Well, the weather here in Portland has been spectacular the past couple of days. In preparation for the upcoming Cascade 1200k I've been trying to get in a few more longer rides than just a basic Super Randonneur series (200k, 300k, 400k and 600k brevets). Today my friend Ed and I headed out to do the Portland-Ripplebrook-Portland which goes from Portland out to Ripplebrook Guard (Ranger?) Station in the Mt Hood National Forest along the Clackamas River. The weather was amazing and the route, by and larger really nice and most of the time on quiet back roads. There is also a long stretch on the Springwater Corridor bike path from Portland to Boring.
I had really been hoping to do this ride in 9 to 10hrs but that wasn't to be. A couple of rather long stops and Ed's bout of vertigo slowed us down quite a bit. In fact, this was my slowest 200k ever 12hrs, 15min. I did the Bingenfest faster in platform pedals a few years ago and that has way more climbing. The Cascade is in late June so I'm hoping to be ready for it. This has been an odd year for me with randonneuring in that all of my times have been slower than in years past. Also, I won't get to do the 400k because I was unable to get coverage for work that weekend in spite of requesting the time off back on Feb 10th (WTF?) Fortunately I will make it up to WA for the SIR 600k on the Olympic peninsula the first weekend in June. I've never been up there and am looking forward to it. Hopefully things will come together and I'll have a strong ride which I think will help put me in a better headspace for the Cascade. My rando bike is bottom bracketless right now so Homer stepped up for randonneuring duties. It performed quite well and I just really love that bike. Here's some pictures: http://www.flickr.com/photos/41335973@N00/sets/72157629674282972/ --mike -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/rbw-owners-bunch?hl=en.
