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Written by Eric Larsson
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Sunday, 27 July 2008 12:08 |
After more than two weeks without a a real training ride, but lots of heavy lifting (ask Owen and Jeff), I'm finally a resident of Portland. To mark my arrival, I decided to join the PVC <http://www.portlandvelo.com/> for their Saturday morning training ride.
Their website advertises it like this:
"This Ride is about 30 miles long. It starts from Cyclemania in Portland and goes throughout South Portland and Cape Elizabeth to Prouts Neck and back along the shore. This ride is a fast (>23MPH) pace and has as many as 75 riders in the summer. It mostly rolling to flat terrain. Group riding skill are important. It is open to all. The ride usually lasts 1.5 hours. There are 4 major sprints on this ride. They include: "Prouts Neck", "Fire Hydrant Hill", "Inn By the Sea", and of course the "Cookie Jar". This is the largest competitive ride in the state and attracts all major Maine Teams, with riders from Bethel, Augusta and all York and Cumberland counties."
About 40 people rolled out at 7:30. The roll out lasted just long enough for me to ask one of the local riders what to expect and for him to tell me that there it went hard up over the bridge to South Portland, again over a rise on the other side, and to prepare for the acceleration from the turnaround at Prouts Neck. Then a half dozen guys attacked hard and the peloton was chasing hard. Sure enough the climb up over the bridge was VO2 max, and there was no recovery before we went over the small rise on the other side. I was just wondering what the protocol was for forming a gruppetto, when the the road leveled out and a fellow wheelsucker said "it's a walk in the park now." Well, it was a 30mph walk, but tucked in at the back at least I was out of the red zone. We pulled back the early attack, but there was almost always a small group up the road and the pack was smooth and fast. I forgot to move up before the turnaround, but burned a match and found a wheel that brought me back into the fold before we turned to follow the shore with a good breeze blowing in off the Atlantic. The second-to-last sprint had a 1hr sports massage on the line, and the owner of the massage studio was at the line with a camera to document the winner. I don't think I will appear in the picture. However, I did move up for the final "Cookie Jar" sprint and finished at the back of the lead group of 10. Then everyone sat up for the final mile as a gesture to cooling down. Total time for a ride "about 30 miles long" was 1hr and 10 minutes. If I get up my nerve I'm planning to try the Tuesday night ride. According to the website "The ride is 48.5 miles and covers the bigger hill climbs in Southern Maine. The pace is close to a Cat III race. The pace is 23-27mph+. This is not a beginner event."
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