John’s Ramblings

Last Saturday my lovely wife was scheduled to do a “spa day” with her friend Nina.  This “no-men-allowed” ritual means that John has the day free from about 9 a.m. until 3:30 or so in the afternoon for a nice long ride.  We made a plan that I would end said ride in Seattle, so that we could enjoy a little celebratory dinner at one of our favorite spots, Brouwer’s.  I therefore concocted a route that would:

• get me about 70 miles,
• start from home, and
• end in the Wedgewood district of Seattle.

Here’s the result:

From Auburn, I headed due north toward Renton, taking a slight detour to the local bike store because I realized that I had neglected to pump up the tires in my morning preparations (thank you, Cycle Therapy!). It was a clear morning, but a little on the “brisk” side as the temps were well into the 40′s.

Since I was passing through Renton anyway, I stopped by the Gym to see if anyone was doing the Saturday morning grunt-and-groan, but all was quiet at Hocevar Performance Gym. If my workouts there had remained a Saturday morning affair, it would be an ideal warm-up to ride here. With my sessions now on Wednesday nights, however, I wouldn’t get home until way past my bedtime, so this is as close to that as I’m going to come.

From Renton I headed East, toward Maple Valley on the Cedar River Trail.  There was much foot traffic, so I decided to take the Jones Road detour that winds along the north side of the Cedar River, past a large and beautiful horse ranch.  The river was quite full, but I saw evidence that it had been even more so.  The standing water was minimal, and forced a slight deflection in my path, rather than a detour.

The Jones Road detour is easy to get to, by leaving the trail as it crosses under 152nd Avenue SE, crossing the river, then taking the first right turn. Getting back to the trail is not so simple, as there is no trail access where Jones rejoins the Maple Valley Hwy. You have to backtrack about a quarter mile by turning right. The scenic nature of the horse farm and the chance to get away from the busy highway for a little while outweigh the inconvenience, though.

It wasn’t too long before I left the trail again, heading toward Issaquah on Cedar Grove Road. Once through Issaquah, I opted for a westerly route past Lake Sammamish, on the chance that I’d hook up with a couple of cycling friends. As it turns out, one ended up spending the day getting vehicles repaired, and the other went on a shopping spree at the local mega-mart. So the journey continued solo, through east Bellevue to Redmond and the Sammamish River Trail.

I was starting to get hungry, and my sports-drink du jour (EFS) wasn’t sitting as well as I remembered it did. I rationalized that since I only had 22 flat miles to go until my planned payoff meal with Terri, that I could subsist on the sports drink for the remainder of the ride. The problems with that theory were many:

• I hadn’t really done a ride of this length since last summer,
• I hadn’t really been eating much (any) in the way of carbohydrate for months, although I did have some oatmeal before starting the ride,
• I hadn’t been sipping my sports drink at the recommended rate, because I just wasn’t all that thirsty.

I probably should have stopped at a Subway and eaten part of a sandwich, but my dieting-self was averse to eating bread when french fries were going to be in my very near future.  So I didn’t stop for any solid food, and the longer I waited to eat something, the closer I was to the end where I would eat something, so I just marshalled forward.  Needless to say, I was pretty well “bonked” by the time I reached Woodinville. I stopped at a park there to watch a group of weekend warriors do pushups and situps while I sipped and rested for a bit. I didn’t feel compelled to join in.

The rest of the ride was uneventful, and typical of the Burke-Gilman trail: crowded with joggers and cyclists.  Much to the relief of my tushy, many of the big tree-root bumps have been repaired in the Seattle sections of the trail.  I left the trail shortly before the U district, and did the long, gradual climb up to Wedgewood.  Our friends were kind enough to allow me use of their newly remodeled shower, and after a change of clothes we were off to my payoff lunch of pomme frites and a beer.  They tasted like 70 miles worth of  goodness!

I will just have to figure this fueling thing out before my next ride…  I hate to buy an entire loaf of bread in order to be able to carry a half a peanut butter sandwich in my kit, but that was probably exactly what I needed.  Maybe I can work out a co-op arrangement with a neighbor so I can buy a single slice of bread when needed.

Tags: Cycling

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