As detailed previously, I have rediscovered cycling in a big way. Taking the activity far more seriously than I ever had before, I have been training for my first century ride, which is scheduled for September 25th. In preparation for that event, I decided to ride in a metric century to gauge my current fitness level and sample what a century ride is all about.

Enter the Blazing Saddles Century put on by the North Shore Cyclists of northeastern Massachusetts this past Sunday. This ride has three routes including a half century, metric century, and full century. With registration allowed on the morning of the event, I was able to decide if I would do the ride depending upon the weather. The registration fee on the morning of the ride was only $25.00. At only ten dollars more than the pre-registration fee, it was a worth while gamble to bet with the weather and against the race. As it turned out, the day was picture perfect with partly cloudy skies, a cool morning, little wind, and temperatures in the low eighties at their highest.

Here is the Metric Century Route and elevation profile:

This was an absolutely beautiful route that traveled through many towns in the region including Byfield, Haverhill (my home town), Amesbury, West Newbury, Newbury, Newburyport, Rowley, Ipswich, and Topsfield. Rest stops were relatively well spaced at 32 and 52 miles along the 64 mile route.

I was relatively cocky about the lack of elevation gain going into this ride (only 2430′ vertical in 64 miles, I do many routes in the Lakes Region that have that much vertical in half as many miles). But the short hills in the Route 1 and Route 1A corridors make up for lack of vertical gain and length with respectable pitch. I was surprised to find myself pushed hard on three of these short by respectably steep hills. I will not underestimate the “flatlands” again and kudos to the North Shore Cyclists for having identified such a respectable route.

I finished the ride in 3:41 (moving time) at an average speed of 17.6 MPH. This is slightly faster than I had anticipated riding even given my low expectations of difficulty. Many portions of the ride were flat or slightly inclined either way in which I was peddling at 20 MPH or higher for significant distances. I tried my best not to draft other riders to get a true gauge of my personal effort. That said, I occasionally came up behind other rides and fell into line. This actually decreased my overall speed as I often drafted in the 17-18 MPH range on the flats which was less than my potential. Ironically, I was at my slowest when I was not peddling solo. I gave a few really good pulls for guys that drafted off me as well. Nothing beats drafting off the 210 pound 6’1″ big dude killing it at 20-22 MPH.

Highlights of the ride included peddling through my original home town of Haverhill, River Road in West Newbury, the ride around Upper Artichoke Reservoir, flying down Scotland Road in Newburyport at 22 MPH, Newman Road in Newbury through the Marshes, Mill Road to Highland Street just south of Bradley Palmer State Park (amazing road to bike or drive down), hammering up the hill that is Asbury Street to the western BPSP entrance (easily passing other guys sucking wind), and the twists and turns of Perkins Row in Topsfield.

Less memorable parts of the ride included riding many route numbers that were previously my life blood of teenage road biking transportation such as Routes 110, 113, 133, and 1A. All equally terrible for road biking due to heavy traffic and junk in the shoulder (though all do have ample shoulders which is why I enjoyed those direct routes so much in my teenage years). The final ten miles were a long slog of uninteresting side roads excepting Rowley Road which was very nice. Peddling through downtown Ipswich was the absolute pits with tight confines, limited shoulders, deep pot holes, and unfriendly drivers. I only missed turns three times, once due to missing the paint and twice due to carrying too much speed.

The biggest highlight was being one of the few (if only?) riders to have a personal mobile cheering section. Both my mom and brother showed up and planned out routes to see me along the way. Cycling is not much of a spectator activity, especially when it is not a race (which is why Crits are so popular being one of the few cycling races that encourages spectator viewing). It was fun being surprised along the route by both my mom and my brother popping up at random points along the way. What can I say? Our clan does things a little differently. Always has, always will.

So with this warm up ride easily finished and with good time, I am looking forward to doing a full century next month on a route even flatter than the metric century that I just completed. This ride was my longest single ride of the season by 15 miles so with a little more distance training, I suspect I should be able to finish the flatter Seacoast Century with ease and a similar average speed despite the longer distance. And then, ski season is only a month away after that ride is completed!