Riding a solo century is never easy. Congrats.
For what it is worth, I have a heart rate monitor that estimates calorie
consumption based on your weight and average heart rate. For me, I go
through about 8,500 calories in the course of a century. For you, it has
got to be higher. That's a lot of GU and Powerbars...
Steve
----- Original Message -----
From: "Seth Dillingham" <
seth@macrobyte.net>
To: "TruerWords" <
TruerWords-site@free-conversant.com>
Sent: Saturday, September 10, 2005 8:33 PM
Subject: [tw] Ride #95: Feel A Little Like I Blew It [Msg#5085]
> <
http://www.truerwords.net/5085>
> --------------------------------
>
> I left for my Birthday Century a little before 11 a.m. Before I actually
> sat on the bike, the plan was to do the same route as last year
> <
http://www.truerwords.net/4210>. Once I was rolling, I remembered the
> long stretch along Route 1, North East of Westerly, with all the traffic,
> hills, and wind. Hmm. At the top of the hill on 184, just a mile from the
> house, I decided to cross the street, ride to the other end of Flanders
> Road, up and down one big hill on Route 1, and grab the Southernmost end
> of Route 117. I was hoping this would be ten miles, but it was only 6.
> Shucks.
>
> Around 12:30 I pulled in to Mystic Cycle. I'd been 35 miles, and my
> average speed was 20.2 mph. The weather was almost perfect: seventy
> degrees, a slight breeze, and sunny with a few big cotton balls drifting
> through.
>
> I really only stopped because I felt like having some lunch: a "Triple
> Threat" PowerBar. Mmm. I took guesses from everybody for my average speed
> at the end of the ride. (This meant describing my route five different
> times!) Graham guessed 19.5. Everybody else guessed higher, including a
> 21.8! (I wish.) They actually wrote the guesses down on the shop benches,
> with a sharpie! They're moving to new digs in two weeks, so they feel free
> to "leave their mark," now.
>
> The route I described to them is a very *flat* century (at least, the
> remaining 65 miles would be flat). Their guesses were based on that
> description, and on me not doing anything stupid. Seems obvious, right? I
> wish...
>
> At the top of Watch Hill, my average speed was still 20.2. At the far end
> of Misquamicut Beach, it was up to 20.4: the breeze had been at my back,
> and the road along the beach is almost perfectly flat. I made a left at
> the end of the beach and went to the convenience store in Dunn's Corners
> to replenish my bottles. This was 55 miles into the ride. So far I had
> eaten: one PowerBar, and one apple danish at Mystic Cycle (somebody had in
> a bag of them for anybody to eat).
>
> I rode back through the beach and Watch Hill again, so now the breeze was
> working against me. When I returned to downtown Westerly/Pawcatuck, my
> average speed was back to 20.2 and I'd ridden just under 70 miles.
>
> This is where things went a little, uh... stupid. First of all, I still
> hadn't eaten any more food. Also, since I hadn't gone up Route 1 on the
> other side of Westerly, I still had more than thirty miles to go but I was
> only twelve miles from home. So, I decided to go up Route 2 towards
> Norwich. Looking back, I realize this was a bad idea. Hills. Lots and lots
> of hills. I'd just turned my century from "2/3 flat" into "2/3 very
> hilly."
>
> In fact, Route 2 stats out with a decent climb, and by the top of it I was
> totally wasted. The lack of food finally wrecked me. I found a side street
> that led to some administrative buildings for the Native American tribe
> that owns Foxwoods Casino (which is another ten miles up Route 2). It had
> trees and grass along the side... I just rolled into the grass and laid
> down for ten minutes. Ate some gel, my second Triple Threat bar, took a
> long drink, and kept going.
>
> Past the casino, I made a left on Shewville Road. I thought this was the
> connector for 117 in Ledyard, but NO! That would have been the next road.
> Instead, this was a hilly side street that dumped me at the bottom of a
> big hill on Route 214, which I had to climb to get back to 117 in Ledyard.
> Argh! (I ate another gel somewhere on Shewville, if you're keeping track.)
>
> At the corner of 117 and 214 I'd been 86 miles and my average speed was
> all the way down to 19.4! Home was less than six miles away, so I turned
> right (away from home). There's a fantastically long and steep hill on 117
> that I knew would be a fun way to die, er, I mean a fun way to finish up
> the ride. I stopped at the top, watied for traffic to clear, and then
> coasted all the way to the bottom. This set my high speed for the day at
> 47.7! (Imagine if I had pushed it!)
>
> Well, what goes down must come up! Or something like that. Since 117 was
> heading away from home, I had to turn around at the bottom and climb that
> (no longer exhilerating) hill again. When I pulled into a convenience
> store in Ledyard (needed more water), just past the intersection of 117
> and 214, I was down to 19.2 mph. Oh man.
>
> The water helped, though, and it's mostly down hill on 117 from there to
> 184. My average came back up to 19.4, dropped to 19.3 again on Rt. 184 as
> I climbed the last hill, and stayed there for the last two miles home.
> (Actually, to make it a full 100 miles I had to ride past my road, go
> another 1/4 mile, and come back.)
>
> It was a good ride, I'm glad I did it. Still, there were two glaring
> mistakes. The most obvious was nutritional: it's completely unlike me to
> go so long on the bike without eating anything! In fact, Jim Boyko (I
> think it was Jim, anyway) now calls me "Gu Boy" because I'm so consistent
> about eating something every 45 minutes, whether I feel hungry or not. I
> know how it feels to bonk, which is what happened on Route 2, and is why I
> had to flop into the grass for awhile. I'm lucky that I was able to
> recover enough to finish the ride!
>
> The second mistake was route choice. All the hills I added at the end of
> the trip just made the lack of eating that much worse. Besides, I'd
> planned and prepared for a flat century. There were plenty of other,
> flatter routes I could have taken. Route 2 was my worst option.
>
> I made it home, safe and sound. 19.3 isn't terrible (for me), but I
> really, really wanted to do a century in under five hours!!! Now I'm going
> to have to try again either next month, or next September. We'll see how
> the weather holds up in October.
>
> Stats: 100.22 miles (161.3 km) in 5h 11' 9" for an average speed of 19.32
> mph (31.11 kph).
>
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