By way of training for our proposed Metric Century, Sloth and I did a ride yesterday. Sloth found a book of routes / maps / queue sheets from the Harrisburg Bicycle Club. (They also have some of these online as PDFs).
Anyhow, we picked out what looked like an easy one – 17 miles of gently rolling hills outside Mechanicsburg. The route was titled Nancy’s D-Lite. I don’t know who Nancy is, but her route was very nice. There was probably less than a mile of roads with any traffic at all, and the scenery was good.
What few hills we had were short, and generally not overly steep. I was very proud of myself for not walking any of them, AND not shifting down into the granny at all.
We stopped somewhere in the middle to take really blurry cell-phone pics, which look especially terrible when stitched together as a panorama.
Anyhow, it was a nice ride. Just tough enough to make my legs a little tender today, but not so bad that I was totally worthless for the rest of the day. We passed several full-zoot lycra-clad roadies, with the requisite crabon bikes and STI, etc. Sloth and were keeping it real in full retrogrouch style. I had lugs and barcons, sloth was rocking 650b wheels and downtube shifters. We both had shiny metal Velo-Orange fenders. Despite our being the classiest fuckers in the whole county, the roadies mostly waved or at least nodded at us, instead of looking at us with sneering derision as they so often do.
It was only 17 miles, and we have lots and lots of longer rides to go on before we’re ready for 63 miles, but it’s a start. I gps logged the whole thing, and here’s a map of it, if you’re familiar with Mechanicsburg.
Anyways, we have lots more queue sheets to pour over. Maybe we’ll try a 20-25 miler for next time.
No more dick-monkeying around!
Sounds like a fun ride. It’s great that you guys can train together, in addition to doing the longer ride together.
How hilly is the metric century route you are planning on riding? The 60-ish milers I did in the Wilkes-Barre area were absolutely brutal in terms of climbing. I’ve done a flat century in northern Indiana/Michigan that was much easier. Hills can make a big difference.
I’m not sure we’ve really decided on a particular ride for our metric century, but every August the Lancaster Bicycle Club hosts their annual Covered Bridge Metric. This year they’re capping registration at 2600 riders. 2600! There’s no f’ing way I’mma go on that ride. But the cue sheet is out there and, since it’s supposed to be gently rolling hills and lots of good scenery, maybe doing that loop when everyone else isn’t would be a decent plan.
The Harrisburg Bicycle Club also has cue sheets for 2 metrics that leave from Little Buffalo and one that leaves from Pinchot. These are probably hillier than the Lancaster ride.
I’m not necessarily suggesting we have to find a metric that a bunch of other people have already done, and I’m perfectly OK with 62 miles of State Forest gravel.
If you put in at Brillhart Station, the ride to Ashland and back on the HRT is a metric century. Lunch at Serenity Junction, high tea at New Freedom Station, dinner at Moreland… You could do it in a day…maybe two…
I did 100 k yesterday no sweat……but I have 2.5 horsepower 2 stroke Mitsubishi engine mounted over my rear tire 🙂
http://www.flickr.com/photos/bikeridingdonutguy/4808420391/