100 KM

This is Part II of my Midnight Century 2010 ride report. When we left off in Part I, I had just reached the top of the first climb and begun to descend back down and around into Liberty Lake.

Near Disaster

The descent into Liberty Lake was a fun reward for the first tough climb, and thankfully completely uneventful. I took it pretty easy and stayed on the brakes until I got to the pavement portion of the road back into town. Unfortunately at that point you pretty much have to start pedaling again anyway, but that's the Midnight Century for you. Lots of gravel descents, but not too many paved ones.

I felt pretty comfortable with the route, but I did have to stop and consult my cue sheet to make sure that I didn't miss the little jog that takes you into Liberty Lake proper.

Liberty Lake itself was pretty quiet and not particularly exciting until I turned onto Moulter to start heading out of town on the next climb. I thought I saw a headlight behind me starting to catch up to me, but I'm not sure now. All I know is that I somehow turned right on Liberty Lake Road instead of left like I should have. At the time I thought that something was not quite right, but instead of stopping and apprising the situation I kept riding thinking I would start to recognize things. Unfortunately a bike path split off the road and I somehow managed to ride right into the small ditch separating it from the road itself. My front wheel dropped down and suddenly I was doing a half endo over the handlebars!

Miraculously I was mostly unscathed aside from a nickel sized scrape on my right knee and the tip of my left index finger felt bruised and sore. My glasses were hanging part way off my face, but hadn't completely disengaged from my ears- it would have been tough to ride the rest of the way without them! My bike also seemed fine although the chain came off the chainring and both of my water bottles fell halfway out of their cages during my unintentional bike gymnastics. Feeling relieved, but embarrassed I fixed things up, hopped back on my bike and headed back south in the correct direction.

Although I was definitely alone for the first half of the climb out of Liberty Lake, I spotted a couple tail lights ahead. I eventually caught up to a couple guys name Dennis and Dan (I think) on Quinimoose right before it began to curve down to the descent. Descending is definitely not my strength as a rider at this point, especially in low visibility conditions so I was happy to settle in behind them and follow them down the hill at a safe distance. I briefly lost sight of them towards the end of the drop, but then caught up to them at the Henry intersection. I whipped out my cue card and helped point them in the right direction towards the coming Saltese Road turn off. Eventually we hit a bit of an uphill and parted company as my pace was slightly faster then theirs.

Not long after that I rounded the bend and came upon the North Division Bikeshop guys hanging out as one of their members fixed a flat. They seemed to have things under control and I was feeling good so I just rolled on through and headed into the next short descent. Despite my head start I was confident that they would catch and pass me again relatively quickly and that proved to be the case. In fact they caught up to me somewhere along 32nd. I ended up moving ahead of them at the Linke turn though as they slowed up to get their bearings and figure out where to go next and surprisingly enough I didn't see them again until Jennings Road well after Spangle.

Linke, Sands, and Spangle Creek

As I settled into the Linke climb the rain picked up again. My glasses started to fog up as I heated up a bit and I had to slide them down my nose just to be able to see the road in front of me somewhat clearly. The tops of my shorts got a bit damp and the small scrape on my knee started to sting, but my torso remained dry and comfortable thanks to my Camelbak backpack. It may have been a surprisingly rainy ride, but air temperature remained pretty comfortable throughout and my tech shirt/Fat Cyclist jersey combo kept me quite comfortable.

I kept expecting the NDB guys to catch back up to me, but there was no sign of their headlights. I continued to press on, but aside from three deer bounding across the road and a couple cars, I encountered no signs of life let alone fellow riders. I was definitely wary of the cars when they passed though as it was somewhere around 4 AM, dark and I was by myself in the middle of nowhere. Of course happened and they drove on sensibly without bothering me, but that was definitely the part of the ride I felt the most paranoid about.

While the Linke climb is not the steepest of the five you deal with during the Midnight Century it seems like it might be the longest continuous grade of the ride. Once you get to the top it's a pretty good feeling to know that three of the five climbs are behind you. Unfortunately it doesn't have much of a descent after you reach the top though- just a straight gravel shot that drops you a bit before you briefly curve east and then turn back west and ride for a couple miles to Highway 27.

