NoRacer

The BBC is putting on a club century ride tomorrow, Saturday 19 July 2008. I've done it before, but for some reason, I only vaguely remember any of it.

It's entitled the "Blue Ridge Summit Century". We'll be starting at Westminster Elementary School in Westminster, MD.

The ride starts promptly at 8:30am, so be there by around 8am so that you have plenty of time to be ready.

You do not have to be a BBC member to ride, but you do have to sign the waiver sheet.

I found a copy of the cue sheet and mapped the route, including rest stops, here:

https://bimactive.com/ba/ui/route_det...e&m2=findroute

According to the map, there's a little over 6,700ft of climbing (using USGS survey points), so if you're climbing abilities are a little weak you may want to consider using a triple or compact crank and/or a cassette with at least a 27 toothed cog.

maxine

Are you doing this ride, NoRacer? It's going to be hot as blazes tomorrow, be careful!

(I'll be taking my new kayak out for its second trip, so I'll have plenty of opportunity to fall overboard and cool off. )

NoRacer

I'm 90% sure I'll be doing it. I need to replace the tires, tonight, so it depends on how easy that operation goes. Even though I like my Tufo tires, the initial installation can be a bear.

Some of this ride is "back at the scene of the crime" from last weekend's ride. At least, after having mapped it by hand, I have an idea of where I'm going and when the road turns upward. Last weekend, I didn't know anything about the route--poor prep on my part.

FatguyRacer

You all be careful on Catoctin Hollow. I was riding there this morning. From about 1/2 mile to the top at the left onto Wigville to the entrance on the downhill @ cunningham falls park its all gravel. Be very carefull on the descent past Wigville Rd. Fortunaltely there are no potholes, but a bit a loose gravel on hardpack. I was able to get down at 30+, but I live for this stuff. The two others I was riding with took it much much slower.

joshandlauri

Well I did Illchester Rd today to try it out, I started at the railroad tracks at the bottom, all I did was stretch, no other warm up. I feel I got up it pretty fast, it was steeper than expected but at no point did I feel like I wanted to walk. I was in low gear 39-32 all the way up the 18% climb and then went up 1 gear for the rest of the climb until landing road, I had the wife being my "team car" following me up the hill just like that volvo/orbea commercial. Then I decided togo back down that hill, I hit 40+ mph easy, then my heart dropped and thoughts went through my head as I saw blind corners, don't get me wrong I love speed but losing control going over rails into ditch or into cars at 40+ is scary, I slowed down to about 30-33mph the rest of the way down and went to river road where I changed and got back in the car.

I hope to do it at least once a weekend till the TT. I also added 150 feet of climbing to my commute by going
eastern-marlyn-rossville-orems-martin blvd as oppose to all eastern ave.

One more thing I have no idea how long it took to get up the hill as I put my front wheel on backward (dumbass), wife thinks it was just a few minutes, honestly I have no clue but I got up faster than I thought I could.

WJ13US

Josh:

I live right by there and go down it all the time! LOL

Just to let you know the TT is a standing start right at the bottom, so if you want to prepare for it you may want to train that way. Also the finish is right before the church parking lot enterence (the first one)

Good luck.

Bill

joshandlauri

How fast do you go down?

NoRacer

Thanks for the warning, John. Unfortunately, I only just now read it.

The road was as you said. The worst was climbing while passing cars kicked up tons of dust. I went slow on the descent, too, since I started the ride an hour after the rest of the group and I was by myself.

WJ13US

I try not to go too fast anymore, see X-ray. That was not a crash on Illichester but a crash nevertheless.

I usually make a right into the park over the bridge or a left onto Bonnie Brace if I'm doing hills, so I can't go that fast.

Good luck on the TT, I'll be there watching. Look for the guy with a plate in his arm.

