Stp?

[salsabike]

Hey, Oxyback, how will we recognize you? And the only reason I'm not coming for the ride on Friday is that we are planning to do it in one day and need to be going to bed at, like, 7 pm.

[lauraelmore1033]

That is excellent advice about putting your food in your helmet at rest stops and eating while waiting in line for the potties! Why didn't I think of that?

Bikerhen, in addition to the great advice above, I'd say just be prepared to have moments where you feel emotionally overwhelmed by the crowds. It's hard to imagine it until you've done it, but I personally, had envisioned an experience very similar to the apple century I'd ridden the year before (which I know you have done as well) The reality is that it's more akin to the atmosphere at the mall the day after Thanksgiving. For two hundred miles.

for me, that is more of an ordeal than the actual physical effort of peddaling all that distance.

[oxysback]

Hey, Oxyback, how will we recognize you? And the only reason I'm not coming for the ride on Friday is that we are planning to do it in one day and need to be going to bed at, like, 7 pm.

I'll be the one in the Dodge Caravan at the rest stops! I'm on support car duty this year.

ETA: Hubby is riding in one day, too, so early to bed for us, as well!

[ttaylor508]

Sweet.
TTaylor - DH & I are also going to try to leave around 4:45 to 5:00 so there's a chance we could see you at the start. But knowing us, we'll be running half an hour late and will end up not actually leaving until 5:30 or so. As long as we can finish before the last bus leaves for Seattle I'll consider it good.

We have started at 5:15 am the last several years which was half an hour later than planned. DH is determined to get us on the road by no later than 4:45 am, so we will see. I predict we will be leaving at 5:15 am I always have trouble sleeping the night before, so its painful to get up at 3 am. Last year I got maybe 2 hrs of sleep. I will most likely be wearing my plain purple jersey and DH will have Corona. Ironman buddy just came down with the flu, so hopefully he will be well enough on Saturday to ride. Hope to see you on the road.

[MM_QFC!]

Hey, Oxyback, how will we recognize you? And the only reason I'm not coming for the ride on Friday is that we are planning to do it in one day and need to be going to bed at, like, 7 pm.

Have a most excellent, fun and safe ride, Salsa and Mr Salsa!
Are you doing it on the tandem? You'll be waving off those wheel suckers, f'sure!
Tailwinds!
Mary

[salsabike]

Have a most excellent, fun and safe ride, Salsa and Mr Salsa!
Are you doing it on the tandem? You'll be waving off those wheel suckers, f'sure!
Tailwinds!
Mary

Ha! I know. Yup, on the tandem. We'll let 'em suck for a bit, then I will turn around and give them the NY look.

Thanks for the good wishes! Would be glad to see you soon.

PS I think we need to have some more "Mick Jagger Fries." (Believe it or not, these are sweet potato fries drizzled with a melted brown sugar/butter sauce--we had them in a Snohomish pub after a ride on the Centennial Trail. They were terrifyingly good considering how bad they sound).

PPS We don't really mind if people draft. But it's nice if they're polite about it.

[LilBolt]

We are doing the ATP (Auburn to Portland)...the chaos seems to dissipate a bit by the time you get south of Renton. Plus, we get an extra hour of sleep. Some excellent advise above. If you do have a PSV and are doing 1 day, it can be kind of nice to have fresh socks & a jersey at Centralia or Kelso. And +1 on making sure your PSV uses the alternate routes! My driver (aka Mom) is equipped with a Garmin, preloaded w/ directions to casinos & Starbucks along the way.

I'll be riding my Holland Exogrid, and wear my brand-spankin'-new She Loves Hills jersey.

PS...I have my own tandem-buddies' wheel to ride. They are from Cincinnati, so I picked up their packages & mom is transporting their bike boxes + bags to Portland...that's the price I paid to 'buy' their wheel. ;-)

[MM_QFC!]

ok, it's Monday...time for STP tales! So, tell us about your experience!

