Strava: http://app.strava.com/rides/23630293 (Epic failure - now I'm convinced I need a new one)
Having to do the ride solo (team-wise) today, I figured I'd work on my endurance riding not having ridden much over 60 miles for a while. All the recent running I've been doing has definitely helped build up my conditioning, so I thought this would be a good ride to put it to the test. I would also take advantage of other teams just, but after that got old, I was pretty much on my own some time after mile 40 (more on this later).
When I arrived there, I parked where we parked last year, which is just by the start of the ride. It was nice given that the porta potties were right across the street as well. Of course, my selection of the first porta potty was not ideal. Who misses and craps on the seat? Seriously.
It didn't take me long to get ready, so I lined up just before 7 somewhere in the vicinity of the Descenders. I was hoping they would recognize me and allow me to ride their wheel. Unfortunately, no one did and I just sat there and waited until they let us go with the motorcycle escort to Poway Drive. I was shivering at the start with temps at around 64 degrees, but I stopped by the time I was on Poway Drive for a bit.
Bob Raibert, one of the Descenders, did recognize me as he was passing, but I wasn't sure who he was...so I asked. He was cool and wanted to ride with me, but I told him I'm not planning to charge up the hill and would like to just draft the whole ride if I could. HA HA. I guess he had bigger plans and started to step it up whereas I...well...didn't. Those who ride with me know I don't like starting out hard anyway, so this ride especially will never be where I expect to kill it on the Poway. I'll leave that for the nuttier ones in our group. There was still some mixing it up going up the hill, but only so I can have others to ride with at the top.
At the top, I made it up with a few other Descenders and rode with them for a bit letting them dictate the pace. We did pass a couple guys who latched on and then one of them rode up beside me as I was on the #3 spot and said, "man, you got some serious pistons!" I hope he was talking about my legs. Otherwise...awkward.
Shortly after that, I decided to push up to the front and start to reel people in ahead of us. While there was probably about 10 or so of us in the line originally at the top, after a while there were only 2 behind me. As expected, I was held out for a while up front, but the guy who gave me kudos on my "pistons" eventually took the front while the guy between us held him out for a while. That let the group that dropped off behind us reel us back in and we started working to catch a group of 6 just ahead of us. Of course, when that wasn't happening fast enough, I pushed up from probably the #5 spot and closed the gap. Yay!
Now those guys seemed like they weren't going too hard, but I waited patiently to rotate to the front again. I did make it up to the front and ended up pushing the pace from 21 back up to 25 mph again. I was relieved eventually, and at that point, I decided I'll just ride in the group and wait for the downhill section.
When we finally made our way to the downhill section, there were probably about 15-20 rider, but attrition lowered that down to 5. I was wanting to jump to the front to get to the bottom first, but I opted to just ride with the other 4 for a while until the group behind caught back up.
I was rotating in and doing my share of the work as we made our way to a pretty decent size hill. Then I noticed that one guy fully kitted was starting to break away while others where trying to chase him down. Being pretty warm at this point, I stood up and started to reel the guy in. As I passed the guys chasing him, they jumped on my rear wheel and I sat down and began to spin up even faster making my way to and past the breakaway guy before the top of the hill (he was cool...he gave me props).
On the other side was a downhill, so with my momentum, I ended up breaking away from the group all together and figured I'd try to find my way through the route on my own. After I passed 2 older guys (I ended up waiting at a corner for them just to tell me which way to turn - HA HA). I ended up thanking and passing them again and was on my own for a bit. It was after that when I saw that they actually had orange markers on the ground to show the route. Cool!
I had to make a left not too long after I passed them, so I got caught at the light for a while and some of the people I was riding with earlier caught back up to me. However, when the light turned green and we went left, I went first but another guy with long hair passed me at a pretty good clip. When I looked to see if anyone was going to chase him and saw no reaction, I stood up and chased him down towing the others behind me. He looked a bit surprised when I got on his wheel, and I even took the front to relieve him after. He ended up pushing up front again, and I rotated with him a couple more times even pushing up from the back when I'd see no one giving the guy any relief. After taking a pretty good pull, he was passing me again and the guy behind him says to me "don't you know this guy's a professional?" I responded by saying I was just trying to help, but decided if my non-professional help wasn't good enough, I'll just conform and ride with the group. In my mind, however, I'm thinking professional what?
After a few more miles of riding and being somewhere past 40, we arrived at a SAG station where EVERYONE stopped, including the "professional." I slowed only to see if anyone else was going to keep going, and after realizing no one was put my head down and went into TT mode. I still had 1 1/4 fluids, so there was really no reason for me to stop yet.
Now there were some guys I knew that were still ahead of me from earlier on, including a few Descenders, but one guy in a Jetta kept driving by me thinking I was at the front. In a way, it felt like it but that was just because the guys who were ahead of me had a pretty good gap and I ended up gapping the guys who stopped at the SAG pretty good.
I was riding alone all the way to Coast Hwy and ended up passing regular riders on that road hoping that someone would want to work with me, but that didn't happen. I got on La Costa and ended up hitting a light for the bridge to go over the 5 freeway. I kept looking back beforehand and didn't see anyone at all, so when the light turned green, I decided to relieve myself of some methane only to look back and realize that someone was right behind me when I did. It was hilarious! Now he wasn't a part of the ride, but he did ride my draft for a while. When we passed a Descender fixing a flat (I offered to help to which he declined...they must be experts on it given they have so many...lol), my passenger had dropped. Of course, my immediate thought when I noticed was did he get tired or did the methane toxicity kick in?
I kept on riding on my own but hoped that the one Descender I passed would catch me at a light where we could work together. That never happened, but I did see another Descender (Dave) after a while and reeled him in. Once I passed, he did take my wheel and then took a pull subsequently as well until we hit a light...a nice exchange for about a mile. He was saying he was tired and was just struggling to make it back home where he was saying I'd probably drop him on the hill. I told him I didn't think I would, but once we turned left and as the road pitched up, he was right.
From this point on, it was just me for the rest of the ride. It was getting mad hot as I was going further inland, and I was finally low on fluids just to stay hydrated. I made it to the 80 mile SAG though with no problems (i.e. cramps, dry mouth, etc.). There wasn't really anyone there, so I asked if there were plenty ahead of me and the lady said there was only one who came in before me. Cool. After filling up 1 water bottle, I was gone.
Now I did start seeing other cyclists as I made my way back, but they were all from the 60 mile route. One guy had even stopped and asked me at a light if "we" were at the 50 mile mark. I told him I was doing the century, so I was more like at 90. Curiously, he didn't say anything after.
Not even the 60 milers wanted to work with me, but it was fun just reeling them in one by one. It was MAD hot when we got to Poway (around 96 degrees), so I was going through that water bottle pretty quick. I didn't really slow down though and eventually made my way back to the finish.
Although my Garmin failed on Coast Hwy (it was displaying the diagnostic screen), I think it did capture my total elapsed time for the ride 5 hrs 23 minutes. Based on that, I think my actual average for the ride was around 20.1 to 20.2 based on a comparison for someone who had 5 hrs 26 min elapsed time. It's not a scientific calculation, but good enough. It was also 20 minutes less than last year's elapsed time. Not too shabby.
In customary fashion, I did have a Peroni after the ride and got my free beer (Stone Pale Ale) from the event. While it's more fun to drink with someone after, drinking alone was still fun. Cheers!
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