Week 24

Date
June 15th, 2013

Distance
202 Miles

Time
13:50

Route Map/Profile

Weather

Picture

2013 Terrible Two- Along the Coast

Ride Report
It was a great day for a "Terrible" ride. Temperatures were cool (but not too cold in the morning) and the wind wasn't really a factor except for the portion along the coast where it was mostly in our favor. I'd like to give a big thanks to the Santa Rosa Cycling Club and all the volunteers for putting on a great event. Registration was easy, the support was fantastic, and the post-ride meal was delicious.

I was able to finish the ride with an official (SRCC posted results very quickly) time of 13:50. Moving time was 12:51:58. That's a lot of stopped time. Most of that was planned. I wanted to ride a little bit slower and spend more time at the rest stops in an effort to (a) have more fun and (b) be sure I actually finished the ride. Some of the stopped time was thanks to a flat tire on the Geysers descent.

The ride started out well. Since I wasn't really chasing a time goal, I started out towards the back of the group and didn't worry about losing contact with the fast guys at the front. Things were relatively easy until the first climb of the day, Trinity Grade. I've only climbed Trinity Grade once (in 2011 when I did my first Terrible Two), but for some reason I remembered it well and it seemed very familiar to me. I wish I could say the same for the descent. I misjudged a corner on the descent, and as soon as I did I remembered misjudging the same exact corner in 2011.

After Trinity Grade there are about 40 flat miles until more climbing at Geysers Road. I was lucky enough to latch on to a fast group of guys for that flat section, which saved me a lot of time. Again, I seemed to have a good memory of the 2011 Terrible Two route because the Geysers climb seemed very familiar to me. I didn't get this same type of feeling at the Devil Mountain Double.

I felt good on Geysers, and then I got a flat tire on the descent. I could imagine being super annoyed by the flat tire if I had a specific time goal in mind, but it didn't really bother me today. I was more worried about getting a pinch flat from under-inflating the tire than anything else, but the lunch stop wasn't too far off and I figured they'd have a floor pump there.

I didn't spend much time at the lunch stop- just long enough to pump up my tire and grab some water. I knew that the real difficult part of the ride was coming after lunch. I felt OK on Skaggs Springs. I wasn't going super fast, but I didn't want to tire myself out before the big Rancheria Rest Stop climb. That climb (described on the TT website as "a wicked, 1.7 mile, 900' wall") is the one thing I remember most about the 2011 Terrible Two. On that ride I didn't know it was coming and it never seemed to end. This time I knew it was coming, but it still never seemed to end. I had been climbing pretty well all day, but not on this climb.

I took a long break at the Rancheria stop. I didn't need to take such a long break. The Highway 1 section along the coast was coming up, which is relatively easy with cooler temperatures. It's a good place to take a little bit of a rolling recovery period. However, my whole plan for the ride was to relax and slow down a bit, and Rancheria seemed like the perfect place to do just that.

The rest of the ride went smoothly. The coast was beautiful and provided a few nice tailwinds along the way. The Fort Ross climb didn't really bother me and before I knew it, I was at the last rest stop. As usual, those last few miles between the last rest stop and the finish seemed to take forever. I knew I had a chance to go under 14 hours, so for the first time of the day I was focusing on a time goal. I wasn't stressing out about it, just giving my mind something to focus on for those last few miles.

I finished with a time of 13:50, which is somewhere in the middle of the pack. I did a 12:44 back in 2011. Obviously I have a lot of work to do to get back to that level. It's sad to see those numbers, but let's look on the bright side. I don't know what happened at DMD, but it happened. I went into TT just wanting to finish and get myself back on the right track. Mission accomplished. So what if it was slow? That was the whole point.

The Alta Alpina Challenge is coming up in 2 weeks. Say goodbye to long rest stops and taking it easy. I want to ride the AAC as hard as I can. I'm going to go ahead and set a difficult (for me) goal right now: 14:30.