Also, on Saturday I went for a ride on the Sammamish River Trail from Woodinville to Marymoor Park, then counter-clockwise around Lake Sammamish...lovely to enjoy a wide open trail, as thousands were pedaling to Portland!
Mary

[ttaylor508]

Okay, I will start with my STP tale....

Woke up around 2:30 am (actually, I didn't sleep well, so I was already awake when alarm went off). We packed up and made it to the start line at around 4:10 am. Got everything unpacked and hit the bathroom line and then hit the road at 4:40 am. It was still a bit dark, so we took it slow, but it was really nice not dealing with the crowds we usually encounter when we left later. First part of the ride was great, saw the skateboard dude in Seward Park, I can't believe he skateboards all the way to Portland and he does it with a smile.

There was a really bad railroad crossing around mile 70, we went over slow, but both DH and I felt our rear wheel slip, we were both lucky we didn't go down. They really should have carpeted that track. After the track, I slowed down to about 16 mph and couldn't keep up with our group. I thought I may have had a flat, so I stopped to check my tire. No flat, but I lifted my rear wheel and tried to spin it and it was stuck. Apparently when I went over the track, my rear wheel somehow bump the brake caliber out of alignment so the pad was dragging on the wheel. My boys came back for me a few minutes later and fixed the problem, but problem started up again on the Tenino trail. Don't know how long I was riding on the trail with the brake pad hanging up, but I was definitely wearing me out. At the ministop on the trail we met a couple of DH's old high school buddies he hadn't seen in 13 years. What a small world!!!

Made it into Centralia around 10:30 and had lunch. I was really bummed they didn't have the pulled pork sandwiches this year, so got a burger instead which sat in my stomach like a gut bomb. Big mistake!

Head winds were pretty brutal and I hit the wall around mile marker 140 and was starting to realize I had missed a few spots with the Glide, so crotch was burning (I know TMI). We took some extra time at the Riverside rest stop so I could recover and refuel. The Longview bridge was much better this year, but DH got a flat at the top. Luckily he was able to pump the tire up so we could make it to the bottom where we could change it. STP support motorcycle with a side car stopped to help us. They had a cute boxer sitting in the side car, wish I had brought my camera.

We slowed pace down a bit on Hwy 30 as we were all getting tired. Saint Helens rest stop was set up much better this year and we got a iced cold coke which really hit the spot. They also had misters and ice, which was really nice. By this point the pain in my shorts was so bad it was actually making my queasy. I was trying to stand to relive the pain, but nothing was really helping. I knew the only way to stop the pain was to get to Portland and get off my bike. The last 30 miles is always brutal, but we pulled into the finish line at about 6:30. Definitely not our fastest one-day, but considering the wind, not too bad. The beer garden was nice and getting off my bike brought instant relief for the pain. One of our riding buddies wife met us at the finish line and we went for a late dinner at a place near the finish. Finished dinner around 10:40 and was surprised to still see riders coming in. It was really nice to stay the night this year as we usually jump on the bus and head back the same day. On Sunday we were able to have a nice breakfast and go back to the Finish line to cheer the two-day riders on. All in all pretty good ride. This was my seventh STP and 4th in one-day.

[malaholic]

Congrats ttaylor508! Awesome job, and awesome story.

I am disappointed to say I didn't get to meet any other TE'ers. I'd forgotten just how huge the crowds are for STP and even if I did see any of you, I'd probably have been to overwhelmed to notice.

DH & I got up at 3 am, left the house by 4, and started riding just after 5. During the first 50 miles or so, I was telling myself that if I ever do this ride again, I'm either going to leave way earlier, or try to plot my own alternate route to avoid the massive groups. Even though it's easier physically to glom onto a huge paceline, for me it's mentally much more difficult, especially if I don't know the rider in front of me and his/her riding style. Plus I'm still a little shaken by the memory of a huge paceline crash during a ride last month...I somehow barely stayed up but the poor folks that didn't had some really ugly injuries, and that sight is still fresh in my mind.

