Cascade Bicycle Club's "Flying Wheels Summer Century" was today and I rode with a bunch of folks from my Saturday riding group. I had a great time. I discovered that my fitness is quite a bit better this year than last. I was comfortable and strong all day with never any threat of bonking. In fact, it was the best I've ever felt in the final quarter of a century and at the finish. I topped the last big hill with the lead group. I could have ridden a bunch more miles easily. That is a very pleasant development.
It was misleadingly advertised since the "century" route was only 96.4 miles. Sheesh, you'd think the organizers could find a couple of more turns that would make it go over 100. Actually, come to think of it it was probably short because there was a brief re-route (from the normal route) due to a closed road. We had 5:10 riding time and just under 19mph average.
Two legs of the ride were on W. Snoqualmie Valley Rd., which the 7 Hills of Kirkland century also used. That's a really nice road for cycling. Hardly any traffic and just gentle rollers. We had a bitching paceline going on it in both directions.
One guy we nicknamed Tube Socks kept leapfrogging us. It was pretty funny because of his outfit (old style cotton gym shorts, t-shirt and namesake white socks pulled all the way up) and because he was on a wal-mart bike with the seat all the way down. He looked about 55 or so. One wanted to make fun of the guy, but he was cruising. He basically kept the same overall pace as us for the first 50 miles. Our group has a habit of riding really fast but then taking longer breaks, apparently, than most people. So on a long ride we pass a lot of people multiple times.
At one point I got ahead of the group, just before we dropped down into the valley bottom a few miles before Snohomish. The group passed me at very high speed. I hammerred as hard as I could and just barely got back on but then blew up from the effort and immediately fell off. We were doing about 33 on those flats (long after the momentum from the hill was gone). That is damn fast.
Overall, it was a nice route. And they had great food at the stops - better than STP. They had a huge selection of cookies and fruit and bagels with PB&J and granola bars and pretzels. Although the label on the 2-pack of choc chip cookies indicated there were 35g of fat in the package! I passed.
After finding that I'm in better shape than last year, I'm now definitely planning to join the group for STP in one day again. Of course, it could just be the pasta I had for lunch AND dinner yesterday.
My recovery meal was Keilbasa and a big Coke. And I watched a little of the comical track relay races they were doing after the ride at the Velodrome. The race I watched had teams named Gilligan's Island (MaryAnn was a babe), Irresponsible Parents (carrying (fake) babies that were falling out of backpacks and infant carriers, and with 12-packs in their kid backpacks), White Trash Picnic, Pretty in Pink (one guy was wearing all pink that had been professionally printed all over with "Hoorray for Boobies"), Zoom and Superheroes (all wearing red underwear on the outside). Superheroes won. The Superheroes had a coaster bike with a front basket that several of the team members would use as aero-bars. It looked pretty fun.
That bike commuting I do every day seems to be providing some conditioning benefits. I've been taking a very steep hill home, and although it's short it has really helped my climbing strength. I think all that digging in the back yard for the garage also increased my core strength.
I didn't bring a camera so there are no photos.
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