HawgFuel

I stayed in Castlerock last year which is approximately 135 miles along the course. I think it was $10 or $15 to camp and they had a $10 all you can eat dinner and breakfast at the school. Made for only a 70 mile ride the second day and I was drinking a beer at the finish line by 12pm Sunday. I'm doing the one day this year!

TBatty

Amtrack has a limited number of bike hooks on the PDX to Seattle run, $5, no disassembly required, conventional diamond frame only. Reserve early to get one. Once the hooks are gone, box your bike and check it, not sure of additional cost, if any. Amtrak website covers their bike policy pretty well.

InTheRain

Actually, you don't have to pay for anything beyond the registration... everything else is your choice. You can sleep in a tent (a lot of people do), you probably want some food (but you eat food when you're at home - so that's a wash), and as far as getting back - you still have the bike right? You don't need a ride back anymore than you needed a ride to Portland.

There is no need to complain. If you don't want to be part of the event because of the cost, you have plenty of options to ride your bicycle 200 miles.

kw

More than likely I'll be volunteering at the finish line for the third year in a row. Good times!

And yes, online registration is $95 and mail-in is one ten, with late fees extra.

CliftonGK1

I took the bus in '08 and actually made an overnight out of my 1-day event. I crashed at a friend's place Saturday night in PDX, then had time for a nice breakfast and caught the first STP bus on Sunday morning.

octopuswithafez

I finally signed up and am rolling all the way to the Big Egg on the 1st day...

redspoke

Coming up from Central California to do my 3rd in a row 1-day STP. I'm getting excited and there's still 4 months to go. Let the Garmin just run from start-finish last year and it took 12 hours 48minutes total. Wanted to get in sub-12hrs but there was a stiff headwind the entire last 50 miles. Here's to hoping it's "hot" like 2008 (no wind).

themuteherald

Are there any other solo riders looking for training partners? A buddy and I are six weeks into the training plan for the one day. We welcome anybody else to meet around the Shoreline/Bothell area for weekend rides.

Also, I know about Cascade's training rides, but I'm looking for something less structured.

See you around the Loop!

irideacenturion

A little late to the convo here, but ...

I'm signed up for the 1 day. I'm excited/a little nervous about it. I know as far as double centuries go STP is considered cake, but 200 miles is still a longggg day in the saddle.

Cliftongk1 (if you happen to read this), when you did your ride in 14.5 hours did you hop onto any pacelines or were you mostly in solo rando mode?

As far as my (completely unscientific) training plan goes, I've got a reasonable base built up so far. I've been riding between 350-450 miles every month since January with at least 2 60-80 mile rides a month and two centuries in there. For May I'm aiming for at least 600 miles, and two 200ks. Then repeat that same sort of mileage in June with a 150 miler mid-way through.

Anybody have suggestions for tweaking that plan?

Jasper Storm

As long as that early-year mileage doesn't tweak your knees, you'll be ok.

Last year I set out with a goal of 12 hours total time, riding solo. I basically started cramping and bonking in the last 40 miles, which caused my rest stop times/food consumption to increase significantly. I had to pull off the road and knead my quads and hamstrings several times. Despite this, I finished in exactly 13 hours total time (85% solo, 15% "unintentional/unavoidable" pacelines.)

It has been my experience that every year something goes wrong for me, but I always have plenty of time to recover. Unless one crashes (rare) or gets heat exhaustion (very uncommon) there is plenty of time to finish before dark (provided that one starts early, of course.)

CliftonGK1

I was rolling solo for 99% of the ride. There was a brief section of SR30 about 15 miles from the finish when a group of people caught me, slipped in for a draft for a little while (they asked first, which was nice), and then kept the pace slow for a while to let me catch a break at the back of the line. But after a couple miles, they sped back up again.