Anyway, other than that things were going pretty well until a different nasty railroad crossing between Tenino & Centralia where my rear tire blew out. Now, I know how to change a tire and I've done it several times, but for whatever reason, I was having a really hard time getting the tube seated; one spot near the valve was geting pinched by the rim and it took both mine & DH's combined efforts to finally get the stupid thing in place. Then, after all that when we went to inflate it....the tire boot we'd put in had moved off of the hole and we had to do it all over again! I was so frustrated. We'd been on track to hit Centralia before 11 but after the flat, and cooling down a bit while fixing it, we didn't get there until almost 11:30. The food line was HUGE and we didn't want to wait that long, so we grabbed a chocolate milk and pushed on to the Winlock ministop instead where we were able to buy food quickly...but then ended up waiting forever in restroom lines.

As ttaylor508 mentioned, the headwinds were pretty rough and after the Winlock stop I was kind of wishing for a big paceline even though I'd been cursing them earlier in the day. But with most of the 2-day riders having stopped and most of the fast 1-day riders long past us, we had to tough it out switching leads every 2 miles or so instead of our usual 5. We'd been hoping not to stop again until the St. Helens stop, keeping to our plan of stopping roughly every 50 miles, but with the winds being so strong we stopped to recover at the Lexington stop too. The next 30-ish miles between Lexington and St. Helens were the toughest of the ride for me.

After a long stop at St. Helens, I kept a very close eye on my computer to manage my HR and cadence. I think this is where I was failing before....I was just riding, and not really managing my ride. If I don't pay attention, I tend to fall into a pattern where my cadence is up over 100 and my HR is up above my lactate threshold; because often on my shorter rides I will purposely push that hard just for training purposes. I guess my body just gets used to how that feels...but it's not sustainable longer-term. So on this last stretch, I carefully kept my cadence right at 90, and watched my HR. As soon as it started creeping up, I'd shift down, as as soon as my cadence started creeping up, I'd shift up. This made a world of difference in how I felt and I rode the last 30 very strong. I will definitely take this as a lesson to pay more attention to my exertion during these longer rides.

We finished at about 7:45 - a lot later thank I'd hoped to finish, but still in time to get our 1-day rider patches, so I'm super-happy about that. Our actual riding time was just over 11 hours which is right where I thought it would be; we just spent a lot more time stopped than I had anticipated.

We had just enough time to get the bikes boarded, clean up, and grab a snack before getting on the bus. I think staying overnight in Portland would've been smarter - the bus was stopped in construction on I-5 north of Olympia for what seemed like forever, and I couldn't sleep on the bus because it just wasn't comfy. We finally made it back, got unpacked and took a real shower, and just as I was getting into bed, the 3 AM alarm that I'd set for Saturday was going off again, to cap off our 24-hour adventure. I shut it off, then slept until noon.

Overall I'm feeling pretty good. I'd like to do a short recovery ride for the legs, but I think my butt won't be able to handle the saddle again for a few days. This is the first time I've done the STP 1-day and I'm happy to check it off of the list. Next up, RAMROD!

I'd like to hear how it went for the 2-day riders...did you encounter much rain? It was pouring when I woke up Sunday, and I kept hoping that the rain & winds weren't moving south.

[ttaylor508]

Congrats to you too Malaholic! We were probably just leaving the beer garden when you came in. We made a lot more stops than we had planned and with our mechanical issues, our overall time was way more than we had anticipated but leaving early made a world of difference in avoiding all the mass crowd mayhem in the beginning. I think DH's computer said ride time was about 11 hours 20 minutes. My legs felt pretty strong at the end, but with the crotch pain, it just sucked the energy right out of me. I think I will need a few days to heal before I jump back on the bike. Next organized ride for us will probably be the Summits of Bothell at the end of August followed by the Tour de Whidbey in late September.

