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Wednesday, July 19, 2006

STP: Seattle To Portland Classic 2006

Thanks to a comment by a user and encouragement by my girlfriend, I ended up doing it. I knew that it was going to be difficult and it was; at the same time, I found out that I could ride much faster and longer when riding with a group. I also discovered that you don't need to spend a lot of money on a bike to compete with the big boys.

I only got 3 or 4 hours of sleep but felt OK when I left the starting line near Husky Stadium at 6:30am on Saturday. There were so many people there (9000 registered riders) that someone was always in front or in the back. I started riding at a medium speed (17-19mph) for the first few miles. Soon we were on Lake Washington Blvd. and then Seward Park. I was going to stop for a pit stop there but the line to the bathrooms was too long so I kept going. Here's the bad part about not getting enough sleep: I don't remember too much after that. I can usually visualize the route I ride almost as if I had been holding a video camera all along, but this time my memory failed me. I remember riding alongside a straight road lined by offices and warehouses south of Renton--that was right before we got to the first food stop at REI in Kent, where I ate a banana and a peanut butter/jelly wrap. From there I don't remember much of anything until we got to Centralia 75 miles later, except for a couple of conversations I had with riders, tagging along with a couple of groups of riders that (temporarily) passed me, and stopping at two more food stops.

I have to say that riding fast with other bikers was the most fun aspect of this ride. First of all, I rode my old VolksCycle that I purchased on Craigslist for $30 last year. This Japanese (I originally thought it was German) workhorse will not give up and will not break down. I took it instead of my Six13 because I hadn't yet received a shorter stem for it that I ordered a few days before the ride. Given the long distance, I wanted to be comfortable on the bike, and the (at least) 25-year old Volkscycle fits me perfectly.

Even though it weighs about 23 pounds, I was able to keep with other riders who had bikes worth thousands. I'm glad I got the Six13 however because I've noticed I can go faster on it, especially on hills and sprints. Just this past Thursday I was barely able to keep up with the pack during my first race. So I think the only reason I was able to keep up with most, but not all riders who were going fast was because my speciality is long distance a la marathon running.

Map created by GPSVisualizer.com
Tracks:
- 20060715-141206
- 20060716-133620


I think I stopped two more times and then made it to Centralia by 1:30pm. I immediately bought a spaghetti dinner for $5 and relaxed for a few minutes. The last quarter of the ride was rough on the legs. I then got my bag which I left at the start line (it was dropped off in Centralia by a truck) and set out a tent in a field on the grounds of a community college. The town itself is very small and it didn't look like there was much there besides the college, houses, and a couple of stores. There was a small beer garden nearby where the Tour de France was being shown and I hung out there for a couple of hours. Somehow it got late really fast and I went to sleep before sunset.

I got up at 4:30am and ate a very good pancake-and-scrambled-eggs breakfast. I was off by about 6am. It was pretty chilly outside (55F?) and it took me a couple of miles to warm up. The ride from Centralia to Portland was a little more scenic--more farms and open fields, but it didn't really get scenic until we crossed the Columbia River in Longview across a huge suspension bridge. Then it was boring again until about 10 miles from Portland where we could see Mt. Hood and the outline of downtown. By then, and actually a couple of hours earlier, it had gotten very warm and I knew I'd be sunburned because I didn't have any sunscreen on (didn't feel like stopping for it).

Throughout the ride, I tagged along with other fast riders and went even faster than the previous day. The difference between riding alone and with a group is tremendous. First of all, it's harder to push yourself riding alone whereas in a group you have competition. Secondly, the drag behind riders makes a huge difference and riding first in the group takes a lot more energy.

I was riding mostly solo the last 20 miles or so until I caught a couple of guys with about 5 miles to go with whom I rode to the finish line where there were lots of people cheering. I was pretty tired by then and drank lots of water, ate, and took a shower. I hung out in Portland with my girlfriend the rest of the day and the following day. Nice city!

Unfortunately I don't have any pictures from the ride because my camera is too heavy to carry with me on the bike and I forgot to take pictures in Centralia and at the finish line.

In summary, this was a great ride: it was well organized, it was tough, and perhaps most importantly for me, it was a very good learning epxerience.



Total: Seattle to Portland (STP) Classic 2006 (07/15-07/16); 201.69mi Bike Ride; 17.4 mph avg.; 11:36:49 moving time; 9260 cal

1 Comments:

Blogger Elizabeth said...

Congratulations. I’m very proud of you, especially for doing this at the last minute without training much at all beforehand. It’s great that time goes by so much faster when you’re with a group. I guess that means you can go twice as far?

July 26, 2006 at 11:14 AM  

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