Dear Readers,
Diane and I did the Bicycling Magazine Fall Classic last weekend. It was an amazing event. The ride was Grand Fondo style with the overall loop being timed, as well as 2 QOM/KOM sections on the course to test the climbers. So a ride, that's not a race, but it's cool to ride with some purpose but no need to turn the pedals in anger. It was my first time. Probably not my last. This was a fun day.
The course was very well marked. I couldn't believe how many moto marshals and corner marshals there were. The star of the show was of course the Leigh Valley. The sceanary was beautiful and the roads were amazing. Great stuff !
This would be the longest ride the Monk has done in well over a year- since blowing her knee out at Providence last year. We were both pretty certain that there wouldn't be any issues- with either fitness or the knee, but there were also the KOM/QOM at mile eight that could cause the whole thing to come up done.
Monkey scrummed to the front of the ride, and those that know her are not surprised by this one bit. The ride took off and she proceeded to drop me. My legs were feeling pretty beat up and I was gone. I'll say it was amazing riding near the front of an almost 500 person peloton. I slowly clawed my way back up to Monkey and said "why are you going so hard right now?" She smiled and said, "I want to get to the QOM section near the front, it's gonna get crazy there." Sure enough when we hit the line 2nd/3rd wheel people started attacking all over the place, it was a little nuts, and a little awesome. We hugged the white line and steadily finished out the climb.
That first climb really spread things out. It was amazing to me how we started with so many, and really for almost the rest of the day, Diane and I rode together enjoying the amazing roads. It was an outstanding time. Mentally, we had budgeted three and a half hours for the ride. But we rode pretty spirited, and at the 3:00 mark just had a little more than 2 miles to go! We were stoked, and had an awesome time.
We finished up and got to take a couple laps on the track. Such a cool experience.
Afterwards, there was great food and beer (part of the registration). We had a great time catching up with some friends too. Diane's knee was fine, this was the deepest she had to dig in a while, but she was stoked. I would say to her, do you want to back off? She'd just smile and keep going. Stoked by her time, stoked by the route- she slept the entire drive home! What and amazing day.
photoblog starting in 3...2...1 :
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| Monkey near the front at the start. |
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| this is my "I've just been dropped by Monkey" face |
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| On the first, and biggest climb |
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| Beautiful Scenery All Day... |
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| Post ride Recovery |
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| Pastrami truffle fries. NEW FAVORITE THING. |
thanks for reading.
respect
fatmarc
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