Good luck on RAMROD! Did both you and your husband get in? DH said it is an amazing ride with breathtaking scenery.

[lauraelmore1033]

I got up at 3:30 or so but didn't make it to the starting line till 5:45. Saw lots of crazyness at the start. My favorite instance was: riding along lake washington boulevard and hearing a young man, riding left of the yellow line asking his friends, "what does CAR UP mean? Why do they keep screaming CAR UP?"
Yikes!
I was feeling pretty good and skipped the mini stop at Seward park and headed up the hill(S) to Ranier Ave just in time to enjoy the sunrise over lake Washington. It was a pretty comfortable cruise after that until the famous hill. I was pretty proud of my self for reaching the lunch stop by ten (at least I was until I read about the speedy people making it twice as far in the same space of time...).

Learning from last year's mistakes, I managed my time/pace, my coping strategies for the heat and my saddle sore issues and made it to my lodgings in Centralia by 2:00. Note for next year: aim for Vader and/or don't choose to eat from the Lasagna bar at Centralia College. Most. Disgusing. Meal. Ever. I watched people trickle in for a while after that then decided to take a nap which lasted until 4:30 am. Bonus! Last year I didn't sleep a wink and spent that uncomfortable night in the tent berating myself for doing such an insane thing (as the STP) and resolving never to get on my bicycle again!

I felt surprisingly good, so I decided to just get up and get started. As I stood in line for breakfast, I noticed that in addition to being ravenously hungry, my hands were shaking and I was sweating profusely. I wonder if that means I didn't eat enough the day before? I felt terrible after the meal but hopped on the bike around 5:30. It had started sprinkling as I ate breakfast and had stopped by the time I put my baggage on the truck. I congratulated myself for deciding on the indoor camping option as I watched people struggling with soggy camping gear.

My legs were weak and shaky and it took at least 20 miles to get warmed up. It was a struggle, during the first 5 miles even to make it up to 11 mph. Something about those rollers after that just really got the blood pumping and my enthusiasm was restored after a particularly thrilling descent. Somewhere around Vader it started raining in earnest. And thundering and sleeting. I didn't care. That was actually a lot easier to bear than the heat had been the previous day. I stopped in Castle rock, but didn't partake of any of the conveniences. I saw a woman who had been in my training group, but she just looked through me as I waved at her. I assumed she was feeling as foggy as I was and I just didn't register as a recognizable entity at that point.

I made it to the lunch stop by 9:50 and, as advised, collected my food in my helmet and ate while waiting for a potty. Tremendous time saver. I noticed that the line for the food had trippled in the time it took to finish my business there.

It was all a blur after that when my saddle sore problem flared up. It took everything I had to keep pedaling with the fire raging "down below". At several points Alec Guiness's voice entered my pain addled brain and gently entoned, "Luke...Luke, use the force".. Not quite sure why. Wasn't particularly helpful. Unfortunately. I kept reminding myself that, as bad as it was, it wasn't as bad as last year. Some how I made it across the finish line around 3:30. There were still lots of people cheering at the line and the row of little kids holding their hands out to hi five the finishers was so cute. Last year I had finished much later and it was a little depressing since most of the cheerers had already picked up their participant and gone home. Much better this time!

We picked up our luggage and scooted out of there. Hubby had seen the backup on the way down I-5 and drove us home along an alternate route.
Stopped at a Mcdonalds on the way and had the best tasting cheeseburger of my life! With the detour, it took 5 hours to get home, but it was less frustrating than sitting still on the highway. Reached home by8:30 and went straight to bed. Best nights sleep ever!

