I started my rando season yesterday with a 200k that conveniently began and ended within a mile of my house.  There were probably 100 folks that started this ride.  It was a great day with temperatures ranging from 38-65 F resulting in little need for more than a couple wool jerseys and a vest.  No rain – just a bit of fog for the first few hours with sun breaks at the tops of any hill over 300 ft.

Jan Heine was at the start with his lovely chrome rando bike, and was the first one out of the gate with his friends and riding partners including Hahn Rossman who was test riding a Mad Fiber bike.  I rode the whole ride with my new pal Bruce, and was grouped up for a while with Asta and a friend who had ridden up from Portland the day before.  Wow – 200 miles up, and 200k for the ride.  Solid!

This was a test for me in a couple of ways.  The most mileage I have put into a ride in the past 8 months was a 38 mile training ride.  I have been commuting over 200 miles a month for the past few years with 3-4 days per week the norm.  I also end up doing a lot of climbing on my commute, so this definitely helped.  I also benefited from a few longer rides last year, as well as a bike fit.  I found a few things that didn’t work once the mileage got over 50 (plain B17, lack of consistent nutrition and water).  On this ride, I started eating and drinking right away, and never really stopped.  My riding app (cyclemeter) said I burned 7500 calories on the ride, and I’ll bet I only had a slight deficit by the end, although 2 bowls of chili and a beer definitely went down with no problems!

I also got to put some miles on a Selle Anatomica Titanico X which I’ll write up later.  Verdict?  No saddle soreness with my Ibex wool knicker/tights.  The iPhone Biologic rig worked, but it took finessing to keep it charged.  I ended up having to turn off the display and lights to keep a charge going to the battery.  Verdict?  Use the SON28 (more output) on these rides, and leave the Delux on the other bike for now.  That or look into a smaller battery powered GPS, but I’ll be damned if I’m going to jump back to the Garmin without giving the larger SON a try first.

Overall, at the end of the ride, I felt tired, but great.  My right knee was a bit sore, but the pain was gone by Sunday night.  I think a 300k is actually in my sights.  It was a great start to the season!

Extra pics from the ride on Flickr