Veteran’s Day metric
Last month bikerjohn and I had great fun on our first metric century (100 km or 62.137 mi) ride together. We’re both right around 50, are primarily commuters, primarily ride solo, and were looking for something different in riding. We’re also pretty well matched in riding style and capabilities. I can out-climb him, but he’s a diesel on the flats.
Scheduling another ride was another story. I work on the weekends, John works regular weekday hours. But, since I work at the library and he’s a school bus driver, we both had Veteran’s Day off. Hoping for good weather, we made the date.
BTW, 22 pics from the ride, and two Quicktime movies are in the gallery. I’m being lazy and haven’t made any of the thumbnails included in this piece clickable. Use the link above, instead.
John diligently mapped our ride at Gmaps Pedometer. You can follow our route via satellite image. Turn on the mile markers for a little hlepful perspective. Unfortunately, the elevation chart doesn’t seem to work. Turn that off for a slightly larger view.
The ride
The sunrise Friday morning was gorgeous. A band of showers had moved through overnight leaving just a few straggling clouds to catch the morning rays. The forecast was for sunny, high of 57°F, 14°C, with light winds from the west. We planned our route west in the morning, east in the afternoon, and this was a perfect forecast.
Unfortunately, it was perfectly wrong.
John picked-me up here at 7:30. After some final screwing around—I was running late, as I usually do in the mornings—we loaded my bike in his SUV. By the time we left his place, lake-effect clouds and dampness had rolled-in. I was glad I’d packed a pair of jeans and a fleece jacket, just in case. I changed out of my shorts, put on my warmer clothes and we rode out. The overcast was thick enough that I rode with both my front and rear blinkies on.
The plan was to ride the Canalway to Brockport, then take the roads out through Holley and Albion, to Medina. As we rode up to the lift-bridge reconstruction in Adams Basin, a coffee truck pulled up for the workers’ morning break. I was temped to stop for one, but since my U-lock mount prevents me from using bottle cages, I’d have had to ride with the coffee in my hand, so I skipped it.
The Canalway out to Brockport was soft from the rain. I don’t like the gravel path to begin with due to the extra pedaling effort. The soft ground beneath it just made things harder. Still, we were going to take the roads from Brockport, so I ground on.
A lot of cycling—especially when riding long-distances or in racing—is about energy management. I don’t worry about it around town because I’m seldom more than seven miles from home and even less from a bus route or a convenience store. And my fairly short commutes explains why I can hammer to work and back without penalty.
While I’d remembered on Friday to ride at a sustainable pace, I hadn’t topped-off the fuel tank. I’d skipped breakfast. Hopping off the Canalway, we stopped at a café on the way to the State University of New York at Brockport.
Java Junction on Main St is a bicycle-friendly place. There’s a bike rack out front, and on-one bats an eye when you walk in wearing a helmet.
There was a long-wheelbase three-wheeled recumbent parked outside when we locked-up. ‘Bent riders are are usually easy to spot. The stereotypical ‘bent rider is over 50, paunchy, bearded and wears sandals and normal clothes. While I got a coffee and a big ol’ sticky bun for fuel, John found the rider, name of Floyd, at a table. We joined him and talked bikes. Afterwards, we compared rigs outside and Floyd let John take his ‘bent for a spin up and down the block.
We found our way out of the village to the university campus, rode through on sidewalks, parking lots and access roads, and picked-up NY31, which we planned to follow all the way to Medina, with a detour or two thrown in for a little variety.
The first detour was in Holley, where starting from the village square, you take a little road down behind Jubilee Foods, through the DPW lot, past the water treatment plant and down into a hollow where they’ve hidden the waterfall. The canal is way above grade through here and the stream flows out of the hollow through a culvert under the canal. It’s actually quite common along the route.
We climbed out of the hollow on a muddy, leaf-covered hiking trail, took a park road around north of town and found ourselves in Podunk. Who knew Podunk was right here in Western New York?
It didn’t take long to leave Podunk behind. It is, after all, a little podunk town. We took a road paralleling the south bank of the canal back to route 31.
The great advantage to riding on the roads is asphalt. The tires roll over it nicely, and every watt put to the pedals translates into forward motion at the wheel. Route 31 is just a joy to ride. The pavement’s fairly new and in good shape, the shoulders are wide and free of debris, and, at least on a holiday Friday morning, the traffic is light.
The disadvantage to riding roads instead of the Canalway, is it’s hilly. Roller after roller, all of which seemed only to go up, never down, taxed us on this next leg. We took turns drafting and passing in some places, and I’d spin by John on the climbs, he’d diesel by me on the flats.
We rode up Main St in Albion to the canal park for our next rest stop. I’d become concerned because I couldn’t remember when I’d last changed the batteries in my rear blinkie. And I hadn’t planned on running it all day long.
The model I have, the CatEye TD-LD1000 uses lenses to focus the light to the rear. As a result, you can’t really tell how bright it is when you’re up close, unless you point it directly into your eyes. When you do that, the very last electrons could be dribbling out of the batteries, and you’d still burn your retinas.
So I propped the bike up against a park bench, and walked back along the canal pier for a couple of hundred yards. Twice—or was it three times, I don’t remember—I tripped on those boat tie-up rings in the concrete and nearly fell into the canal. Anyway, my taillight was bight an dplainly visible from a 200 yards back, so we didn’t bother stopping for batteries.