[bikerHen]

OK. Now a report from an STP virgin! We got to the start line just before 6AM, actually found our friends we've been training with and met another club member who did the one day ride on our ride over to the start. I was very nervous about the start and the crowds but didn't have too much trouble getting going and finding a place to ride. Enjoyed the views along the lake and really had a good time just rolling along chatting with other riders. We lost one of our group at the top of the Puyallup hill, we turned off and she didn't see us and kept going. We finally hooked back up and all was well. We had a husband acting as our sag and he took very good care of us. We lost two friends just after the Tenino stop. We didn't catch them until Centralia. My sister was having some saddle sore issues and was needing to stop and "reapply" more often. Our ride time for the first day was about seven hours. Not great, but we did it!

The second day we left Centralia about 6:30AM. The first hour was accompaned by a spectactular thunder and lighting storm. We were all speculated on the best way to NOT get hit by lighting. Of course no one even thought about get inside and out of the storm! The day kinda went down hill from there. The rain got worse, body parts were getting more sore and I was really missing my Surly LHT with it's full fenders. My sister and I stopped at Lexington, had some fabulous taco from a little stand in the park and continued on down the road. We lost our two friends again cause they didn't see us stop at Lexington. The cooler weather really was making the ride better, even with the rain. Crossing over the Longview Bridge was just awesome! It was another point I was stressing over from stories I had heard. We were somewhere in the middle of at least 300 riders when the group was escorted over the bridge. We kept to the right and really didn't have an issues with the crowd.

We were flying along having a good time then about 5 miles from St. Helens my "good" knee started hurting. By the time we pulled into the rest stop I couldn't push down on the pedal. Not good when on a bike ride! I went to the first aid people and they gave me ice and ibuprofen. Then my sister talked me into a 10 minute massage. The gal that work on me said it was my quad and IT muscles that were tight and they were pulling the ligaments around my knee, or something like that. She did horrible things that caused a great deal more pain, but after 10 minutes it did feel better. So I kept the ice on my knee while we stood in the porta potti line, talked the first aid people out of more ibuprofen, ate yet another PB&J sandwich and hit the road. Another 5 miles down the road and the drugs kicked in and we rode as fast as we could, hoping we could get to Portland before the drugs wore off. Everytime my sister stopped to "reapply" I slathered Bio-freeze on my knee. About the time we hit the city limits my knee started to ache again. It was ok on the flats but did not like pushing up hills. Of course by now it was raining. The closer we got to the finish line the harder it rained. Did I mention how much I was missing my Surly with full fenders? And if I wasn't having enough issues, I started to bonk. So everytime I stop at a light, which was about every one, I was cramming trail mix in my mouth. My husband was at the last corner and took a very flattering picture of me, dripping wet, runny nose and cheeks full of trail mix! But, WE DID IT!

Now that it's all over, I have to say it was really a good ride. I didn't feel overwhelmed by the crowds at all. Most riders were well behaved. There were of course some exception but for that many riders on the road not bad. I was amazed at the number of riders with flats. We were very lucky in our little group of four. No flats and only two dropped chains. One friend dropped hers going up hill and I dropped mine screaming down a hill which scared me to death. I just knew the chain was going to wrap itself around something before I could get stopped.

So I'm glad we did it. I was even having vague thought about next years ride on the way home. The logistics are kinda hard to deal with, but I guess we have a year to figure it out.

Oxyback, sorry we didn't make dinner. We programed the resturant into the Garmin and it was showing the place miles away. Not sure if it was that far but we decided to stay local for dinner. bikerHen

[Blueberry]

Thanks for the ride reports - would love to read any more of them!

We may think about trying to fly in for this ride next year - sounds like a fabulous time (and hopefully the logistics wouldn't be too terrible!).

CA

[salsabike]

Here's how our third STP on the tandem went:

The first 100 miles were great. We were happy with our speed and felt really good and had fun. When we got to Centralia around 11:30, we were feeling a little hot and tired but perked up pretty fast after some food and 5 minutes’ rest, and got going again pretty quickly.