After a night of carefully negotiating gravelly descents I particularly enjoyed the short ride down Highway 27 to the Dishman Mica Rd because it was paved and I could actually descend without using my brakes for a change. There were no cars or trains anywhere to be seen and it didn't take me long at all to reach my next climb on Sands Rd.

Sands isn't too bad as it climbs fairly gradually to begin with. It's only just before you finally turn right onto Bruna that things really start to get steeper and more challenging. The first time I rode that climb during the day I didn't think it was that much tougher than the either of the previous three climbs, but that night it seemed harder than I remembered. Thankfully I was still feeling strong though, no sign of the leg cramps or muscle twinges that I usually run into when I start to get dehydrated and low on salt and potassium.

Once I got to the top of the hill, the descent back down Bruna was yet more sketchy gravel with one steep rolling hill thrown in to break up your rhythm. My preference would be to stand and knock it out quickly, but I had to drop into my granny gear and spin through since I lost traction when I stood up. The sky was finally beginning to lighten a bit as worked my way down I was completely prepared for the final Excelsior hill this time around and it didn't feel quite as tough as it had during the scouting ride when it caught me by surprise.

I crossed the Palouse Highway on Dunn as the sky continued to lighten. Morning was finally arriving. I was still feeling pretty good overall at this point, although my arms were starting to get a little cold. I reached the crazy summer road turnoff gate and discovered that someone had put up a sheet of paper with a big smiley face on the gate and put little tear off smileys down at the bottom like one of those ads you find on a college campus bulletin board. It looked like five had been ripped off already and I would be number six. I paused to tear off a smiley (number six I think) and downed some Clif Shot Blocks as well and grabbed a Clif Bar that I planned to eat once I got to the gate on the opposite end of the summer road.

I generally tried to eat while pedaling as much as possible throughout the ride, but accessing the food was never very convenient. It would have worked a lot better if I had ever gotten around to putting together a bag or coroplast box to put on my little front rack. The pockets on my jersey weren't very accessible while I had the backpack on and the pockets on the backpack were kind of a pain to access when riding as well. Unfortunately I only managed to have a couple bites of that delicious chocolatey Clif Bar before I started another bumpy downhill and completely dropped it. I didn't even bother to slow down or look back, but I mourned it's small brown biodegradable loss for a few minutes afterward.

Elder road down to Valley Chapel was pretty scenic at times, but not too exciting beyond the couple deer I passed along the way. I did stop to put my arm warmers on prior to the big curving descent though. That's one spot where I'm glad that I passed through after the sun had risen because even when riding the brakes and approaching cautiously it was hard to ignore the potential to shoot right over the edge there to the valley below. On the other hand it would have been fun to watch a fast guy like Tom McFadden negotiate that turn in the dark.

Valley Chapel Road was a nice little paved change of pace after the gravel I had been living on for the last couple hours. Unfortunately it was all too short and within a few minutes I was at the base of the final significant climb of the ride- the infamous Spangle Creek road. I opted to take it head on as I had with the previous four climbs and my legs responded well. I found a good climbing rhythm and worked my way to the top in slow, but solid fashion. Despite feeling good this far into the race it was a welcome relief to finally reach the top and turn left on to Yale.

Spangle to Fish Lake

My relief at finishing the last big climb was short lived. The section between the top of Spangle Creek Road and the Cheney-Spangle Road was the toughest part of the course for me by far. In retrospect while I did a good job staying hydrated and a decent job of eating throughout the ride I think I was bonking a little bit after that final major climb. Perhaps it was that poor abandoned Clif Bar's revenge? My legs felt fine, fairly strong in fact, and I still had no cramping issues, but my lower back tightened up big time and my neck was strangely sore as well. Combine that with a whole body malaise that's generally a sign of being short on fuel and you have a pretty good idea of what I was experiencing. Suddenly, what should have been relatively easy rolling gravel roads were pure speed-sucking misery. While the washboard bumps and thick gravel typically slow me down to begin with I wasn't helped by the soreness in my back and neck. My speed dropped to a paltry 10 km/h as I suffered my way along.

