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Yesterday was King’s Tour of the Quabbin. I didn’t tour the Quabbin, I cut it short.

What a miserable day. And it didn’t start off well. My phone went out,  (although the DSL is still working), I forgot my camera, I forgot my fenders, I forgot my glucometer, and I missed my exit off the turnpike. (That meant I had to meander through Worcester the hard way.)

I got to Rutland shortly after 7 and stood around waiting for the rain to stop. It didn’t.  I’d planned on doing the 100 mi., but wanted to get started earlier to finish earlier since high winds were supposed to kick in around 2 pm. The 200k was supposed to start at 7:00, the 100mi at 8:00 and the 100k at 9:00. Several people standing around bagged it for the day and didn’t ride at all. I finally rolled out at about 7:35. In the rain.
I had to decide by mile 34 while route to do. That’s where the 100k splits from two longer rides. But by the time I got to the first (and only!) rest stop, I’d pretty much made up my mind that I wasn’t going to full 100 mi. It’s a good thing, too. I had zero energy left by the time I got finished. Two guys, Bill and Tom. rolled up while I was trying to decide, and I rode with them for most of the rest of the day.
I swear there are as many hills in the 100k as the 100mi, but compressed into 40 mi less. I will be mapping out the 100k shortly, so we’ll see whether that’s true. The 7Hill site says the 100 mi has about 7500 feet of climbing. All I know is I was completely wiped by the end of the day. I didn’t help, either, that the day’s high temperature was 56 degrees. Did I mention it was raining?

There were one or two very, very brief periods of no rain. In one place, the pavement almost got dry in spots, and the sky started to lighten. But that only lasted a few minutes and it was back to rain. I have a Fassa Bortolo cycling cap that I wear under my helmet when it rains. By the end of the ride, all I could do was grind out the hills watching that little bead of water sliding back and forth on the end of the bill. And now that I think about it, I must have left my cap in Rutland. I can’t find it.

The wind also started kicking up, but since so much of the ride (or at least the 100k) is in the hills, you’re pretty much sheltered from the brundt of the wind. In the 100mi you’re pretty exposed out there on US 202.

I got home around 3:30 or so, and had the car reserved until 11:00 pm, but didn’t have any energy to do anything else. It was a cold, rainy, miserable day. I have a 200k ride next weekend that I’m now wondering about. It’s much flatter ride (Boston to P-town) but it is 130 miles.

This entry was posted on Sunday, June 11th, 2006 at 12:32 pm and is filed under Rides. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.