Author: James

This was the official kick off for the SIR Brevet season, a hilly loop out from Renton hitting Tiger mountain and May Valley. There were 90 odd riders at the start and we got sent off on our merry way by a bagpiper in full regalia.

My legs felt pretty good but there seemed a lot of riders ahead of me. I got to the finish and the area behind the pub was full of bikes (and the pub full of bikers eating and drinking). Once the official results came out I saw that there were actually a fair few riders still out on the course after me (I came in around 36th) so I was in my standard mid pack position after all.

Now the challenge for the rest of the season is to get faster!

The sun finally arrived! Clear blue skies and a great day on the bike heading up over the hills from Redmond and out to North Bend and Lake Dorothy.

No punctures today and I rode at a better pace, averaging 16.5 mph for the day with no breaks.

I need to bring a more varied selection of food for these rides as gel blocks and Zone bars were getting a bit old by the end of the ride. A sandwich or banana would have gone down well.

Next up – the spring populaire next Sunday and the official kick off of the 2010 SIR brevet season.

Pretty wet roads at the start of this ride. I promptly got a flat after about 4 miles and saw the peleton vanish up the road. 25 minutes later (not my fastest tire change) I was back cycling and wondering if I’d get to see anyone else for the rest of the ride.

Fortunately I eventually caught up with Larry (who had also got a puncture) at mile 22 or so and had some company for the rest of the ride. We decided to shave 9 miles off the ride at an opportune moment to catch up with more people and thus had even more company for the last 15 miles.

Pleasant company and a nice opportunity to test out my new aero bars for portions of the ride.

I registered for the Cascade 1000k last night, lining up the final step for optimal positioning for pre-registration for PBP next year. The larger the rides you do in 2010 the earlier you can pre-register for PBP in 2011.

It was a toss up between doing the official Cascade 1200 or doing the Cascade 1000 + RUSA permanent #413 (260k). You ride the same course but get slightly different credit for it depending on which combination you decide on. I still kind of want PBP to be my first official 1200 and the 1000 will also count towards the Randonneur 5000 award which would be another nice accomplishment to get lined up in conjunction with PBP: http://www.rusa.org/award_r5000.html.

Here’s the course:

and the various mountain passes

(Images from Robert’s blog)

This Saturday’s ride was from South Center in a loop around Dash Point. It was back to the rain with non-stop light rain for the whole ride. Plenty of climbing and a good workout for the legs. My pace was about 1mph slower than last year (probably due to the rain).