Somehow I kept the pedals turning and got myself through Spangle, across 195 and onto Jennings Rd. Jennings road was more of the same that I had been experiencing since reaching the top of Spangle Creek Road, but I kept going in a slow, but determined effort to get that section over with. Then when I least expected it the NDB guys finally caught me again. They seemed to be in good spirits and one of their members asked how my "pedal" was going as he pulled up beside me. I think my exact words were "I am so ready to be done." He offered some encouraging words about the hard part being over and continued on with his group.

Despite feeling like crap at that moment, I wasn't actually in any danger of calling it a ride at that point. I was actually strangely encouraged to finally encounter some fellow MC participants again even though they seemed to be doing much better than I was. Amusingly enough I caught the NDB guys again a few minutes later when one of their members paused for a natural break on the side of the road. They caught and passed me again shortly after that and then I was by myself again for a few more minutes until a guy named Joe with a nifty white bike with an Alfine hub caught and passed me. Joe wasn't going quite as fast as the rest of the NDB guys and I was able to keep him in sight after he passed and use him to finally pull myself out of my riding funk.

As I tried to keep within range of Joe I gradually figured out that standing and riding on the flats for a few seconds helped me get some of the painful stiffness out of my back. Finally getting off Jennings and onto the Cheney Spangle pavement was a big boost as well. Slowly, but surely I got my speed closer to 20 km/h again. I downed some more of the honey/molasses/salt homemade energy gel combo I had been using throughout the ride and settled into a pretty good pace following Joe as he rode ahead of me by a couple hundred feet.

I was starting to feel better, but I never actually caught Joe until he opted to take a break at the Fish Lake Trail trailhead. I was actually feeling much more like myself again. My back discomfort was working itself out as well and I started to pick up the pace a little more so I could finally get the ride over with.

The Final Push

Once I turned onto the Fish Lake Trail and realized I was on the final push down to the finish I definitely got a second wind. At this point I recognized that finishing before 8:30 AM, was still actually a possibility and I resolved to push the pace as much as I could. Slowly, but surely with the aid of the slight downward slope I was able to get my velocity back into the 25+ km/h range.

At the loan water fountain along that section of the trail I discovered that the NDB guys were stopped and filling up their water supplies. I still had plenty of water so I passed them yet again. At this point I was feeling tired, but good, despite that I was sure that they would catch me within a few minutes. I resolved to go as hard as I could the rest of the way and see what how long I could hold them off.

I cruised towards Fish Lake in the upper twenties, but had to slow for a pair of walkers out with a dog and taking up the whole trail. I let them know I was there (and more cyclists were on the way) and worked my way around. It never ceases to amaze me when walkers spread out and take up the whole width of a multi-use trial like this. There are almost always just as many bikes as walkers.

Once I got to the Fish Lake parking lot I crossed the railroad tracks and found the rocky trail/road that bypasses the Cheney-Spokane road and directly leads to the official trailhead. This route was in much better condition then the last time I had ridden it a couple years back. They actually cleared out most of the ballast rock and left a much more ridable path. I took advantage and continued to push my speed back up.

The rest of the way to my finish at People's Park was pretty much a blur briefly interupted by the washboard on Marshal Road that temporarily knocked out my bike computer. I didn't see the NDB guys again until about five minutes after I got there at 8:24 am. I immediately called Mary to let her know that I had finished and would be coming straight home for the big breakfast she was fixing- foolishly turning down an offer for her to pick me up. The ride home up the South Hill to our house was a slow miserable slog. I had no climbing power left and instead of getting home in my usual half hour I arrived their a full hour later. Luckily the breakfast still wasn't quite ready so I didn't miss out!

In the end I survived and accomplished my goal of finishing on the first try. The 8:24 finish time was pure gravy, but if I do it again next year my goal will definitely be to break 8 hours. At any rate, if you're a slightly crazy Spokane area bike rider it's definitely worth trying the Midnight Century at least once just for the experience.

