Rides 2010-60/61: Leadville 100

After Saturday’s longer ride, I decided to take it easy on Sunday afternoon and just ride the bike. This meant that there wasn’t too much effort put forth to maintain a steady cadence and most hills were met with an abrupt slowdown and some soft pedaling. It felt good to just ride with no pressure, thus the near 24 miles went by slowly and I took the time to just enjoy the scenery in the warm, summer temperatures.

I’ve been taking my good Panasonic Lumix DMC-TZ5 camera along on rides in hopes of improving the quality of my cycling photos.

Here are the Sunday ride stats:

Tuesday after work was a different story, as I really felt like getting some decent miles into my legs. After the weekend rides, I was feeling that a regular rhythm to the rides was doing my body good – plus my legs weren’t complaining at all. Unfortunately, the temperatures were still pretty warm with relatively high humidity, so I wasn’t expected to break any of my summertime records. Still, I wanted to ride hard and long.

On my way south toward Wayzata, I encountered another cyclist on a mountain bike keeping a fairly good pace along the dedicated bike path that heads out of town and along the lakeshore. Getting a little closer to him, I noticed that he was wearing a Leadville Trail 100 jersey. I’ve read a little about this race and realized that those jerseys must be earned (not purchased), so I asked him it he had ridden the race. To my surprise, he said “yes” and went on to describe that he was about ready to leave for the 2010 version – taking place in just a few days. He stated that this would be his 13th attempt at the race and had a simple goal of finishing within the 12 hour cut-off time.

If you are not familiar with this race, it sounds rather brutal. It takes off from Leadville, Colorado (which is already at approximately 10,000 feet elevation) and climbs through the local mountain passes for 14,000 feet of total climbing. It is a 100 mile out-n-back course that is mostly off-road on a mix of logging trails and singletrack. It is a true endurance race, to say the least.

I’m most familiar with the ride from reading the Fat Cyclist blog. If you have seen my pictures with an orange colored cycling jersey, that comes from the Fat Cyclist (he goes by “Fatty”) and is produced locally by the Twin Six company. Fatty talks in detail about his annual pilgrimage to ride the Leadville 100 each year. It’s fun to enjoy the race vicariously through his blog and understand what it is like to ride a truly epic adventure.

So, it was fun to connect with someone in Minnesota who was also ready to embark on the same adventure as the Fat Cyclist. We talked in detail about the race for a few miles before my planned route departed the trail and headed west along the lake. I wished him the best of luck and hoped he would have a great time on the ride.

Here is how the ride finally ended up – with not great results, but good enough for the conditions:

For both Sunday and Tuesday’s ride, I was using a new pair of Descente bib shorts that I had just purchased. For as much time as most cyclists talk about the technical details of the bike, the quality of the complete ride is actually influenced more by the clothing incorporated into the ride. Bikes are great, technical wonders – but miserable conditions and improper clothing choices can take a $8000 bike and render it a literal “pain in the ass”.

In my past, I have generally gone “low ball” with my clothing purchases and found the items that were extremely discounted or off-brands from the Nashbar or Performance Bike catalogs. After upping my miles this summer, I have started to realize that is a poor choice and doesn’t do justice to any ride. If I can’t last the duration of the ride due to my clothing (versus capabilities of the bike or even stamina of my body), then it becomes rather self-defeating.

My new bib shorts are awesome (the Descente Strata line) and provide the right level of padding and compression to make for a very comfortable ride. I can tell that several years into some of my other shorts has resulted in a breakdown of the Lycra and they just don’t hold my muscles as compactly as they once did. Plus, the Descente shorts are made very well and should last far beyond my bargin-basement purchases. At nearly $140, they better work well – but it becomes money well spent.

For as much as I enjoy the pain and suffering of a good ride – there is something to be said for being as comfortable as possible throughout the entire process.