(sent from my phone)
UPDATE:
The Race Across Oregon team, Flying Aquarians were on the roads of north central Oregon today. We rode a route that took in 70 miles of the 2010 Race Across Oregon route along with 30 miles of "connector" bringing us up to a nice 100 mile ride today. We began by meeting at Elmers Restaurant in Gresham for breakfast together. We then drove nearly two hours to get to Tygh Valley, our starting point for today's ride. It was the same route that Lauren and I rode a few months ago and liked so well we thought it would be good to share it with our crew. They agreed so today found all 5 of us there as well as John Henry Maurice, the crew chief for my 2010 Furnace Creek 508 adventure.
It was a cloudy but warm morning as we prepared to pedal.
We began with a "relatively flat" few miles before taking a fast descent to the Deschutes River at Shearer's Falls. From there we crossed the river and began a long climb out of the Deschutes Canyon heading to Grass Valley. I climbed well, keeping my heart rate at 165 +/-3 the whole way. That was good enough to drop all my fellow riders except for Doak, who is, after all, the King of Brynwood!
We climbed for the next 60 miles but it became a more reasonable climb after the first 10 miles. As we rode over the lip of the canyon we could see 5 snow capped Cascade Volcanoes.
John Henry was still smiling as he decided that riding with Flying Aquarians wasn't all that bad.
We stopped at a small grocery store in Grass Valley and took in our share of water, V8 juice, and a few energy bars. We then continued our climb to Shaniko on US 97. 97 wasn't all that bad. The other roads were virtually empty of traffic but 97 is a main N/S connector and had some traffic. Sightlines were good, shoulders adequate, and for the most part traffic was kind. We rode the nearly 30 miles to Shaniko and stopped at another small grocery store. Again we topped off water supplies and this time added some ice cream! The temperature was in the mid 90's by now and the wind was working us a bit along with the raise in elevation.
You will notice in the photo that Doak is working on a flat tire. In keeping with the usual scenerio, Doak had a flat. I don't think I've ever been on a ride with him where he hasn't flatted. Maybe the team should buy him better tires! ;-)
We were sitting at almost 60 miles into the ride at this point. All three crew members reached Shaniko before Lauren and I. The last crew member passed me about mile 45. Don't they know that Lauren and I are supposed to be the cyclists on this team?! I think Lauren and I should talk some smack at RAO in two weeks and challenge other crews to race our crew. Who cares about the real race, our crew ROCKS ON BIKES!
I began slowing down on the long low gradient climb from Grass Valley to Shaniko. At first I thought I might have consumed too much water in one setting at Grass Valley, but after a while I discounted that theory. As we finished up at Shaniko we turned more directly into the wind and made our way to the high point of today's ride just a few miles west of Shaniko, then we did a few up and downs before taking the big descent back to the bottom of the Deschutes Canyon at Maupin. Just before taking that descent however John Henry developed an "issue" He and I were trading positions back and forth depending on terrain (I'm currently a better climber, he a better descender) as I was coming up on him he stopped me saying he had a mechanical issue. Sure enough he did. His chain side carbon crank was cracked. We thought if he could treat it gently he could make the mostly descending trip to Maupin where perhaps we could jury rig some repair, snag a ride for him back to Tygh Valley, or at least find a comfortable spot for him to wait for our return with a vehicle. He made it about 30 ft before the crank snapped completely off.
Oops, how many of us carry spare crank arms? He descended carefully with one pedal reaching Maupin where he found an air conditioned location with internet to watch the Tour de France as he waited for us.
We left him and his crippled bike and climbed back up out of the canyon. It was quite warm and several of us doused our jerseys in water before making the climb.
The climb up from Maupin isn't nearly as bad and before too long we were making that fast descent to Tygh Valley.
Our route today left us with 95 miles so we all rode out to the fairgrounds and back to bring us to that magic 100 mile mark. It was a nice final 5 miles of today's ride. Flat, shady, no traffic.
Dave and I grabbed an Orange Slushy at the Tygh Valley store and the the others had some cool treats as well. We loaded our bikes and drove back to Maupin to rescue our compadre.
We sat in the cool spot he had found and had ice water and a beer. Pretty nice end to a ride..........all except for John Henry, who has to deal with a broken bike.
I was slow today. My Garmin showed 100.15 miles, 15.1 mph avg, 40.2 mph maximum, 130 bpm avg heart rate, 168 bpm max, along with a 56 average pedal cadence.
Careful analyzation of the data shows that I was working very hard at going slow!
Darn it, the race is in two weeks and the crew chewed me up and spat me out today!
............BIKE............LIFECYCLE.....ROLLERS....TOTAL
Today......100................0...............0..........100
Jan........618...............0................0..........618
Feb........692...............0................0..........692
March......940...............0................5..........940
April......934...............0................0..........934
May........905...............0................0..........905
June......1152...............0................0.........1152
July.......307...............0................0..........307
_________________________________________
TOTAL.....5563...............0..............5.........5568
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