Randonneurs

[maillotpois]

Looks like a great route, Anelia. Photos, please?

We did a new 200k brevet route a friend organized a week or so ago. Great ride through farms and forests, not too hilly and I got in with a great group of riders from the Sac/Davis area. Some folks I knew before, but hadn't really ridden with. It makes such a difference to have fun riding companions. Gearing up for a fleche in a month or so. Our RBA asked us to join his team and the team is filled out by two just wacky fun guys. I loved the fleche last year. It was my favorite ride of the year and my team was amazing.

[azfiddle]

I did one 200k last year. The weather was too cold for me this year (20's to start) and I'm not too interested in the longer brevets. My DH did 200, 300, 400 and had a DNF on the 600 in the Arizona winter/spring series last year. I thought it was 80% fun and 20% misery. I might do one again in the future though.

[Anelia]

The promised pictures
I was wrong with the route but it was even more interesting than I thought. 228 km and about 1800 m ascent. It took us 10 hours and I enjoyed almost all of it. I felt miserable in the middle but after I ate salty bread and soup, I was OK and continued.
I am the gal (only one this time) with the mountain bike (again only one)

[salsabike]

Wonderful pictures! And sounds like you made great time considering the demands of the route.

[maillotpois]

Drat I gotta wait til I get home to look at these. Something to look forward to after vacation.

[Anelia]

And the boys shot some videos:
Video clip No 1
Videoclip No 2

[Susan Otcenas]

Just saw this thread today. (Haven't been on the forums much lately. Super busy here at TE!). As some of you, I caught the rando bug a few years ago, and I've got it bad. ;-) I love nothing more than heading out on my bike and riding myself silly. I love the challenge of the long rides, and sometimes marvel at the distances I manage to ride without falling over!

Jaclyn, I finished PBP in 2011, but Mortagne au Perche (the 2nd to last control, where you DNF'd) was my lowest of low points. (My brief summary of the ride is here: http://forums.teamestrogen.com/showt...t=44397&page=7 scroll partway down the page, which is page 7 of a longer thread.) Keep 2015 in your sights!

It's good for me to go back and read that write-up now. I need to really internalize all the things that I struggled with back in 2011. I've decided to ride London-Edinburgh-London in July, which is a 1418km randonnee. 200km longer than PBP! But with another 26 hours in which to do it. I'm hoping to get a little more sleep than I did at PBP (which was ~10.5 hours worth) and to finish the ride not feeling quite as thrashed. I'll be riding with a good friend from Eugene. She and I are very compatibly paced and have ridden both 400K and 600K together, so we know we are great ride-mates.

I'd encourage pretty much anyone to give rando a try. As has been mentioned here, the rides start at 100K (62.5 miles.) 200K is a great challenge to train for if you've ridden a few centuries and felt pretty good about it. And maybe you're looking for a new challenge. If you've ever given riding a double century a thought, then a 300K (187 mile) is definitely something you could also consider.

Rando doesn't really get badass scary until the 400K distance. That's 249 miles, which is a helluva long way to cover on a bike in one go. I personally find it to be the hardest distance. You're guaranteed to ride many hours in the dark, and if you're amongst the slower in the bunch, you have a good likelihood of seeing not one but two sunrises. This has happened to me once, when it took me over 5 hours to complete a 400K up in Washington. Wow, that was a loooong nite. Distances over 400K are, for 99% of randos, multi-leg events. The typical 600K has an "overnight" stop somewhere around 350k, where most randos have enough time to catch a few hours sleep before continuing on. I've done 4 600s, and I like that distance. Hard enough to be challenging, but not so long that it seems insurmountable. Anything over 600K is a major, 3-4 day affair. Some people knock 'em out like they are nothing, but for me they are a Really Big Deal requiring months of planning.

If anyone is local to Portland, and is interested in learning more about rando, or want to try a 200K and needs some company, let me know. I ride lots of 200s and know most of the Oregon routes pretty well. I *really* want to encourage more women to give rando a try. I think women are well suited to endurance events. (we're more patient than men, and are less likely to feel like we need to jackrabbit out of the gate to keep up, meaning we don't burn ourselves out too early in a ride.) I'd love to ride with some more women! There are only a few female randos in Oregon.

I rode a lovely 200K yesterday with one of my rando buddies. I put up a few pictures here. https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?...5691132&type=3

Susan