Has it been over two weeks already? Time flies when you put off writing ride reports. I'm actually beginning to feel like I can do it again next year. I'll admit that I wasn't sure there for a few days.

But that's not really the important part. The important thing is that I have yet to put up any kind of significant write up about the event in question. I've been working on it- not exactly diligently, but off and on. Slowly, but surely the collective word count has been growing into the 2000+ range and frankly that's ridiculous. Clearly I need to start breaking this up into a more manageable couple posts. So that's what I'm going to do. Without further ado Part I:

The Lead Up

After a few years of wanting to do the Midnight Century things finally came together for me to take part this year. Based on the first hand reports of John Speare from the last couple years I knew this was definitely not a ride that I could just show up for with my commuting base and be successful. A lot of people show up and take part, but then inevitably end up bailing out along the way as the course destroys their body and will to continue. I think it's great that so many people make an effort to participate in some form, but doing it part way was not for me. If I was going to show up at the Elk for the ride I needed to know that nothing short of a mechanical or crash induced injury was going to force me to bail.

I did a much better job of maintaining my overall cycling fitness this year thanks to the Univega Sportour I put together last year in conjunction with my trainer. Riding on my trainer is not my favorite thing by any stretch of the imagination, but it was pretty important for me to stay in shape during the cold winter months. And this spring and early summer, even if I wasn't able to ride into work and get my usual commuting miles I made sure to hop on the Univega. So that set me up for a successful training ramp up in July when I was able to commute almost every day and to throw in some nice big extended evening routes with big hills added. Finally I topped things off with daylight rides of both halves of the course to avoid any course surprises and give myself the confidence to ride on my own as necessary.

Saturday Night

I left my house at about 11:30 pm. I had a little nervous anticipation going on, but as I told Mary, I was well prepared and ready to go. We said our goodbyes and I headed out on my first night ride in ages. After some internal debating I opted to get down to the Elk via Inland Empire Way rather than navigating Walnut and Downtown Spokane by myself at that hour. Just after turning off Cedar and heading down Maple I felt what would be the first of many raindrops during the ride. Lots of people were watering their yards so at first I thought I might have just been hit by a stray drop from a sprinkler. Not so much. By the time I was down to 7th Ave I was experiencing a full on rain shower. I wouldn't have changed any of my clothing choices for the night anyway, but I was really wishing I hadn't completely forgotten about my Eddie Bauer cap with the 3 LEDs in the bill- keeping the rain off my glasses and being able to read my computer and cue sheet in the dark would have been very helpful!

I made it safely down to the Elk despite the newly challenging weather. A guy named Justin came up and introduced himself and we moved up the street to Tully's Coffee where the rest of the group was congregating. I said hi to Joe Thomsen and basically hung out and took it all in as the group swelled to roughly 25 people. Lots of different bikes and styles going on, yet we were still all one unified collection of friendly nocturnal cycling adventurers. It was pretty cool.

Pat showed up after a little while and started taking some pictures for his blog. As he mentioned in his big MC blog post the vibe of the group is pretty sweet. Just a bunch of cool people on bikes looking to do something fun and crazy together on a dark and rainy August night. I recognized Glen Copus of Elephant Bikes fame (maybe someday I can have him build me a cross bike) and Tom McFadden (the MC pacesetting machine) through the context of the interesting conversations they were having next to me.

A few more people rolled up and then it was Midnight and finally time to go.

And We're Off

Tom took off as fast as advertised and was essentially out of sight within seconds heading down Riverside . I ended up towards the front of the pack mostly by the accident of lining up there as I was waiting for the race to begin. I moved to the side to let more fearless descenders pass me, but for the most part everyone seemed to be taking it easy to begin with. As it was I took the turn on Clarke a little faster than I should have. I saw Glen up ahead and settled into comfortable opening pace trailing him by a couple bike lengths. We hit the short climb on Main and I passed him although he caught back up almost immediately as we waited with a few other riders for the first light on Monroe.

