Quick and Significant Hill (Mountain) Training for a Non-Climber?

As some are already aware, there is an annual ride I participate in and even though I say I'm not going to ride it - every - single - year, somehow I end up getting talked into doing it anyway. This year, I registered early to save myself the frustration because I knew inevitably some person, moment, or event would present itself and miraculously I would be doing the Venus de Miles ride. Why fight it was my motto this year and I started annoying friends and family early on to help me out with fundraising. I don't mind the fundraising, actually. It's the one consistently positive attribute of this ride and the money goes to a cause I whole-heartedly support. I also expressed plans early in the summer to complete my first ever century ride. So, since VdM has a century option, it seemed like a great idea to just go ahead and sign myself up. Even though I ended up completing my first century on an unsupported ride, I was still excited to participate in this event, if for no other reason than to compare the experience of riding alone versus riding in a supported, group event.

Venus de Miles starting line - August 2012

In past years, the 100-mile ride has gone up into the mountains and (among other reasons) this has kept me from really wanting to participate. However, when I first got a look at the route map earlier this summer, it had changed significantly. I realized no part of it was going into the mountains (Yippee!!!), but I also was not exactly thrilled with the roads we'd be riding. Many of them have no bike lanes, no shoulders, and they also travel through extremely high speed and high traffic areas. I was starting to rethink my decision to do the century with VdM. I even had a back up plan to ride a shorter distance with the group and then complete a century on my own just to avoid the route that had been planned. Oddly, VdM still had no route approvals just a couple of weeks ago and I started to wonder if the ride was going to take place at all. Then, just as I was starting to believe I was getting out of the ride this year, route approval came in... However, the ride had been changed back to climbing up into the mountains. This is where the big sigh was let out. This is also where panic set in.

I am not a climber.

Lots of people say it, and many actually aren't climbers at all, but I am really not a climber. I like to blame the excess mass on my body (which I'm sure doesn't help), but I've seen plenty of big guys rock the hell out of climbs, so I really don't think that's the problem. It's also not the bike as I've whittled my way down to a pretty light and fast bike. The sad but honest truth is that I just don't seem to be able to do it. I do climb hills, and I never walk them, but they are the most painfully slow climbs I think one could experience - even when they aren't notoriously difficult climbs. Knowing that the first 60 miles of the ride will be climbing (in one form or another), I am really concerned. The worst part of the climbing is that the actual mountain portion doesn't even begin until half way into the century. Call me a wimp, but four thousand seven hundred and sixty-four feet is a lot of climbing for me. A lot.

100-mile Route Map

In case you missed it in the photo above... this is what the climbing looks like. Yeah, see that scary, large hump to the right side of middle... that's the part I'm dreading the most.

Yes, 4,764 feet of climbing to do... and a lot of it will be starting as I'm getting tired

I have less than three weeks to go and I have no idea what to do to train myself for this sort of climbing. The century I did on my own was about half the feet of climbing this ride will entail, and I planned much of it to be early on in the ride, not after the half way point. In addition to just being naturally ungood (yes, I'm making up words again) at climbing, I have an injured knee and have been experiencing aching while doing even the most minor climbs over the last several weeks.

So, fabulous people of the interwebs... I need help, suggestions, thoughts... anything you think would be valuable to help me out as I attempt to train myself to climb in a very, very short amount of time. I know I can do the distance, but I am not so sure the climbing won't take me out of this ride earlier than I would like. I'm also a bit fearful of being able to finish out the distance after expending all the energy to attempt to get up the big peak, so any thoughts on that matter are certainly welcome as well.

{Part 3} The Surly Pacer: Adjustments to Gearing

It's been a couple of months since my last check in regarding the Surly Pacer, and there have been some ongoing adjustments to this bicycle. This round has been more focused on the actual gearing of the bicycle than comfort, as I seem to have found a happy place for the time being in regard to comfort.

