  I was wondering if that road would ever end.  It was truly a gorgeous segment.  I remember a 10 mile loop area that starts out rolling, then has some difficult climbs and one really gnarly 60 yard stretch.  As I rolled up to that segment I didn't even try to ride up it.  It was like looking at a wall.  Walking up wasn't difficult, but I just wasn't willing to exert that much energy on the bike knowing I still had ~35 miles to go.

Elevation Chart
The rest stops were about every ~15 miles and I took my time at each one of them to eat, drink and stretch.  The volunteers were awesome, especially one lady at the last rest stop (more on her soon).

After mile 80 there is some more uphill that really isn't too pleasant.  But then the best downhill ever.  It must have been close to 5-7 miles of downhill.  It wasn't steep, just a good rolling downhill where you didn't have to pedal at all and you could cruise at about 25mph.  Really enjoyed that.  And it turns out that's the last enjoyable part of the ride.

The last 5 miles of the ride, after you've got 99 miles on your legs already, is the most ridiculous uphill segment ever.  It's not switchbacks where only the turnarounds are steep, it's pretty much straight up.  There is no reprieve, no rest, no level spots.  I made it without too much effort (ha) for the first ~3.5 miles.  It did take quite a bit of dedication to keep chugging along in 1st gear at 2 or 3 mph.  OK, it was hard.  I made the last rest stop and some dude told me I looked comatose.  After 30 seconds when I could speak, I told him I was just "concentrating".

There was a lady here who was fantastic.  She pours water on you, puts a towel on you, walks you to a chair, refills your water bottles, hands you something to drink, and some other dude takes your bike.  It really was awesome treatment and I guarantee everyone getting to that point needs it.

So this rest stop is about 1.25 miles from the finish.  One would hope there was some reprieve from the steepness but there isn't any.  I made it almost another .5 mile and then shut it down.  I'm not sure if I would be typing this blog if I toughed it out.  I was thinking that I have a family to return to and I wasn't quite sure what would happen if I put forth the amount of ch'i that was required to make it to the top.  I do know that I might have made the top, but it would not have been pretty afterwards.

So I walked 1/4 or 1/2 mile until I saw all the people at the top and the photographer.  Some lady was encouraging me and said she'd push.  I said ok and got back on.  She gave quite a push so I finished on the bike.

There was no huge elation feeling at the top, just thoughts about how hard that ride was.  There were a few people who really didn't look too good at the top.  A feast was eaten at the top and eventually I recovered to enjoy the moment.   Fortunately, you get shuttled back down to the starting area where we picked up our bikes and got in the car for the 4 hour drive home.

I don't recommend this ride for the casual rider.  It's hard, very hard, and deserves it's "Mountains of Misery" name.  My total net time was 9 hours 33 minutes.  Riding time was around 7.5 hours.  I placed about 290 out of 500 starters.  MOM results look like ~90 riders didn't finish.

Post ride comments: YouTube Interview

Saturday, May 21, 2011

Relentless - Marshal 57 miles


Saturday May 21 Dan Wolfe and I met up in Marshall VA to tackle the very difficult Blue Ridge Mountain Road and then some to be a tune-up for next weeks Mountains of Misery (MOM) century.  We arrived around 9am and off we went on Rectortown Road.

The beginning of the ride is rolling hills that aren't too bad.  However, the route does not let you warm up much so you're climbing right out of the gate.  It was an absolutely gorgeous day and the country side is impressive, although I stopped noticing later in the ride.

Snickersville Turnpike is 20 miles into the ride.  We took a short break to power up and rest because we both knew what was coming.  Snickersville is quite a climb just getting up to RT 17 and then Blue Ridge Mountain Road.  This is a daunting task and it really is pretty difficult.  You can read this post about an earlier ride on the Blue Ridge Mtn BRM Ride.

We made it the length of BRM (~11 miles) with one relentless hill after another.  The difference with this ride is we took a different route than last time which added multiple climbs after BRM.  We re-filled and had a quick lunch outside the Ashby Inn in Paris.  It's a cute place.

Route 688 was next and the climbs there were difficult, perhaps more mental than physical ... but that is hard to imagine.  Coming around the corners just made me want to cry.  It can be a difficult thing not to panic during these climbs.  I'm tired, sore, and just don't want to tackle another hill.  The mental toughness plays a huge part.  This was only about mile 40 of the ride.

The next 17 miles included a couple more climbs, one of which was unnecessary.  We missed a turn and unfortunately this led us up a big hill.  On the flip-side, we turned around and got to go down it.  I didn't remember it being that big ... it was huge.  Fast fast fast downhill.  I hit a new land speed record on an earlier hill with 46mph.  I may have been able to make 50mph, but I was way out of my comfort zone and started braking.  46mph on a bike through narrow winding country roads is exciting and very scary.

I am happy to say it was a successful prelude to the MOM ride later this week.  I can't imagine MOM being any harder, just a little longer.

Many miles ahead,
K-Lance

Stats
Ride Time: 3 hrs 55 mins
Distance: 57 miles
Avg speed: 14 mph
Max speed: 46 mph

 
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