After months of training, climbing the steepest hills in Seattle,  adjusting weight, equipment and life, I completed RAMROD last Thursday. The ride this year was a 153 miles and 10K feet of climbing taking the highways around Mt. Ranier, climbing up to Paradise, circling around to Cayuse Pass, and returning to the start at Enumclaw.

The ride started at 5:00 am at Enumclaw High School. The ride begins with 55 miles of gentle rollers to the south side of Mt Ranier.  Once the climb begins you have 20 miles of steady road climbing up to Paradise. The descent on the other side of Paradise is exhiliarating. There is a 4 mile climb after that which is short and not as steep. The descent takes you down to 2250 feet further and faster then the descent from paradise. The final climb of the day starts at mile 98 and is 8 miles up to 4960ft up Cayuse Pass at steady 6% grade the whole way. The climb went slower then I liked but I had good company on the ride. Everywhere I went, I found people to talk with as we biked up ascents and had lots of interesting stories to tell.  The most common refrain was, "I started biking and lost 50 lbs, and now I cannot stop :)" It was nice to know I was in good company.

The ride down Cauyse to Enumclaw was straight fast and uneventful and I got in at just under 4pm.  Right after the ride I did two things that saved my legs:

1. Ice bath of legs for 10 minutes to kick out lactic acids. --This is the 2nd time I have done this after a long ride and my legs end up requiring no extra recovery time.
2. I got a massage following the bath that included stretching my legs and neck so that I could revert from spending the day hunched over the bike.
   

The next day I left for a trip and suffered "Zero" side-effects from having biked the 150+ miles the previous day. All in all, it was an oustanding time, and a huge feeling of accomplishment after having completed STP in one day two weeks earlier, and finishing this ride last week. Feeling "super-human" and confident in my legs taking me anywhere has been great. 

That said, I look forward to winding down the training, and planning the bike rides to train for next year.

The goals accomplished:

• Finished the ride
• Finished the ride without pain

A goal for next year

• Finished the ride making it up Cayuse in less than an hour. (maybe next year)
  

Obligatory Stats:

• 153 miles
• Started at 5am, got in at 4pm with around 10 hours of ride time, and 1 hour of rest stops throughout the day.
• I only have data up to Cayuse pass where my GPS ran out of battery. But I did capture the three big climbs, and only missed the fast downhill (8 miles @ 30-40MPH) and gentle slope back down to Enumclaw.
• http://trail.motionbased.com/trail/invitation/email/accept.mb?senderPk.pkValue=13403&unitSystemPkValue=2&episodePk.pkValue=6402485