There was just something epic sounding about riding my bike 100 miles. I liked the evenness of the 100. It just had a lovely ring to it. Sure if I'd realized at the time of my sign up that the 65 Mile option was 100 Kilometers I might have considered that, but just, the idea of going 100 miles in a day was definitely on my list of things I wanted to do.
Leading up to the big day on June 3rd, I didn't have a ton of time to train on long rides, but I did do some pretty intensive 20/30 mile days that had a lot of hills built into them. For me, I can be on my bike all day and not care. I love it, but hills are definitely my weakness, and I wanted to make sure that even if I got to mile 90 and hit a great big hill, that I wouldn't be hopping off and walking because I wasn't prepared. And in the end, the only hill I had to walk part of the way up was the one where I hit my knee and started bleeding, so I suppose practicing going up some beasts of climbs all around NJ actually paid off. As for the reason I didn't quite make it the full 100 miles, well, that's some human error at play.
I got up about 2 AM, so I could leave my house by 3 and get to Hershey by 6 AM, so I'd have time to fiddle with my bike, get my packet and get stretch a little before we were allowed to start the ride at 7 AM. And, though some pesky deer did try and jump up out in front of me at one point, the rest of the ride was rather uneventful. So I got there, chatted with a few people (most of whom were shocked I had driven so far) and got ready to go. Mostly this meant studying my map, since there were several routes to choose from, a 17.5, a 35, a 65 or the 100. And I made sure to pay attention to people who had like colored wristbands, knowing they'd be going my way. Once it started at Hershey stadium, we wended our way around the parking lot, and then through the actual Hershey Park. I got to ride through most of the park, before we were let out a secret exit and then on to the streets of Hershey. We rode up through some Hershey sites and then over to the college, mostly the same route as the cute little trolley tour that you can take.
Once out of Hershey land, we were into farmland and countryside. I learned that while corn looks flat, its not, there were so many rolling hills, that by the time I got to the first rest stop around mile 15, I'd begun to wonder what I had gotten myself into. That turnoff for the 16.5 mile ride looked tempting, but I forged on. Then about three miles out of the rest stop (which was packed with snacks and most importantly refreshing ice water) was when I was riding up a big hill and fighting with my low gears (a problem that has since been fixed at my bike shop), when my gear shifted unexpectedly and wrenched by leg up so that it hit my bike pump and gouged my knee. I walked to the top of the hill, put some of the ice water on it, grabbed the bandaid I had remembered to pack in my small backpack and slapped it on and kept going. After all, I had 80 more miles or so to go.
So up and down over all the rolling hills, each time I had to really get up a big hill my knee was killing me, but at another rest stop I found a lovely person with some advil. Around mile 30 or so I met up with a lovely woman whose husband was clearly itching to really power fast through some miles. He was moving fast and then would get about a mile up and wait for her. So we told him to go on to a rest stop and we'd meet him there. It was at that crucial rest stop that I made my big mistake. There was a sign there for the big 35 mile loop that took off and differentiated from the 65 mile. I grabbed a yummy PB&J from the volunteers, as I was starving and had been riding for several hours. Then took off, since my newfound friend was doing the 65 mile ride. So we separated after they both marveled at the fact that I was attempting to go the full 100 miles on my hybrid bike, when most of the riders doing the long ride were on sleek little road bikes that were far lighter.
So I headed off, but for some reason there wasn't a big group leaving the rest stop when I was, and I missed one of the little stickers that were on the road indicating which way to go. I misread my map and ended up on a strange but beautiful road, that after about 7 miles, connected back with what I thought was the loop I needed, but turned out to be the road back to the rest stop I had just left. So I biked back, tried to go down the proper road, and made it about 5 or 6 miles or so (I really need to get one of those handy odometers), when some guy passed me and said that he felt like he was on the wrong road, and he turned around, so I turned around with him, and ended back at that same rest stop.
At that point I began to worry I wouldn't finish by the four o'clock deadline if I attempted the same route for a third time... and I was running out of gas. So I opted to hop back on the return route to Hershey, which was still a good 30 miles away. Turns out, that the hardest part was on the way back, an enormous hill with huge elevation gain, but it was the prettiest (aside from 3 Mile Island). Once I started nearing Hershey and seeing familiar sites, I was so delighted. Even though I'd long stopped seeing people who were doing the ride. But the bike path that leads around the hospital out there was just gorgeous (seriously, ride it if you are in the neighborhood). But about 5 miles from the end, and with only an hour left before the cutoff, it started pouring. But not just rain, thunderstorms. I can deal with water, even on my bike, but thunderstorms? Lighting when I'm in an exposed area, or riding around rollercoasters is more than a little disconcerting. And what's more, I saw a guy on a motorcycle totally wipe out in front of me because of all the water. As the storm ended, I finally arrived in the stadium, and got my t-shirt and pin and they threw a ton of food at me (since I was one of, if not the, last people to finish), but weirdly no chocolate. That's probably my biggest complaint about this ride. Anyway, I had seen a couple around the mile 90 sign, and they had told them that I was still behind them, so the volunteers knew I was still coming. All of the volunteers were impressed that I did the century (or anything close to it, since I told them my getting lost saga) and were extra impressed that I finished in the rain. But I still had nearly three hours to drive home, before I could truly relax.
I was happy that I made it anywhere near 100 miles, since it was leaps and bounds over what I'd done before. I'm quite into challenging myself, and this was indeed that. I know better how to look for the signs and pay attention the cues Now that my bike is fixed (apparently the gears were off, even though the young kid at the shop told me it was my imagination when I went in to get it checked at the end of last summer), thanks to my dad getting it a nice tune up. If (more like when), I go it again, I'll have learned a lot and be way better prepared. I'd be curious to try out a road bike, just to see how it effects my speed... maybe I'd be able to ride 15+ miles an hour instead of closer to 10/12. I also feel like I could kill at 65 mile ride, with no problem, so next spring, I might add a couple of those to my to do list, and maybe another century as well to make sure I did the whole thing. Maybe even this one. I don't think I have plans next May 19th...
