...Just Another Beautiful PA Brevet

As you may have noticed, it's been over a year now since my first and only post on this here tandem rando blog. So, what do you suppose was so special about the Easten PA June R-12 brevet that would prompt me to sit down at the computer and tap out a ride report...? Well, in fact - nothing! It was just another beautiful PA brevet...!

The College Hill 200k brevet from Tom R.'s house in Easton, PA on Saturday June 6th was part of the Eastern PA R-12 series Tom started last fall to give area riders an opportunity to earn their RUSA R-12 medals without traveling too far or having to search around for a brevet or permanent during "off" months in the schedule. The R-12 series rides are organized as "no frills" affairs - sorry none of the customary PA pre-ride oatmeal or post-ride chicken soup and goodies. Just a RUSA certified 200k route and your brevet card for a low entry fee of $10. Many of the series rides have been hosted by RBA Tom, and a few have been organized by PA rando regulars.

"No frills" or not, you can be assured that any Eastern PA route and cue sheet is always "top shelf" - and Saturday's ride was no exception. The course was largely the same as the '08 Fall 200k - a clockwise loop from Easton taking riders through Wind Gap before tackling the mighty Fox Gap on the way to the first Delaware River crossing at Belvidere, NJ. After a stop at Skoogy's Deli we took on the Lommason's Glen and Staat's Rd. climbs in NJ then crossed back into Pennsylvania at Milford. We climbed south and west away from the river to the southernmost point of the route, and the final controle on the road at the quaint, and always welcoming Carversville General Store. The final 38 mile leg from Carversville north back to Easton traversed "classic" northeastern PA terrain - lots of pretty, quiet backroads including several covered bridge crossings and hardly a yard of it seemed as if it wasn't pitched up or downhill somehow (mostly uphill!)

The Eastern PA ACP spring series of rides had concluded over the final weekend in May with the Water Gap 600k, so unless you were planning to take on the upcoming (very challenging) 1000k, this R-12 series ride was your opportunity to keep a PA R-12 streak alive. The June ride might also have been billed the "siblings and spouses edition" - brothers and PA regulars Ivan and Jerry Umble were in attendance. Brothers, and PA newcomers Ben and Tom Hoen met halfway at Easton to do some riding together - Tom (riding his first brevet ever) made the trip north from Baltimore, and Ben, an experienced randonneur, drove in from the Hudson Valley, NY (if my memory serves me correctly.) Guy Harris, a regular fixture (or fixie?) at the PA series was joined by his wife Barbara on her first brevet of the season, and yours truly was accompanied, as always, by my lovely and talented stoker and wife Barbara. In addition, Bill Olsen came out for a final shakedown ride before heading to Virginia for the start of the Shenandoah 1200k later this week (too bad he couldn't convince his brother to come down from Minnesota a little early - we would have had another set of brothers on the ride!) Christine Newman joined the gang on her Bike Friday (the beautiful Bilenky was in the shop...) and Joe Carbone came out to try another PA 200k (an encore to his gutsy ride at the spring series 200k? - http://www.njrando.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=11&t=335) Len Zawodniak showed up a bit late due to an alarm clock malfunction (that's 4am Len, not 4pm!), but that didn't stop him from coming home first in just under nine hours!

In 2009, the Eastern PA series has seen all sorts of weather, much of it less than ideal for a day on the bike. But this day, June 6th, turned out just about perfect. Friday's persistant, soaking rain had (thankfully) moved out overnight and left us with a beautiful late spring day - thick cloud cover hung on much of the morning to keep temperatures pleasantly cool, and road surfaces damp. By noon-ish the sun finally had broken through to bring us a mostly sunny afternoon with a light breeze and temperatures finally climbing near the forecast high of 80F by later on. Friday's rains added interest to the water features of the day's travels - the Delaware River was muddy and swollen, and the various smaller streams (usually flowing charmingly downhill alongside a road we were struggling to climb up) were bubbling along with more zest than usual.

Barbara and I had a pretty good day on the Burley. Despite neither us feeling 100% on Saturday, we managed to get around the course in just under 11 hours - a personal best for us on a PA brevet. We're making an effort, this season, to try to get a little faster - with an eye toward PBP '11. You know the deal - the faster you can get around the course the more time you have available to eat, sleep and recover. These hillier brevets are not so easy for us on the tandem, but we are pleased to see some steady improvement in our riding from last season to this year. Although Barb and I both felt pretty beat up, both physically and mentally at the finish of Saturday's ride, it was very satisfying to finally finish a PA event in less than 11 hours.

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Some of the highlights, lowlights, and observations from our day on the road include:

0600 start, 1930 time limit in the month of June - no need to mount the lights today, right? I guess we must have felt pretty confident at the start - this was perhaps the only time we've ever started a brevet without the lights mounted on the tandem. Always enjoy the beginning miles of this route - south alongside the Delaware, cruising at a good clip on Rt. 611, the climbs up Mud Run and Wind Gap, the Cherry Valley - Fetherman Rd. section.

