A Brown to a Steeler in a Day

Posted August 15, 2012

Another single day’s ride was ahead of us on our way to Pittsburgh as we departed Cleveland early in the morning. We had done a bit of city riding around Cleveland as we visited the city, but for the most part, we hadn’t done THAT much riding over the last week. Nothing like what we were used to in the first half of the season

We spent three nights in Detroit, then rode one day to Cleveland.
Then spent three nights in Cleveland, rode one day to Pittsburgh.
Finally, we had three nights scheduled to sleep in Pittsburgh.

That’s two, count em, 2!!, days of riding smashed between 9 nights. It was almost like we were back to “normal” riding. Two long rides per week, couple short rides interspersed. What were we going to do with ourselves?!

Needless to say, we had to stay fresh. We started to wonder how are bodies would hold up on this home stretch. It took us a wee bit of time, roughly 2 weeks, to get used to the 100 mile day rides, back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back. During the first half of the season we had:

6-day ride (MIA-ATL)
7-day ride (ARI-DEN)
8-day ride (DEN-DAL)
9-day ride (SEA-SF)
11-day ride (HOU-TB)

Physically, our tendons weren’t ready for the repetitive motion of a 100-mile bike ride without recovery. Fuel-wise, our bodies weren’t used to consuming the necessary amount of food, nor were we accustomed to digesting and using that amount of food in a timely fashion. Mentally we had to catch up to the physical exhaustion from a long day’s ride, so that we could still be productive and work at night as we prepared for the next city. We had a lot of adjusting to do.

Buuuuuut, we did it. And quick! We were pretty good at it by now. We were better at finishing a day’s ride earlier, eating bigger breakfasts, going to bed early, waking up early, and still having enough energy to be productive for a night work sesh.

But maybe things were changing. The grueling summer schedule was beginning to take its toll on us. In addition, our rides were more spread out. What we had conditioned our bodies for all summer long, day-after-day riding, mixed in with about 6-7 hours of sleep a night… was going to change. Less riding, more big cities, and the general wear and tear of a 6-month long cross-country trek, meant things were going to be different in this second half.

For all of those long rides that we did in the first half, we had no scheduled rides longer than 5 days for the entire second half of the season. The teams in the north and northeast are so much closer together!

Would this mean that we wouldn’t be able to handle the long 100-mile-day rides better? Maybe we would handle it better because we’d be more fresh… we didn’t know. Were we mentally resting enough? Were we going to be able to handle the lack of sleep for the rest of the summer. I have a feeling we are about to find out all of these answers.

Well no point in sitting around pondering what’s going to happen, let’s get into it already! We started our 1-day journey to Pittsburgh very close to where we held our event at the Boys and Girls Club.

The ride started off as every other city ride, very city-y. Just have to work through it, pound it out and make it to the free and easy ridin’. The free and easy ridin’ was supposed to be trail-heavy. The Headwaters Trail was, according to Google Maps, a great trail that spanned much of the distance between Cleveland and Pittsburgh.

But in real life, this unfortunately is not the case. The trail does exist, and it’s wonderful where it is, but it’s spotty. It’s not connected and about a 1/6 of the distance Google Maps said it was. It wasn’t a big deal, because the back county roads are no problem. I blame more Google Maps. It’s clearly marked a well-maintained continuous bike path. This has happened several times throughout our journey. Yes, I know Google Maps can’t be perfect… so they should just hire us to help them with their bike maps across America! 🙂

The Headwaters Trail was great when it was going, except for one spot. Still have no idea how I didn’t see this one.

Once we got over the Google Maps issue and the tree-in-the-road issue, which took about .67 seconds, we looked up and saw we were close to the town of Warren. Nice for us cause we could get a water break, stretch break and tweeting break. However, once we rode up to the town, we altered our approach. It looked to be a town that used to thrive on a manufacturing plant but had hit hard times.

Well, just as we were leaving the city of Warren, there was a TON of manufacturing plants that we rode by. It felt like another world. The largest manufacturing plants I had ever seen. This picture doesn’t do it justice, but I promise you… HUGE!

The second half of our ride started to give us a bit of the test that we had expected: more hills. We hadn’t had hills since… Atlanta? It had been a LOOOOONG time. We were actually ready for it. We wanted the challenge again. Well, western Pennsylvania gave it to us.

But first, here’s a dumpy-looking barn we saw… just because.

All the way into Pittsburgh was hilly. Still nothing compared to the 101 and 1 out West along the Oregon coast, but it was a stiff test. I graded us. We passed.

We were lucky to be riding into Pittsburgh during Bike Fest. It really doesn’t get much more perfect than that. Still not sure how we hook up so well with these cities. That’s just lucky.

We were also looking forward to Primantis Bros, the great views of the skyline and catching a game at PNC Park! Bring on the ‘Burgh!