Marin Century

[maillotpois]

So who's doing it? Which ride - there are SO many options to choose from this year!!!

I know what SOME of you are doing....

I registered for the double but have a chance to ride the Mt. Tam Century with an old training partner of mine, so I bet I do that instead. I'm feeling a little lazy after Death Ride.

Anyone else??

ETA: It is August 4.

[yellow]

I love it when webpage designers do such a good job with the page that they forget to include very important information (LIKE THE DATE OF THE RIDE) in a very easy to find spot. I go to the website and...nada...nothin'. Maybe someone should let them know they should put the date of the ride right up front.

Mad Martha and I are tentatively planning on a road trip to Cali to do the Marin 50k on Nov 10...oh, wrong sport. Sorry!

Seriously, someone else may want to know the date of the Marin Century! (hint, hint)

[maillotpois]

You mean you weren't born knowing that information??

Sorry about that! I fixed my post. Can't do anything about Marin Cyclists'.

[tprevost]

I was gonna do the century but now I think I may just do the metric... either way, I'll be there

[aka_kim]

I (foolishly and optimistically) signed up for the Mt. Tam Century. Which course I actually end up riding is TBD.

[jobob]

Heh heh, I'm seeing a pattern here.

I was planning to do the 200K but more than likely I'll do the Marin century instead.

[maillotpois]

Gosh - that is a pattern! AV go lazy - but still ROCK.

[maillotpois]

It just occurred to me - for those of you doing the Mt. Tam Century or double - the top of Tam has a lot of loose gravel on the roads. It is a huge pain in the neck. The top is basically a double summit, so you descend as well, and it is twisty. Please be careful of the loose gravel.

[aka_kim]

Would it be too wimpy to not go to the top? - I could call it the Mt Half Tam Century. (Yeah, I am looking at how to eliminate a few thousand feet of climbing wherever possible. )

[maillotpois]

It's 3 miles each way from Rock Springs and really not that much more difficult. Well worth the extra effort just to know you went all the way.

But yes, you can just hang a right at Rock Springs and cut out the top. We do that most of the time we do the Alpine Dam loop just because we're generally pressed for time.

The view from the top can be incredible, though, as I am sure you know.... And the second climb is not really as high as the first. Once you get to the "big white DOD ball peak" you have really hit the high point.

[aka_kim]

MP, I didn't intend to snub you at the end of the ride, it just worked out that way . But I do still hate you.

[jobob]

Kim & I rode the Mt. Tam century. Kim's such a hoot, she was worried that I'd be too fast and strong for her, and I would leave her in the dust. Bah! She had to wait for me at the top of every freakin' climb. Told ya, Kim. neener. But at least my cruising speed has improved enough so that I could at least keep up with her for the most part on the flats, there's a plus.

I'd never ridden up Mt. Tam before so I was looking forward to this. The climb up Fairfax-Bolias was nice and shady for the most part, and the Alpine Dam area was lovely. On the way up I happened to meet one of the organizers for this years Waves to Wine MS ride, so Kim & I had a nice chat with him about the upcoming ride while we were heading up towards Ridgecrest.

By the time we reached Ridgecrest I was tired, and the rollers on Ridgecrest totally wiped me out. We were well above the fog line and it was freakin' hot up there, and while I generally do well on rollers I was too tired from the climb to be able to get some momentum going and power up the rollers like I normally do. That made them all the more harder than they needed to be. When I finally reached the intersection of Ridgecrest and Pan Toll (and Kim was waiting patiently, working on her suntan), we still had about 3 miles to go to the summit of Tam. It was an up and back, and after about 30 milliseconds of debate we wussed out on it and and hung a right to begin our descent down PanToll and Panoramic Hiway.

Heading down Panoramic we rode into the fog, and in the space of about a half mile it went from sunny and freakin' hot to damp and cold with a nearly 40degree temperature drop, so we soon had our armwarmers and vests back on. We rode past the entrance to Muir Woods, which can be a bit dicey with all the cars parked along the road and pedestrians wandering about and the @#$% tour busses passing within inches on the narrow windey shoulderless road (can you tell I lurved that part).