The Surly Pacer comes with a 34/50t crankset up front, and a 12-28t cog in the rear, making it (in my opinion) not much of a climber for steep, long hills. Originally this was intended to be my road-road bike (as opposed to the touring-road bike), so I wanted to find a way to make this a better climber. It will get up hills, but not very fast or easily (Read: Once again, G.E. is at the back of the pack going uphill, not that I necessarily mind being at the rear), particularly taking into consideration its (by my standards at least) light weight. I'm by no means an expert when it comes to proper gearing, but we quickly realized that perhaps a change was in order.

Initially, my thought was to simply get a triple crankset for the front, which would allow for more of a spinning gear, which in turn should make it easier to pedal up hills. If we changed out to the triple, however, this would mean I'd also need new shifters. We also weren't sure that the derailleur would work properly with a triple up front and we were having difficulty finding the correct bolt pattern for the crank, so instead it was decided to look for a larger tooth cog for the rear. I'm always a bit perplexed with the actual mechanics of gearing (I earn very, very low scores on those mechanical aptitude/pully tests). Why a larger tooth rear cog makes the bike easier to pedal always takes me a minute to comprehend (well, in all honesty, often more than a minute). Regardless, I just wanted to make this work, so whatever it would take was just fine by me.

Sam found an 11-34t cog for the rear, which we thought would provide enough of a difference to make the hill climbing a bit easier. Along with the new rear cog, we had to get a different rear derailleur. The only one available that would work was a different (lower level, XT) mountain bike derailleur. Sam spent many hours adjusting to get everything just right, and we went out for an initial ride to see how it would roll.

While I didn't notice much of a change initially, shifting was definitely the biggest issue with a severe lag in actual shift time. I found that I almost couldn't shift at all when on a hill because it would just click in place and not want to shift until I was at the top and on relatively flat terrain again, or it would clunk heavily into a gear when it wasn't expected, so I would end up in gears nowhere near what I needed to be in for hill climbing. It worked somewhat, but it was frustrating not to be able to change gears readily. In the end, what we believe to be the biggest issue is the mixture of parts. The front Tiagra road components want to be associated with the original rear Tiagra road components, and throwing in the XT parts just seemed to wreak utter chaos on the system.

While we could spend more time (and money) in an attempt to find a proper set up, the Pacer has really turned into more of a faster-fun-slightly-longer-ride bicycle for me. I enjoy just buzzing off quickly to a location (if I don't need to carry much - I sense a messenger bag in my future) within 15-20 miles or so, and I can always just make my legs stronger, right? In the end, I think it's a better option to keep the original set up and not mess with the design of the experts, at least not for my current needs (though part of me would like to experiment with turning it into a single speed as well). Ultimately, the Pacer is being returned to its starting point in regard to gearing because it worked its best for me in that original form. I'd rather be slow up hill, than have to get off and walk because I can't shift out of a more difficult gear, or have the system lock up entirely.

I'm certainly finding my groove with this bike and am happy that it's being used more than I initially thought it would. It's definitely fun to ride, spirited, and while I'm sure it doesn't compare to a 10 pound carbon or titanium road bike, it suits my needs quite well.

Summer Mission Accomplished!

I am so excited! Today we decided to take advantage of one of the very few sub-90 deg F summer days and take a little bicycle cruise through town. There was an open house that we wanted to check out in old town (which turned out to be completely cute, by the way), and we need to go up one of the dreaded old town hills to arrive at the destination. In the past, I have not been able to make it up these hills because, while they start out semi-doable, when you get toward the end, they take a horrible turn for the worse and become the worst up hill grade one can imagine (at least this is how I see it). Today, for the very first time since we've lived here, I was able to make it up the road without stopping!  I was very excited (and out of breath), particularly because I was on the heaviest bicycle I've ever owned/rode through town. We (the royal we, of course) actually weighed the Pashley, and with the rear baskets added on, she weighs 52 lbs!!  Good gracious. And that's not even counting my purse or the 3.5 lb chain that were in the front basket.

Just had to share a bit of my joy... and one of these days I'll take a picture of the dreaded hills.