CRW Spring Century

[dmaze]

Weather aside, this was an absolutely gorgeous ride. It was practically all rural roads, taking the long route through Harold Parker State Forest in North Andover, quietly ducking into New Hampshire, and returning via the nice part of the Merrimack River in Amesbury and Merrimac. I even caught the train stations in Wakefield and Topsfield for paying attention. In all this came to 101.80 miles for me (route map, since to my surprise my treacherous GPS batteries didn't die).

Biking in the rain wasn't actually so bad. I maybe went a little fast at the start, hitting the first rest area at mile 47 right around 3 hours, and so after the second stop at mile 76 I was pretty much crawling home in that "mild rises make me shift into my bottom gear and curse the world" sort of way. I wonder if focusing on longer rides would help; if I'm going to do CTTC I definitely need to practice climbing.

Was I the very last person back? It wasn't obvious; the home base was starting to be cleaned up when I got back around 4:20, and I didn't see anyone come in after me, but I also wasn't obviously being followed the way narya and I were when we did CTTC. Overall the support was present but minimal, and if you're actually traveling light you could definitely get by on the water and food at the stops. In a couple of places I would have liked to see a couple more arrows, and I would have liked the cue sheet be a little closer to reality (especially where it could have said "no really ignore the 'road closed' signs").

I finally got passed around mile 88 by the guy riding the century on an ancient fixed-gear bike. The fully enclosed recumbent was cool, particularly given the weather.