Once we got onto the Centennial Trail Glen set a pretty good pace and I tried to keep within 3 or 4 bike lengths of him. There were a couple faster cyclists a little bit further ahead of Glen, but Glen's pace seemed to be pretty good to me and I concentrated on following him. It was a bit strange riding so fast in the dark after not doing any night riding in months, but I adjusted pretty quickly.

The Centennial Trail was definitely a part of the route where I felt like I could put money in the bank of my race time so to speak because it's paved, relatively level and probably faster than any other longer section of the route except for the Cheney - Spangle road and the Fish Lake trail. My number one goal was just to finish, but I figured I would be able to ride the race somewhere between 8 and 9 hours total with some good fortune. Riding a reasonably fast time on the CT wouldn't be very taxing and would hopefully give me a little time buffer at the end to reach that secondary goal if I made it that far.

On My Own

Going into the race I thought I might try to ride with Pat, since I figured we might ride at similar speeds throughout, but I was also okay with riding by myself if that was how it worked out. Unfortunately I never even saw Pat again after the start. I continued to follow Glen on Maringo until I suddenly lost him on the curvy section of the Centennial Trail immediately after the trailhead. One moment I was seeing his taillight as usual and then the trail curved and I followed it, but there was no sign of Glen anymore. I couldn't quite figure out if he had just driven off the trail or just completely dropped me so I went ahead and pushed on.

Riding that part of the trail took a bit of adjustment with my speed and lighting. Even though I've ridden the trail many times during the day that particular section is pretty twisty. My headlight was sufficient, but nowhere near as many lumens as some of the riders. There were a few moments that I was afraid that I might not make the turns and shoot off into the bushes.

I remember thinking around that point what a comfortable night it was. Sure it was wet and a bit rainy, but the air temperature was excellent and only really started to be too cold on the last couple major descents.

There were still two taillights visible a ways further up the trail, but I didn't make any effort to catch them immediately. Eventually a group of three guys that I later learned were from the North Division Bike Shop caught up to me. I decided to pretend I was in a bike race and use them to bridge up to the two riders that I had seen ahead. I fell in behind them and sure enough we caught those guys pretty quickly. I rode at the back of the now larger group (the two guys we caught up to were also part of their North Division group I think). I held the pace for a while more, but eventually dropped off the back and lost sight of them.

The rest of the ride out to Spokane Bridge Road was pretty uneventful. I caught sight of the North Division guys' taillights heading south and continued to see them until the first big climb began and they disappeared again up and around the hill. It was definitely reassuring to see bike taillights off in the distance throughout the ride and seeing Tom's trademark pine cone smiley in the road was pretty uplifting too. It felt good to know I was not alone and on the right track despite being out in the middle of the countryside by myself in the middle of night. The first climb was challenging, but I was ready for it having ridden it in daylight back in July. Once I reached the top I took a quick break, downed a Clif bar and then started the fun descent into Liberty Lake.

Little did I know that I was just minutes away from my first real ride-endangering mishap.

Midnight Century 2010 Pt. 2

So I survived my first Midnight Century on Sunday. I finished in a solid and satisfying 8:24 despite a crash in Liberty Lake and my body rebelling on the gravel roads around Spangle. I've been working on a recap since then, but rides that long and epic deserve a correspondingly worthwhile post and it may take me a few more days to get it all written up in a fashion I'm satisfied with. In the meantime you can read Pat S's 2010 ride report and see the preliminary 2010 finishing results on John Speare's blog.

Way back when, some 20+ years ago when I was a high school distance runner at Ferris, we had a run that took us over the top of Browne's Mountain. You got up to the top via a gravel road by the name of Corkery that winds around the east side of the hill until finally cresting a final ridge along its southeast corner. I hadn't run or ridden the route in over 20 years, but it was filed away in my memory back awaiting another chance for exploration.