Made it over the fearsome Fox Gap with a minimum of fuss - slow and steady, but not suffering badly. The somewhat technical descent down to Lake Minsi gets more and more fun every time as I gain familiarity with the road. We commented that it was nice to see anglers fishing on Lake Minsi from boats rather than through holes drilled in the ice, like in February while we rode past on the "Beyond Hope to New Hope" R-12 series ride. I'm not sure who was nuttier that day - the cyclists or the fishermen!

The Jersey side: Skoogy's Deli was hopping at prime time on a spring Saturday morning. The babbling brook alongside Lommason Glen Rd. was babbling quite vigorously. The Staats Rd. climb hurts every time, but the payoff, the descent of Sweet Hollow Rd. to Little York is always pretty and fun. We ran across two Princeton Free Wheelers rides along the way - a gang of at least 15 taking a break in Bloomsbury, and a smaller group enjoying some goodies at the Milford Bakery. Barb and I paused there, too, to enjoy some delicious pastries and coffee - how can you not?

Back in PA: Once you cross the Delaware at Milford back into PA, you've got 71 miles done and less than 55 miles remaining. If you look at the elevation profile, all the major climbs are behind you - it ought to be smooth sailing to the last controle on the road in Carversville, then a pleasant tour north to the finish in Easton, right...? Wrong!!! The last half of this brevet is very scenic and deceivingly tough. It becomes that much tougher if, like us, you have a serious case of rando amnesia, you can't recall your last ride over this same route in the fall, and your mind genuinely believes all that stuff I just said about only 55 miles left and all the major climbing is done! The fact is, there is very little level road over the final 55 miles of this course (or at least it seems that way.) There are no really large gains or drops in elevation to register on the elevation profile, but your legs tell you a different story. Often during this stretch we wondered why we were creeping along in the granny ring, when the pitch of road under our wheels didn't really look so bad. Oh well, this is beginning to sound like I'm whining - and we can't have that! If you can put aside the heaviness in your legs the Bucks County countryside really is very pretty - as I mentioned earlier, we pass through several (4, in total?) historic covered bridges.

We grunted our way up the penultimate hill of the day - the innocent sounding Buttermilk Rd. then made the right onto the 50 mph descent of Lower Saucon Rd. We knew we'd make it, now as we sped over the final flat run-in toward town. I tried not to glance at my watch as I knew we'd be flirting with the 11 hour goal I had in my head (I'm careful never to announce these secret goals to my stoker until after the ride is over - it would surely kill some of the enjoyment for her...) We picked our way through downtown Easton then the formality of the final climb up College Ave. to the finish at the WaWa. My watch said 4:53OBT (Official Brevet Time) but somehow, by the time we made our purchases and got to the checkout the clerk wrote down 4:58pm on our brevet cards - I can't fuss about a few minutes, we'd made it in before the magic 5 o'clock hour!

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A big thanks to RBA Tom Rosenbauer for putting on another fine PA brevet. Tom decided not to clip in and ride with the group this time - he had a few things to catch up on around the house, and there were events going on all day at nearby Lafayette College for his 25th college reunion. Rumor had it that if he had failed to make it back from riding in time get get ready for his reunion dinner, there would have been trouble... ;>) Thanks Tom for taking the time out of your busy schedule.

And there you have it... The long awaited second installment in the Double Super Secret Tandem Rando Society. There have surely been memorable rides over the past year that deserved a write-up in this space, but never got it. What can I say...? Until the spirit moves me to blog again...

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Post Script

I failed to include a couple important details about our day - As Tom mentions in his ride report e-mail, Bill Slabonik was there at the finish with Tom to greet riders as they finished. Bill has been unable to ride as much as he'd like recently due to a shoulder injury which will require surgery soon. That didn't stop him from joining the post-ride festivities on Tom's front porch, though. We enjoyed your post-ride banter, Bill, and what a beautiful machine is that Campy equipped '84 3Rensho. That must have been a fine winter project, indeed... Good luck with the impending surgery - hope to see you back on the bike soon.

Riders paused for a while on Tom's porch after finishing the day's ride, but there was no post ride meal gathering this time. Barb and I decided to point the car towards home and keep our eyes open for a diner along the way. We came across several, but decided to stop at the Clinton Station Diner alongside westbound Route 78, just west on Clinton, NJ. http://www.clintonstationdiner.com/ We sat in the part of the diner that is a converted 1927 passenger railroad car - quite charming! We didn't order the 50 lb. "Mt. Olympus" burger, but we did enjoy generous slices of key lime pie and chocolate mousse cake for dessert - we'd earned it, right?

And finally, congratulations to Joe Carbone on his first official PA finish! Barb and I wondered all day Sunday how Joe had made out - once Tom posted the results we learned Joe made it back to the WaWa in 13h17m - a huge improvement over his previous two PA series attempts and a testiment to Joe's perserverence. We're sorry we weren't there in person to cheer for you at the finish. (I can assure you that our thoughts were with you as we worked on the previously mentioned desserts, though!) Congrats, Joe!