Fuji 44 miles with a pug on your handlebars

KillRamsey

Hall of Famer
Location
Hood River, OR
Name
Kyle
This weekend we once again participated in the D2R2 ride in Deerfield Mass - which stands for Deerfield Dirt Road Randonee. A Randonee, if you don't know, is a rambling ride on mostly non-paved roads, which can be a race but frequently isn't ridden too aggressively. We were in no way racing, with a 30 pound pug on my front rack and an almost-4-year-old on the back of my wife's bike. And we opted for the short Family route, only 44 miles, instead of the longer routes (confusingly measured in kilometers -- 100, 115, 180). Anywho, some quick shots from the X100:

Empty food tent the night before the race:

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No campfires, so we had to make do with a candle. Camera sitting on a folding stool, 5 second exposure. "Hold still everyone."

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The view at night, including 5 airplanes and some cars driving by on the dirt road, and a lot of light polution from the searchlight of a moon about to crest that ridge:

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Halfway point, lunch stop by a covered bridge:

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My view all day. At about 10mph, his ears generate enough lift to become bouyant:

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Stopping for a stretch.

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Sharing a well-earned beer at the finish line:

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My daughter, finally freed of the bike seat, free to sprint across the open fields and be a goofball:

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Sunday morning, packing up in the fog:

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And that's it I guess. Still love this camera.
 
My metabolism was kickin' after that ride, so I punished the food tent pretty badly. Then when everyone was done and there was still shredded pork left, Gordo got a little reward for a hard day's work too.
 
That's one SERIOUS hard core ride! I used to ride a lot and in the early days of that ride, several years back, I think there were only 62 and 100 mile options. I used to ride centuries pretty regularly (on pavement) and I had friends who were a lot fitter than I've ever been who tried the 100 and thereafter swore they'd never do anything harder than the metric (62 miles - 100 kilometers) and even found THAT punishing. I hope the 44 mile option is a LOT easier if you and your wife did it with a pug in the basket and a child in a child seat! I filed that ride and the Mt. Washington Hill Climb among the rides I had no interest in attempting. Now I barely ride so I don't even think about such things, but for a while I used to bite off more than I could chew from time to time and I had the impression this was one of those... How did your daughter like it - seems like a pretty bumpy ride???

Great pics, as usual, BTW!

-Ray
 
Daughter loves it, because we talk the whole time. And when we ride with friends, she's chatting it up with them too, or being goofy and laughing, or we play I Spy, or she conks out and takes a nap for awhile. We take breaks every 45 mins or so too, so it's not a slog.

As for the distance, it's a lot easier than it sounds, somehow. I'm no athlete, but I do bike about 8 miles a day to/from work etc. That's less than 1 hour a day, so I don't do much distance. But for these rides what matters most os the climb... if there's a lot of climbing then the heavy bikes like me get punished, and I get worn out quickly. The 44 mile route has a few climbs but they're gentle. I rarely had my heart rate up. And I could've done a lot more, if I hadn't been saddle sore. I feel no soreness today, for what it's worth.

I think it sounds a lot harder than it is. As long as they're on something comfortable, I think most people could do that ride and still be smiling.
 
THIS is an athlete. This is my friend Jon, who did the 180k loop, which intentionally seeks out the hills. They did over 11,000 feet of climbing. Left at 6am, got back at about 7pm. This is him at the halfway point, so 90 kilometers in, at which point he had climbed over 5,000 vertical feet of dirt road WHILE consuming 3 warm wheat beers out of his handlebar bag.

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And you will not find a more humble, laid back, goofy, unassuming guy. He just did a 4-day 1200 kilometer ride in PA two weeks ago. He just sorta digs it.
 
^wow that's pretty impressive (reminds me of the Navy SEAL who finished runner-up in the first-ever Ironman, after his support crew ran out of water and started giving him beers instead!)
Nice shots, seems like a really nice event! The nitpicker in me can't help but note that Deerfield Randonee, or DR, would've sufficed since the Dirt Roads are implied by the Randonee - sorry I'm still in thesis mode.
Great that you're including your daughter in this (in a way she can enjoy too)!
 
The most fun part of the whole thing was peoples' reactions as they rode past. Most of them were in full spandex and truckin', but they'd suddenly realize what that shape was on my bike as they came towards me, and then point and say "oh cool!" or "THAT's what I'm talkin about!" Had at least 20 people ask to take his picture.
 
Daughter loves it, because we talk the whole time. And when we ride with friends, she's chatting it up with them too, or being goofy and laughing, or we play I Spy, or she conks out and takes a nap for awhile. We take breaks every 45 mins or so too, so it's not a slog.

As for the distance, it's a lot easier than it sounds, somehow. I'm no athlete, but I do bike about 8 miles a day to/from work etc. That's less than 1 hour a day, so I don't do much distance. But for these rides what matters most os the climb... if there's a lot of climbing then the heavy bikes like me get punished, and I get worn out quickly. The 44 mile route has a few climbs but they're gentle. I rarely had my heart rate up. And I could've done a lot more, if I hadn't been saddle sore. I feel no soreness today, for what it's worth.

I think it sounds a lot harder than it is. As long as they're on something comfortable, I think most people could do that ride and still be smiling.

They must have added easier options. I know the 100 mile version, and to a slightly lesser extent, the 100 kilometer, has brutally steep hills - the kind where you're constantly trying to shift your weight to make sure you can maintain traction on your rear wheel AND keep your front wheel on the ground at the same time. THAT would be tough with a child or a dog! I seem to remember that this started as a sort of underground event - word just sort of got around - I don't think there were food tents or anything in the first couple of years. Sounds like they've opened it up a bit. No, the idea of 44 miles isn't a lot, but its more on dirt, and could be really tough if you had any steep climbs on dirt. In any case, I can't do much more than ride around town doing errands since my asthma has kicked up a few notches, but I used to be pretty serious about it. I think photography has sort of replace cycling as my current obsession. I always seem to have to have one...

