Training with the Pros, it sounds like fun but it can’t be. Pros are genetic freaks; they put more kilometers on their bikes than any of us civilians do on our cars each year, they ride around whole countries at an average speed greater than 40km/hour and they can dish out such Rule V style day-after-day-after-day. We all dream about it but we don’t have it.
In an earlier life I came close to landing my dream job in Monaco with the IAEA. Serious people counseled me not to take the job, they said it was a bad career move. How could I explain to them I didn’t give a shiet if it was a bad career move, the chance to live, and more importantly to be a cyclist near San Remo and La Madone was all I cared about? Yet I knew if I even saw Tom Boonen or one of the many Aussies who call Monaco their home out on a training ride, I would only be seeing their lycra-clad asses disappearing up the road. Could I at least catch up to Stuart O’Grady to chat him up for a minute before my inability to talk and breathe would force me to lie and say I was turning right HERE? Maybe I could drink beers with the Aussies, I could keep that professional pace, actually no, I would get dropped there too.
Oh that job fell through and my dreams of commuting into work on Merlin on the Cote d’Azure disappeared like those watery mirages on a hot highway, but I digress. I have some good and funny direct video evidence why training with the Pros would be a cruel lesson in our mortal failings. One such Pro is Ted King, an American racer living the dream; he is based in Lucca, riding for Liquigas, riding in support of Ivan Basso and Peter Sagan. He is tough, he has finished every Giro d’Italia he has started. He broke his collarbone this summer racing in Philadelphia when his front wheel dropped into an inexcusably lame drain grate (thank you very much, oh third-world infrastructure that defines the USA).
To bring his training back up to speed he did the 200 on 100 with fellow Pro Tim Johnson and amateur racer Ryan Kelly. The 200 on 100 means 200 miles on Route 100, riding North to South from the top to the bottom of the state of Vermont, the Green Mountain State. Unless you are Marcus, 333 km seems like an impossibly long ride to do at once, I would be in broom wagon long before the end of such madness.
And by madness I refer to the 338 km at 34.1 km/hr average speed with 3,197 meters of climbing thrown in for good measure.
Video credit to Chandler Delinks
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@Buck Rogers
Sorry, my last point was about how much of a fuckin' idiot I can be when challenged, not about any self-implied badassness (which should go without saying as it was running after all)!
@Buck Rogers
No. If we're going to do this, we're going to do it all. I'm all for social Cogals and getting to meet the good people on this site for friendly rides. But once a year, we need to create a real mettle tester. If we're going to do this, I want to die on the bike, not roll in for a pint after 100k of chatter.
@Buck Rogers
My mind boggles at what you must have stolen to have forced you to run 50 miles because RUNNING IS FOR CRIMINALS
@Steampunk
FUCKIN' WORTHY response!!! I'm in. Next June I'll be in VT. L et me know what weekend works for you all.
Well Buck, if you want to take the lead I'll be glad to help. Just need plenty of heads up for work is all, but if we plan for next summer that will be no problem I'm sure.
http://www.mapmyride.com/routes/view/55594514 - For anyone interested in the routes, ~3300 meters in elevation gain over 340 kilometers.
This would take a bit of training on my part Buck, the longest ride I've ever done is a century, and it didn't have that much climbing. We'll have to see about what everyone wants, and how many people would show.
But I'm totally game for riding the bike with some of you, and spending time in New England.
His voice had the sound of fulfilling every inner most desire at the very end - "Ah, chocolate milk". Hilarious. Beaten down to the basic cravings.
I'm actually going to be in Burlington VT the last week of June. I may be a little tired from the Savage Century I plan to complete on the 23rd, but hey, couldn't pass this up!
@Steampunk
This. Is. Why. We. Keep. You. Around. Was about to say the same thing - and feel the same way about Liege. Half measures, friendliness, and mentorship are awesome and a great theme for Cogals. But some things are best dealt with through extensive applications of Rule 5 through the reduction of people who think they're good cyclists into something resembling a single-celled organism.
As my dad said to me this weekend, "I haven't had time for long rides this summer. The most I got in was 7 or 8 hours."
That, my fellow Velominati, is the order of magnitude we should be measuring ourselves by.
@Marcus
Yes, thank you. Per Rule 42: One should only swim in order to prevent drowning, and should only run if being chased. And even then, one should only run fast enough to prevent capture.
@itburns
Every movie I ever make will end with this line. Sorry. I'm that shameless.