Century Thursday

Yesterday I got in my second Century of the year, of course on the singlespeed. The first was way back in February when we had a balmy 45 degree day... wow that seems so long ago.

This time it really was balmy, and at 80 degrees forecasted, I was really looking forward to getting in a god long ride. I wasn't sure that I had 100 miles in me though, especially since I was going to be riding some singletrack trail in addition to roads and rail trail.

I had wanted to be on the road by 10am, but as is normally the case with me, that didnt happen. I ended up doing some much needed bike maintenance before the ride, so at noon I finally hit the road by heading north from Royal Oak up to the Clinton River Trail to Rochester, where I picked up the Paint Creek Trail. Following generally the same route at the Massive Fallout Ride last October, I exited the PCT just south of Lake Orion and took bike path and roads up to the Bald Mountain Connector, then through 1/2 of Bald Mountain and out to Addison Oaks County Park. I got there with only 33 miles under my belt (much less than I had thought), the trail was in fantastic shape, and I felt really good after my first lap so I rode it again! After two laps at Addison I headed back the way I had come and started riding the rest of the Bald Mountain Trail loop back to the PCT, but that part of the trail was in really bad (muddy) condition, so I turned back and took the roads back to the PCT. I rode the PCT back to Rochester where I stopped at a gas station for some Gatorade, Skittles and a supersize Snickers. Apparently the correct time to eat a 600 calorie Snickers is 62 miles into a 100 mile ride LOL!

After re-fueling I headed back through Rochester and picked up the CRT again... this time heading east for 10 miles (to give me 20 round trip since I had 63 already and from that point it was 17 miles back to my house). The CRT turns into the Macomb Orchard Trail a few miles east of there, and surprisingly I had never ridden that section of rail trail and had no idea what to expect. To my surprise, the MOT is a very smooth asphalt paved trail that stretches all the way across Macomb County. I rode it up to where it crossed 30 Mile road, which gave me 73 miles and I turned around since at that point it was 27 miles to home. Kinda weird feeling having ridden 73 miles and finally heading towards home at 6:15 pm with 27 miles to go, but that was where I was. I ended up taking a slightly longer way home which netted me just over 100 miles for the day... and got home at 8pm where I immediately slammed a recovery drink (oddly enough, for the last 20 miles I was really thinking I just wanted to get home and have a recovery drink - Accelerade in my case) which Ive never craved before. I guess I really must have been electrolyte deficient and my body knew it! Then I proceeded to lay down on my floor for about 45 minutes till I was able to get up again!

So, I ended up with roughly 30 miles of roads, 50 miles of rail trail, and 21 miles of singletrack. Not too bad for a Thursday!

Mileage: 100.98
Ride time: 7:19
Pace: 13.4