BTW, your friend has a very cool bike. Looks like a custom built job for rides like this. Although I don't think I'd want to have to shift with downtube shifters in some of those conditions - either going uphill or downhill! And the dynamo hub on top of it. I used to ride with people like him. I could even hang with them on the flats most of the time. But when gravity came into play, not so much. Gotta go your OWN pace on the hills...

-Ray
 
That looks like fun actually! Does the dog just sit in there or did you have to seatbelt him? It's always fun to see people taking their pets along. I have a small carrier to take my Sun Conure [small parrot] in when I go places so I am one of those people too.
 
Ray - I haven't done the other ride lengths, nor will I likely ever do them, but from what Jon said, you're 100% correct about them being very steep and loose. I think I'd probably bounce the poor fat old bastard out of the basket if I took the pug on those roads. Jon said the 180k was much tougher than any single day of his 1200k in PA. The bike he's got there is a Rawland, which is one of those awesome niche frame builder companies who put out one kind of frame a year, in one color I think, and it's just the frame and fork. You build it up however you want. Soma does this too. The whole event was Randonee Bike Porn. Those massive tires he has on it are for this event only... the only time of year he ever uses them. Normally he has regular 650B tires on it for going to work (or Pennsylvania, or Maine, or whatever wacko trip he's on).

Iso - He does just sit there. On paved roads he eventually gets tired enough and takes a nap, which is what he'd be doing all day if he were at home anyway. But on the dirt roads he just couldn't stay comfy, so I had him up WAY past naptime Saturday. When it gets exciting, going downhill, he sits up and leans forward, shifting back and forth, driving me crazy and steering the bike with his weight. I have to smack him on the butt and make him sit still. Mostly he just looks forward and woofs quietly under his breath when people pass us.
 
Ray - I haven't done the other ride lengths, nor will I likely ever do them, but from what Jon said, you're 100% correct about them being very steep and loose. I think I'd probably bounce the poor fat old bastard out of the basket if I took the pug on those roads. Jon said the 180k was much tougher than any single day of his 1200k in PA. The bike he's got there is a Rawland, which is one of those awesome niche frame builder companies who put out one kind of frame a year, in one color I think, and it's just the frame and fork. You build it up however you want. Soma does this too. The whole event was Randonee Bike Porn. Those massive tires he has on it are for this event only... the only time of year he ever uses them. Normally he has regular 650B tires on it for going to work (or Pennsylvania, or Maine, or whatever wacko trip he's on).
Yeah, that kind of extreme riding was never for me, except in small doses, which means it wasn't that extreme. I actually remember when Rawland first hit - I was still into it enough to be considering one, but I had a cyclocross bike that I did some pretty good dirt-road and off-road touring with and it was adequate for the amount of that kind of riding I did. I rode on dirt from Telluride to Moab on that thing and it held up, although there were definitely times I'd have preferred some 650b fatties instead of the 700x35 cross tires I was running. I rode across PA once but took something like six days to do it - no day much over 100 miles and most closer to 80. 300K per day is a bit beyond what I wanted to do even when I was really into it. In fact, I don't think I've ever finished a century ride and thought to myself, "well, that was simply delightful - I think I'd like to do another, so let's go"! Just not the way I'm built. Kind of ironic - all of my big mile rides were done on 700c wheels. Now that I can't ride much anymore, my 700c custom ti is languishing in the basement and I'm riding around town on a 650b Rivendell Bleriot. Which I think may have been a cooperative bike they did with Soma, but I think that might have been a different one a couple years later - don't remember.

Oh well. Some fun times. Glad you're still able to do all of that stuff. But taking the daughter and the pug shows a lot more mental health and perspective than I had. When I got hard core about riding, I got hard core and it was mostly not a family activity. Although my daughter and I did do a couple of summer tours together when she was about 14-15 and she's maintained a really healthy cycling lifestyle ever since, so some good came of it beyond my own selfish pursuits...

-Ray
 
Saw a lot of Rivendells there too. So many juicey rando frames... sigh. I'm slogging it on my daily mule, a 4 year old Trek Belleville. It's a thick tube steel frame, powder coated, matching racks and fenders, gennie front hub, internal 3 speed rear. Weighs a ton, but it's held up well.

The positive reinforcement we got from everybody there for bringing our whole family on the ride was incredibly reaffirming. Similarly, I got a lot of compliments on the X100, believe it or not. This guy, for example...

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...saw the X100 on my back and asked if it was a film camera. I told him no, but then showed him the Minolta XD-5 in my bag, and he sat down to pet Gordo and chat for awhile. He was there with an amateur radio club, who provided communications between all the stops and home base for the ride, since cell service is non-existent out there. They consider public service their primary goal, so they like chances to show up at things like this ride and help out. He and I chatted about cameras for awhile too... about being cold or uncomfortable and wondering why you're out in the Grand Canyon freezing your butt off, and then the moon comes up and you know why. Such a great guy.
 
But taking the daughter and the pug shows a lot more mental health and perspective than I had. When I got hard core about riding, I got hard core and it was mostly not a family activity. Although my daughter and I did do a couple of summer tours together when she was about 14-15 and she's maintained a really healthy cycling lifestyle ever since, so some good came of it beyond my own selfish pursuits...

-Ray

Agreed. I'm kind of where you were at, riding sans family and racing cyclocross (though I'm hoping when my daughter is old enough it might be something she would be interested in that we could do together), but I'd like to get the the point KillRamsey is at.
 
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