Understated Club ride descriptions

[Catrin]

I just had a good laugh reading this in a description of a club ride in southern Indiana. They know what hills are down there:

"All road bicycling will be on good roads with many ripples and a few larger bumps and a couple of hills." Talk about understatement

Do you have a favorite example of a club ride description?

[Veronica]

I once described the top of Mt. Tam as "rollers, trending up". I think Jobob has referred to that section as "the Seven B!tches."

Veronica

[jobob]

I think Jobob has referred to that section as "the Seven B!tches."

That's what the locals call Ridgecrest Road on Mt. Tam.

Well, either that or the Seven Sisters.

[Veronica]

That's what the locals call Ridgecrest Road on Mt. Tam.

Well, either that or the Seven Sisters.

I had never heard that until either you or Kim called it that. Anyway... I just remember SK telling me that they were not rollers! Hey, I did say trending up!

Veronica

[DarcyInOregon]

What I really hate is doing an event ride that was described as "flat to gently rolling hills" and the terrain is anything but flat to rolling. I know the terrain in my own region, but when I travel to another state to do an event, I am dependent upon the route description as I am not familiar with the region. When I end up having 5,000 feet or more of elevation gain, with miles of climbing that include grades that are 6-10% or higher, I do not consider the route to be flat to rolling. I finally concluded that the descriptions are written by Alpha male racing cyclists who perceive anything less than a 15% grade to be "flat." So unless the route is in Florida, I will never believe a description again that says "flat to rolling." I like a challenging ride, but I plan my riding schedule around the event rides, and it sure messes up the plan to do miles of climbing when I expected flat to rolling.

Maybe there is a list of terminology somewhere on the internet with an accurate description for commonly used words to describe a route, but I haven't found it. Like in this forum, when someone says they are having a hard time climbing a "steep hill", what are they referring to? Is the distance 1/4 mile, 1/2 mile or 1 mile or longer? Is the grade 3%, 5%, 8%, 12% or higher? One person might consider a steep hill to be 1/4 mile at 3% and another cyclist considers steep to be over 1/2 mile and at least 9%, so it would help if there was an accurate description for what is "steep."

I would really like warning of the more significant difficult parts of a route in the route description. For example, if at mile 64 there is a one mile climb where the grade fluctuates between 16 and 19%, cyclists can't tell it is that steep by eyeballing the hill, they go up it and then it is a mad scramble to try to unclip on a sharp grade with motorists whizzing by and no flat driveways to turn into, it just seems to me to be common sense to put it in the route description.

[oxysback]

Ditto, Darcy! By the way...did you do the Vine Ride today? Hats off to you if you did. Hot and windy!

[JennK13]

Perhaps it's a regional thing Living on the Front Range of the Rocky Mountains in the Denver area of Colorado, our "hills" our others "mountains". If you're west of I25, NO ride is "flat". But, to us locals, it is

[badgercat]

Maybe there is a list of terminology somewhere on the internet with an accurate description for commonly used words to describe a route, but I haven't found it. Like in this forum, when someone says they are having a hard time climbing a "steep hill", what are they referring to? Is the distance 1/4 mile, 1/2 mile or 1 mile or longer? Is the grade 3%, 5%, 8%, 12% or higher? One person might consider a steep hill to be 1/4 mile at 3% and another cyclist considers steep to be over 1/2 mile and at least 9%, so it would help if there was an accurate description for what is "steep."

I hear you, but I think steepness is really in the eye of the beholder--what you're used to riding on. I went on a club ride in a city where I'm living temporarily where people were out of the saddle to climb a hill that wasn't much worse than one I breeze over in my daily commute back home.

My boyfriend and I use http://www.mapmyride.com/ a lot because it provides elevation profiles. Often times, routes for charity rides and club rides will have been loaded in there already and we can know a little better what we're getting into.

[Veronica]

Steep isn't something you can really quantify. It's different for everyone because we're all at different riding abilities. Today I did a 22 mile ride with 3300 feet of climbing. We had ten miles of climbing spread out in three separate climbs with the longest being about six miles. For someone else that could be freakishly steep. The only "steep" part was a little .7 mile jaunt through a neighborhood, with lots of little hills, some with grades of nearly 20%. Because they were so short, I didn't think of them as steep.

Not everyone rides with a unit that will tell percent of grade either. I guess steep means it was a challenging climb or descent for that person.

Veronica