Yesterday I finally decided to check out the Corkery route again by bike so that I could get in some additional climbing work on the way home. Turns out that the climb up Corkery Rd (and later Phalon Ln) is just as tough as some of the hills in the Midnight Century. There was actually one spot where it was so steep that I was in my lowest possible gear and lifting my front tire slightly off the ground with each stroke.

I actually left Phalon briefly and did a little exploring. My explorations led me to some land that's for sale up there and some single track that began the descent, so I used that route that to get over the top. From there I rejoined Phalon and worked my way down to Custer, an awesome and steep gravel descent down and around the hill to 57th.  All in all a great, relatively short climb (although it added at least 30 minutes to my ride) that's just a few minutes from my house. I'm sure I'll be back before August 7th rolls around.

The Midnight Century is roughly a month away and I've begun to ramp up my preparations. At the top of my todo list was riding the portion of the route I was least familiar with, the climbs and descents between the Centennial Trail and the Palouse Highway. Yesterday I took advantage of my day off and headed out.

The morning temperature was just about perfect- sunny, but at just over 50° F cool enough for a long sleeve jersey and base layer t-shirt. I figured I'd take off the jersey once I got into the climbs and I started heating up, but I never actually did because there was always just enough of a breeze to keep me cool.

I rode my Trek as it's perfectly set up for the kind of ride with the new 700x40c tires I put on a couple weeks ago. It's actually pretty stripped down these days. No rear rack or fenders and I've been using a waterproof Ortlieb backpack for commuting. I opted to use that to carry my food and other supplies for the ride and it worked fine, but I've got a Camelbak on order that will be much better suited for this type of ride or future S24O excursions.

Riding the Centennial Trail between GU and the Washington-Idaho border was pretty awesome. Not too many people out and about walking and it's flat and paved. With those conditions I was able to cruise along at just under 30 km/h most of the way. It's actually been a couple years since I've ridden out that direction all the way to the border and it was pretty encouraging to get more confirmation that I'm faster and stronger than I was a few years ago.

I figured I would refill my water bottle at the visitor area at the end of the trail, but I wasn't actually low on water at that point. I ended up just continuing on and then stopping at the junction of Sunrise and Idaho to text Mary, eat a Clif Bar, and fire up the GPS program on my iPad.

The first significant climb starts in the hills to the east of Liberty Lake and then eventually descends down by the lake itself. The route was pretty straightforward through this section and the descent was fun. There were a couple new developments popping up next to the lake that offered new places for confusion as I worked my towards Sprague, but the route was pretty straightforward through here.

The second significant climb heads south out of Liberty Lake on Molter and I really enjoyed the views to the north and west once you get up and over the initial hill. It's a huge expanse of prairie down below, while you continue climbing up and around the hillside on a road that seems like something out of the Tour de France.

The second descent was pretty fun too, although I discovered the Saltese Lake Rd turn you need to make is slightly unintuitive. Saltese Lake starts working its way north to 32nd with some gradual climbing that eventual culminates in a climb up Linke and a third descent on gravel roads. Nothing too extreme, but it's climbing and descents on rough conditions all the same. Eventually I came out right at Highway 27 and descended north on it for a bit to get to the infamous Sand Hill road.

The Bruna Rd portion of the climb off Sand Hill was pretty steep, but I didn't feel like it was any worse than the climb prior to Liberty Lake. I felt pretty solid all the way up. The descent down the dirt summer road could definitely be dicey in darkness though. And actually the short, but really steep Excelsior Rd roller was tougher for me from a psychological perspective because I wasn't expecting one last hard climb at that point. It was very satisfying to be done with the tough stuff at Dunn though.

The ride back in on the Palouse wasn't too bad. I was able to get up to speed pretty easily on the flats and descents, but I didn't feel like I had much power on the last couple hills. I had no problems climbing, but I was stuck in 8-10km/h mode and in fact I got passed by three different cyclists. I was fine once I got up on the level ground of Moran Prairie though. Despite a little soreness here and there I felt really good overall the rest of the day. The full Midnight Century should definitely be pretty doable a month from now and I plan to pick up where I left off and ride the second half of the route from Dunn in another week or two.