Finding a public restroom in Albion was a trip. Gas station after gas station told me they had no public rest rooms, even after I tried the old, “But I’m a old guy with a prostate condition” line. No sympathy. And given that Albion is a two state prison town (see milepost 24) and the county seat, it’s just crawling with village, county and state police, so taking a whiz by the side of the road was out.
As a result, I nearly got wet again cycling south on Main St, route 98. A woman in an SUV passed me with her right blinker on to pull into the Family Dollar plaza. And, fortunately, she stopped right next tome before right-hooking me. The SUV waiting to turn left out of the Family Dollar took this as her cue to pull out in front of me. I wouldn’t have been able to stop if she’d changed her mind halfway.
Damn! Nearly hit by two cars making two mistakes at the same place—despite having both my front and rear blinkies on. And yet, my bladder held. In fact, it’s the only reason I didn’t get mad. I was too focused on not pissing myself to worry about cars that didn’t hit me. I decided to get mad only at the ones that do. Riding 100 yards behind me, John thought I was a goner both times.
God bless the Mobil station and K&K Mini-Mart at the southwest corner of routes 31 and 98! Finally, a place with old-fashioned, civilized, compassion and courtesy towards the traveler. I was in their restroom so long that the motion sensor light switch turned the light off. I finished my pee aiming by sound alone.
Mounting up outside, a couple in a pickup truck with a dog in back admired my bike. “That’s a nice-looking bike,” he said.
“Thanks,” I replied. “It gets me where I’m going.”
“Where you ridin’ to?”
“Medina. Then back to the city.”
I left them with their jaws in the laps as I pedaled away.
About eight miles further on is Culvert Road. It’s the only road that passes under the Erie Canal. Built in 1822, it still carries traffic beneath the canal. It leaks a little bit, but it’s still there, strong as ever. We stopped for bit to take some pictures.
We should also have eaten because only five miles later, I nearly bonked on the last climb into Medina. I knew my blood-sugar was low, I was feeling hungry too and the long, lowest-of-low-gears climb took the last of my energy. I nearly puked at the top before consuming a trail mix bar in three bites. Had I not stopped there, I wouldn’t have made it quarter of a mile to the canal park where we planned to stop for lunch.
More than a half-hour later, lying down on top of a picnic table, I felt warm all of a sudden. The sun had come out! And the wind was shifting. No more headwind to buck! The ride into and around Medina was the best part of the day. Even if the time-temperature clock at the bank showed only 47°.
We had planned to visit the railroad museum in Medina, but we had miscalculated the time. It was 2:00 with only three hours of daylight left and three hours of ride time alone ahead of us. We took a couple of snaps and turned around.
The gods of cycling laughed upon us. While in Medina, the winds continued to shift and our planned tailwind ride home became another upwind grind. Only this time on the soft, gravel Canalway.
I don’t recall much about the return leg of the trip. It was still cold. It was still a headwind. And gravel crunching under the tires. I remember mile after mile of washboard riding in the tire tracks left by tractors and bulldozers cleaning up after last month’s snow and wind storms. And horse tracks. I longed for asphalt beneath my wheels, even if it meant lots of climbing.
I just kept my head down, the water on my right and tried not to drop more than a half-mile behind John.
Our riding intervals became shorter and our rest breaks longer. Even so, three hours later, at sunset, we cycled into Brockport. We encountered a few other cyclists on this leg. From the looks of it they were just out for a quick ride after work and before dark.
Just east of Brockport, in full darkness, we turned off the canal path and took roads the rest of the way to John’s place. It was a blessing. The wind had died-down, I was on asphalt and got to coast every now and again. Better conditions gave me a bit of a second wind and instead of being way behind John, I was a couple of hundred yards ahead of him pulling into his driveway.
And never quite so glad to be off my bike.
Epilog
The single thing made this ride tougher than the last was training. In the past four weeks, except for the TNUA rides, all I’ve done are my commutes. A couple of miles here, and a few miles there doesn’t keep you in shape for long rides. A couple of 30-milers in preceeding week would have made all the difference.
Second, while I managed my energy output well, I failed on the input side. Rule number one on long rides is: Eat early, eat often. That aspect of the ride home went well. We stopped every 45–60 minutes to munch a bar or an apple.
Third, I’d set expectations. I was looking forward to a nice 30-mile tailwind ride back. When the wind shifted, so did my mood. The cold and gloom didn’t bother me—after all, I’m a native Rochesterian. Banking on a long tailwind run and not getting it, took the wind right out of my sails, so to speak.
Finally, I’m good for only about ten miles on gravel. I either have to train on it more, or avoid it.
Still, I’m happy I went on this ride and want to do more long rides like this. Just as I applied what I learned from the last trip—put the backpack in a pannier, don’t wear it—I’ll apply these lessons to the next one.
Maybe I’ll drag out the bike club maps and see what they have for metric and full centuries. Hmmm… I remember there being a 70-mile tour of ten parks in the county…
By the numbers
- Total miles: 69.25
- Ride time: 5:31:22
- Total time: 8:30
- Average speed: 12.5 MPH
- Max speed: 23.9 MPH
- Average cadence: 70 RPM
- Max Cadence: 105 RPM
- Fuel: Four bars, three apples, half a banana, one sticky bun.