We finally reached Highway 1 which alas wasn't all that much better, it was still narrow and windey and relatively shoulderless with lots of cars and a slog of a climb after Muir Beach to boot. I was well into my "who am I kidding mode" by then, and whenever I caught up to Kim (who by now was waiting for me at the top of every little anthill roller, it seemed ), in betwixt general purpose whining I was informing her and anyone else within earshot that no way in creation was I attempting a freakin' double century in this lifetime.

But by the time we passed Stinson Beach the traffic volume went down considerably, the road widened, the fog had lifted by then and it was nice & sunny but the temperature remained pleasant, and all was well with our world. Just past Pt. Reyes we headed inland on Pt. Reyes - Petaluma Rd. and hung a right past the Nicasio Revervior. Almost done, yaaay! My lower back was tightening up so I took a couple of vitamin I's and by the time we reached the final rest stop in Nicasio it was much better.

It started getting really hot again as we went inland so we had some nice cold Cokes at the final rest stop at the Nicasio School. This rest stop was common to the final leg of all the rides so it was fun to chat with people - and everyone was glad that they were almost done! We met up with MP and her friend Skye(?) at that rest stop and she gave me some words of encouragement which helped a bit, but I still wanted this ride to be O-VER.

Lucas Valley Road was hot but at least we were in the shade a lot, and Kim was joining in on the whining by now and misery really loves company so I was plenty fine with that. Once we got over the final (thank gawd, short) climb in the baking sun we had the nice long descent to the finish.

At the finish I made a beeline to the ice cream freezer and wolfed down a Haagen-Dasz ice cream bar as we waited in line for the real food. You know that saying, life is uncertain, eat dessert first!

We rode about 88 miles of the 94 mile route (since we wussed out on the 3 mile up & back to the summit of Tam) and my Ciclosport shows about 6300 feet of climbing. Compared to others' computers my Ciclosport seems to underestimate climbing but, whatever.



Some parts of this route were really nice, but the traffic around Muir Woods and up Highway 1 was a bit of a drag, so next year I'll probably do the 200K instead.

Many thanks to Kim for putting up with my sluggitude & my whining

Now that I've slept on it, I'm pretty happy with what I did and maybe ... maybe ... I might still shoot for the Solvang double.

[snapdragen]

I am not worthy....... Congrats to you all!

[maillotpois]

Great job you guys!! Sorry I didn't really have a chance to chat at the finish. Kim I did not feel snubbed - I was too lazy to get up and greet Jo besides yelling out at her (which I think she didn't hear) when she came through the finish...

Clarification: Those are not "rollers" on Ridgecrest toward the top of Tam. Rollers are pleasant elevation changes where you can carry momentum through to the next one. Those are what are referred to politely as the seven b!tches, or seven sisters in mixed company. They are rarely fun and always wear me down. They sure did that yesterday.

I did the ride with my friend Sky who I trained for Death Ride with 2 years ago. This was his longest ride since Death Ride in 2005 and he is quite the little sandbagger. (He's 32 or something and is a skinny racer dude so it's not like it was unexpected.) But we had a great time - it's fun to find good friends to suffer with, and I'd really missed riding with him.

DH did the ride with a super speedy guy he hadn't ridden with before, and their ride time for the 95 miles was just over 6 hours. What-ever.

He dubbed my sit bone problem "@ss thetans" (think Scientology) and we worked on exorcising them. It was really bad yesterday, pain to the point of nausea at times. So I am looking at some time with my doctor and shorter rides between now and the Grizzly Century and Solvang double.

[jobob]

I was too lazy to get up and greet Jo besides yelling out at her (which I think she didn't hear) when she came through the finish...

Nope, didn't hear you - sorry ! I think my brain was buzzing by then.

Clarification: Those are not "rollers" on Ridgecrest toward the top of Tam. Rollers are pleasant elevation changes where you can carry momentum through to the next one. Those are what are referred to politely as the seven b!tches, or seven sisters in mixed company. They are rarely fun and always wear me down. They sure did that yesterday.

Oh, OK! Actually, looking at the elevation profile after I downloaded it last night, I was thinking to myself, "myself, those sure as hell don't look like rollers" (at miles ~30-34 on the profile) but external validation of my suffering is always appreciated.