My training plan today called for finding some hills. So I asked around for some advice and a few people recommended riding through Jay Cooke State Park to Veterans Overlook and back again. A quick Google search showed that was about 22 miles which seemed perfect for what I had to do.
So after my swim class this morning, I ate my bagel in the car on the drive down to Carlton. The first mile of my ride was on the Munger trail until I hit Hwy 210 which continued through the state park.
It was a beautiful ride through dense trees, paralleling a river on a brand new road. But the HILLS!
It was mostly downhill for the first 40% of the ride and some of those hills were STEEP. I was pretty scared going down those hills with the turns and such and I was riding my brakes most of the time. One particularly long steep downhill I was sure I was going to have to walk my bike back up it.
So after the first 9 miles of mostly downhill, then it was a nearly 2 mile climb to the overlook. By far the longest continuous climb I have done. I had a brief stop at the overlook to snap a couple of pictures then back down the hill to the bottom and to begin the long climb back to my car.
I spent most of the next 9 miles in my small gear but I never had to walk my bike. Never even came close actually. It was hard work with power requirements that reminded me of the threshold workouts on the trainer that I hate.
Made it back to my car, laid in the grass in the sunshine and just relaxed a bit.
Dare I say it was a "fun" ride?
No comments:
Post a Comment