Kenny Lucas
Why is it that when I return from a week at the beach I get it completely handed to me on my next ride? It's not the drinking, laying on the beach, floating in the ocean or the pizza that gets me soft, is it? This years completely painful ride was the Patapsco Epic.
There are multiple route options and of course I chose the longest one, the 50 miler. It took a little motivation for me to get out of bed before 6am for the hour ride up to the state park. One bonus was seeing the sunrise which I don't see very often :-)
No worries on the trip up, simple drive and I rolled into the starting point, registered and got on my way. The first few miles were just fine and I was thinking this would be an enjoyable few hours on the bike.
The Bloede Dam project was pretty neat. I had to stop for the picture and video.
 |
 |
I have to say one thing, is this ride had the best aid station food ever. This one had a chocolate fountain running with lots of goodies to dip in it. Another station had sno-cones which I haven't seen before.
I've never ridden in Patapsco State Park before, and I may not do it again. The terrain is relentless, rocky, technical, narrow, rolling, even the the downhills aren't relaxing due to the number of roots, turns and rocks on the trail. There simply isn't anything easy about this ride.
I feel pretty accomplished just given that I stayed vertical the entire ride. There were lots of riders bleeding from their arms and legs.
So through 15 miles I was feeling fine but to be honest, I would have been ok cashing it in at that point. I kept going thinking that maybe the trail would let up a bit. To my dismay, it didn't. I reached the 35/50 mile turnaround point and sat on my bike for awhile while talking to the two volunteers. The 35 mile was a left turn. The 50 was a right turn. My bike was leaning left.
I opted for the 35 so I headed down a power line field and found the next trail. Wait a minute, I know these riders, they were ahead of me. Turns out I missed a turn and found myself back on the 50 mile route, I just found a shortcut! I don't know where I am so I rode with them for awhile until the next aid station. To my delight, beyond this aid station was just a big loop that brought you back. It didn't take much decision making to decide I was going to turn around now.
That turned out to be the 40 mile turn around point. That's about 25 miles more than I wanted to ride. It was a complete death ride on the way back. The trail never got easier, the rocks got bumpier and it was a real struggle to keep it going.
 |
| Really Cool Bridge |
There was this real cool bridge we got to cross. Below is one side of the view from the bridge. Lots of people were out playing in the river. This would be a fun day to take the family.
I couldn't have been happier when I finally reached the end. Red Hot and Blue was serving up some chow that I dove head first in. Lots of riders at the end party that looked a helluva lot fresher than me. I just can't believe how difficult that ride was.
And of course my Garmin died on the course so I have no stats. But it was 40 miles of death in about 5 1/2 hours.
Map: Official Patapsco Map