Bill

joshandlauri

Sorry to hear about the plate, hope you can get back on the bike soon.

sat:illchester practice for tt
sun:13 miles, some good local climbing, tried to keep the pace up higher, faster uphill, managed to hold about 11mph up the 12% climb.

greaterbrown

GB's century o' the month was last monday. Got miserably lost in DC, but a great ride nonetheless.
Route here: https://www.bikely.com/maps/bike-path/164542 (not public yet cause it needs some fixing)

HC203

Hey Charlie,
You're already gone but I'm heading to Canada for the Route Verte as well. I'm flying up to Quebec City on the 29th . I had planned on riding from Quebec City to Baltimore using NY State bike route #9, but after previewing it this past week while in the Adirondacks I deemed it unsafe, like riding Falls Rd. for 100+ miles, winding, blind corners, too much FAST traffic. The Vermont side looked much better but considering heat in the mid Atlantic and time I've decided to ride from Quebec City to Ottawa by way of Montreal, flying out of Ottawa-Making it up as I go.
Harry

NoRacer

Nice ride GB!

NoRacer

HC, have fun and be careful out there. Take lots of pictures.

FatguyRacer

I hear ya. There was quite a bit of traffic on that road on Saturday. It's usually dead. Apprently I wasnt going as fast downhill as I thought. It lookes like I was in between 26-28 mph going down that gravel road. All I know is my hands were hurting by the time I got to the asphalt.

I'm going back in a couple of weeks. Maybe Saturday on the PPTC ride if I dont go to Lancaster for the Grandview Crit. I will take the hard 2 miles up Wigville/Tower Road to Rt-77 and skip the gravel descent.

My fitness is coming pretty good for 200lbs. I had no trouble getting up Catoctin or Park Center (except for that one section that felt like Illchester) on a 39 inner and a 12-27 casssette. I kept my HR in Zone 3 and low Zone 4 the whole time on both hills. Im sure if I had been doing this day with guys from the team, I would have been toast, but since I had a race on Sunday I kept it on the down low and skipped riding it with teamates.

heres a little snipped from my 50 miler. As you can see from the Entire workout avg speed, it was a very slow active reco day for me.

NoRacer

^^^^^^^
Here's the mountain climbing portion of my solo ride Saturday:

FatguyRacer

Ouch!

I gotta do me a 8000+ ft day sometime soon.

NoRacer

Interesting that my GPS estimated the climbing to be about the same as WKO+. Before using GPS, I always considered WKO+ to be remarkably high. I believe my iBike Aero got more like 7,000ft of climbing, but when processed through WKO+ gained 1,000ft.

The worst part of the ride, though, was in the open under the sun heading back to Westminster.

FatguyRacer

My Polar reports lower than WKO. I asked the WKO guy about this. He said WKO does not smooth and it calculates every ft. Polar may be smoothing the data. I always go by the higher WKO numbers. Makes me feel like I did more.

We were glad to be done too. We started at 8am and even then it was hot, muggy and hard to breath. Once we hit Catoctin Hollow Road it got better. The higher up I went the better I was feeling and the better the air quality and temps. Same with Park Center Dr. The 11 miles of downhill into Thrumont was great. But once we got to the Sheetz in Thrumont it was back to being brutal all the way back to Monacacy Elementary School where we started.

dspaff088

Hey im from howard county... and looking for a few group rides in the next couple weeks before i head down to virginia for school.

Any groups going? or anyone interested in starting one?

cointelpro

Sorry for the semi-jack but I'll be in Howard County for the next week and was wondering if anyone could recommend some places where I could hunt around for an old 80s road bike. I tried going to Race Pace Bicycles today but it was a little too high-end for me and my wallet.

derath

The only place I can think of would be White's in Westminster. But I would call first since that isn't super close.

-D

cointelpro

Cool, thanks derath.

dspaff088

yeah racepace is very overpriced... you could try princeton sports in columbia... but i dont know what they carry as far as 80's bikes. i cant really think of any LBS in the area that carries vintage bikes...

sorry

WJ13US

Have you tried Mt. Airy? They have tons of old stuff. Here's their web site.


https://www.bike123.com/

Bill