We did have a lot of fun on the rollers because even though tandems are slow going uphill, the amount of momentum we can generate going downhill is amazing, and often carries us up the next hill. The rollers were just a blast.

We spent a lot of time passing and being passed by the same people, which creates a little community all its own. Rode with another tandem for a bit. Lots of tandems out there this year, we thought.

At some point, the wind shifted from a crosswind to a headwind. THAT was a drag. I no longer remember exactly where that happened but I'm sure someone else will.

So things were still going reasonably well when we got to the Lexington stop (mile 143). We left Lexington feeling fine, and about a half mile down the road, had a rear blowout. We never did figure out what caused it but whatever it was, it took a huge bite right out of the tire. I would say the diameter of the missing tire piece was about a half inch. We had a boot with us but neither of us felt too comfortable about counting on a boot for 60 more miles. So...we walked the bike back to Lexington, and got a new tire. Boy, if River City Bikes hadn't been at that stop, I'm not sure what would have happened to the rest of the ride. Thank you, Alex—nice guy, too.

We started out again from Lexington. Maybe that's about when the headwind hit, because from there we just got slower. When we went over the Longview-Kelso bridge, right at the top of the bridge we encountered a moron and his girlfriend stopped on their bikes in the middle of the path—with the bikes angled to take up the whole path--yakking on a cell phone ("Hi, we're on the bridge...") that forced all of us oncoming riders into fast moving traffic. I so wish I had had the time to smack him upside the head.

And then we got a second (front) flat at mile 170. So much for Mr. Tuffy tire liners saving us from flats, dammit. Oh, well. And I personally am convinced that the last 30 miles of STP actually occur in an alternate universe, where time....just..........slows..............down. We're going to look at all the different segments of the ride according to Chris' Garmin. I am absolutely sure that the last 30 miles took us way, way, WAY longer then the rest did.

So...instead of coming in around 7, which was my hope, we got in at---10:30 pm. Wow! Ack! All I can say is, it's a good thing Cascade kept the finish line and bike corral open. AND that room service was open till 11 pm. Arghh. When we did it in 06, we ALSO had two flats, with the second one occurring 8 miles from the finish. We seem to have some “luck issues” doing this thing on the tandem in one day, but we really like to do it anyway.

Oh yeah. AND somewhere around mile 175 or so on Route 30, one of our panniers came loose, flipped around backwards, and locked up the back wheel. We fell over (going up a hill, so slowly) right into traffic (not the full lane’s worth, but maybe a foot or two into the car lane). No scratches or scrapes, and luckily whatever car went by managed to dodge us. So....I guess our luck issues cut both ways, huh?

The volunteers on STP are really excellent.

A great innovation---bag dropoff on Friday night! That means we didn’t have to go to the start line at all. We had a friend (the friend who volunteered to drive our pickup to Portland Sunday morning to get us—he’s a seriously early riser) drop us off near the start in the U District around 4 am, and we just got rolling from there. I LOVE not going to the actual start line.

Seemed like there were lots of flats out there this year.

We really had fun most of the way. The hotel greets you with a hot cookie, by the way.

And here’s a thank you to our Ironman folks here. Round about mile 170 when I started feeling really tired, I remembered all of you. I saw Colby's recent photo, and RunningMommy’s video, and some other folks, in my mind’s eye and thought to myself, “Hey, babe---if they could do that, you can do 30 more miles. Be quiet.”

On some other thread, someone asked about riding mantras. I don’t have a riding mantra per se, but I have a general triathlon training one that I’ve been using for months. I can do anything for an hour. I can do anything for another hour. Etc.

We have concluded that the Selle Anatomica saddles that we love are 85-mile saddles for us. We are still in search of the perfect double century saddle. My butt got sore, but oddly enough my legs always felt good and they could have kept going for quite a while.

Any of you see us? The tandem with the puffer fish on the back rack!

PS Diameter of the tire hole (not circumference, silly girl. Someone hasn't had enough sleep yet).