John’s Ramblings

Believing the weather forecast of a sunny day, I participated yesterday in the May Day Metric bike ride, starting from Phil’s Southside Bike Shop in Federal Way, Washington. The sun did arrive on the scene, but only for the last hour of the ride.

This is a well supported event, with food stops at approximately 25, 37, and 50 miles. Since the route from mile 25 to mile 50 is essentially out-and-back, you (may) visit the first two rest stops twice if doing the full 100 mile route.

We did not. A combination of fatigue from the “character building climbs” and the cold temps we experienced since 7 a.m., we opted to do the “Metric Century”, which ended up being about 76 miles and 2,600 feet of climbing.

The route had it’s challenging sections, to be sure. For example, they route you up and over the hill at Milton, rather than around the south end of the ridge, a far flatter route. It was clear from the ride publicity that there would be plenty of uphill to contend with, so there were no real surprises (with the possible exception of just how steep some of these suckers were!). From Milton we passed through Sumner, then joined the Daffodil Classic / Buckley route that I had ridden three weeks prior. This of course meant another dose of “character building”, this time with the steep little climb near Victor Falls. Not having any women or small children in my vicinity during this portion of the program, I availed myself of the opportunity to let the road engineers, route planners, and the asphalt itself know just how I felt about doing this sucker for the second time in just a few weeks. It was easier this time, by the way. One rather large fellow riding nearby stood up out of the saddle, started stomping the pedals and shifting at the same time. [Insert loud metallic breaking sound here]. He managed to get to the shoulder of the road, and was looking at his rear wheel and scratching his helmet as I looked over my shoulder rounding the turn. I think his day was done, having learned a valuable lesson about pedaling lightly when shifting. SAG vehicles patrolled the route every 30 minutes or so, so he would not have to wait long for a rescue mission.

The 25 mile rest stop was at the park in Downtown Orting, and featured Ding Dongs along with the usual assortment of fruit and bagels. From Orting the route followed the same roads as the Daffodil until the junction of highway 165 and Lower Burnett Road. From there it was a right turn, and a few miles on the highway shoulder to the second food stop at Wilkeson. Same food choices, with Twinkies taking the place of Ding Dongs.

The allure of Ho Ho’s at the 50 mile stop just wasn’t enough of an enticement, as we opted to turn for home. We wound our way down Johns Road, back through South Prairie, then Orting & Puyallup via the Foothills Trail. Once in Sumner the sunshine started to break out, and we stopped in beautiful downtown Algona to shed a layer or two of clothing before tackling the “Little Italy” climb. We climb Little Italy with a fair degree of regularity around here. In fact, I had pedaled my Clydesdale ass up this gem just a few days prior, completing the task completely in the middle chainring (a first). Such was not to be the case on this day, the net result of beginning the climb at mile 68, rather than mile 8 of a ride. I made it to the top just fine, but the deep fatigue and stiffness in the lower back were really beginning to set in at this point. Fortunately the remainder of the ride was fairly benign. The ride ends strangely, the last mile having to be completed on the sidewalk due to the extremely heavy traffic in the Federal Way/Twin Lakes area where the ride originates. I’m not quite sure how this could be avoided, but there has to be a better way to end a big ride than sharing a 4 foot wide chunk of concrete with joggers, dog walkers, and strollers. Dispensing with the Hostess bakery theme at the finish line, they serve up pieces of pie to the arriving cyclists (apple and coconut cream). Bonus points for serving the pie inside the neighborhood pub, where ice-cold malted barley recovery beverage awaits.

A good ride, one that I would not hesitate to do again unless the weather was prohibitive.

Tags: Cycling, federal_way, may_day_metric, phil's_southside_bike_shop, ride_report

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