Cycle Oregon 2007: Day 5 -- What Doesn't Kill Lingy...

For the first time of the week, I woke to the soft patter of raindrops on the nylon of my tent, and Day 5 began with a sinking realization that the week was now really almost over. Three more rides to go. Somewhere between the evening of Day 4 and the morning of Day 5, the week went from seemingly never ending to almost over. The good thing about waking up with a pang of could-be regret like this, is that it caused me to breathe slower and be more aware to take everything in on the last few days. I silently packed my things into my bag of increasingly dirtier and dirtier clothes. My kit selection process went from "what's left that's clean" to "what's the least dirty". I had some clean stuff left, but I wanted to save one clean setup for the last day, so I didn't roll into the finish line to greet my lovely wife smelling like a rotting onion. The fact that the morning was warm didn't occur to me until I was standing naked in my tent and my testicles had not retreated into my chest as per the previous 4 mornings. I slid into my gear, trying to balance the possibility of a wet ride with the fact that it was warm, and there was a pretty good bit of climbing to do. I elected for the standard issue outfit of shorts and jersey as well as arm and leg warmers, but no rain jacket or booties. I left my tent and grabbed my loaner 2008 Trek Madone and headed over to the RVs to see what the crew was up to.

I tagged a long with a group that was just heading over to breakfast and had a couple of spoonfuls of powdered eggs and a slice of kielbasa that I washed down with some watery coffee and some orange juice. I was a little hungry, but I didn't want to eat too much as the no-solid-food rule had been working out pretty well for me. Day 5 lunch wasn't until after the ride in Oakridge, but I had plenty of Hammer Gel and an emergency Clif Bar should the need arise, so I didn't feel obligated to chow down too much. Everyone ate essentially in silence and we returned to the RVs to prepare for the ride.

The mood of the entire camp was essentially a reflection of the weather... not terrible, but a little gray and soggy. The RV'ers were packing up as the group assembled and we all mumbled our good mornings to each other. I was pretty excited to try out the demo bike, as I had never ridden a carbon-framebefore, but my enthusiasm also extended to the fact that we were going to be riding on a newly-paved stretch of mountain road for a significant portion of the day. We assembled for our morning picture and we hit the trail in two groups, as the Aussies were a little slow on the uptake that morning. I was in the second group with Amanda and the Aussies.

We were one of the later crews getting out of camp, and we had the first few miles of the course essentially to ourselves. Eventually, we got onto a multi-use path heading around Dorena Lake, and started to have to deal with passing as a group which proved to be a little sketchy due to frequent entrance/exit posts and road crossings. Still, we had a good pace and a string group, so we flew along nicely. The Madone felt great -- very snappy and responsive, and very, very light. I could feel the efficiency in the power-transfer, and the rolling hills on the course were like an amusement park ride. Eventually I pulled away from the group and caught up with Lingy, Ed, Keith and Steve and fell in line with them. I felt great -- which was good, because that entire group is nuts to ride with. These guys are all super nice and fun to ride with, but they ride strong 100% of the time, no one eases up and everyone takes their turn and pulls hard. We had a killer rhythm going which got us caught up to the front group of Lon, Sally, Roland and Matthew. All of this jockeying and pulling and drafting is an amazing way to pass the time. Before we knew it, we were pulling into the second ODS stop of the day (we skipped the first), which was at the base of the big climb.

I decided to let the front group go and wait for the Aussies, since I was enjoying riding with them, and I didn't really feel like hammering up the climb with the Lon train. We set off on a nice pace, the grade was only around 2-3% at the beginning, so we were chatting and goofing around, when out of the blue, Scottie just took off. Not to be pwnd, I jumped on his wheel and we set up off the hill. A short bit later, the course turned off the road and onto a newly-paved, 1-lane access road that was more like a bike trail in the middle of the wilderness. This was described in the Cycle Oregon literature as "virgin pavement," and it was super smooth and fast -- great for climbing; if not a little packed with recumbents and other slow climbers. Scottie and I took turns in the front and we flew up hill, "on your left" became the mantra of the day, and I think I was more tired from saying it than from the actual climb. It was a grind though, and before long, we were winding our way out of the soggy morning fog and into the hot, high-altitude sun. The path was beautiful, the climb was tough and the company was great, we set into a great rhythm and in fairly short order, we were at the ODS stop near the summit.

We downed some V8, filled the bottles and had some yummy fresh fruit while waiting for the rest of the group. We hooked up with Amanda, Zed, Robbie and Kirsten and were off again. There was a short two-mile climb up to a false peak, a two-mile descent, and another two-mile climb up to the real peak, and then a huge descent into Oakridge. We hit the trail amist tons of warnings from the CO staff about how gnarly the descents were. Amanda, Scottie and I were feeling strong, so we hammered up to the first peak and down the backside and stopped to take a couple of pictures where were could see the morning's fog way down below. We continued the fun drop and hit the climb on the other side. I still had legs and I knew the rest of the day after this 2-mile stretch was gonna be all downhill, so I really hammered on the loaner bike to see how she could climb. I left it in the big ring and FLEW up the 2-miles of 6% grade, out of the saddle the entire time. The bike was super-responsive, and this type of riding was perfect for a super-stiff, carbon frame. I waited for the rest of the group at the top, and we hit the descent together.

I started the descent a bit on the conservative side. It was a new bike and I am not a balls-out descender anyway, but the faster I let the bike go, the better it handled and the more comfortable I got. Eventually, I was all by myself absolutely flying down the hill. The pavement was smooth, excepting the occasional usually well-marked high-altitude blacktop separation or deformation, and the bike clung to the surface. I was on the drops, and barely ever even touched the brakes. Since it was a loaner bike, it didn't have a computer but I guarantee you it was the fastest I have ever been on a bike. There were a few rollers midway down and the bike sliced up them like it had a motor, I was flying past people to their occasional disagreement... more than once I heard, "too fast!" in my wake as I zipped by someone. Hahahaha, suckers.

The descent seemed to go on forever and it was glorious. Big, winding corners and wide open straight-aways -- the surface was dry as a bone and there was no reason at all to brake. There was one sketchy spot where there was a drop off in the middle of the road maked with "XXXXX" across it. I hit it, but I had seen it early enough that I was expecting it, so it didn't throw me at all. I couldn't believe how long the hill was, much like the climb up, it just seemed to go on forever. Finally, I hit the bottom and was bummed that it was over, but grinning like an idiot from the absolutely epic ride thus far. I stopped at the bottom and waited for the crew, Amanda was the first person I saw, but she didn't know how far behind the others were. I decided to wait a little longer for them and she went on to camp. I waited a few more minutes, but still saw no one, so I headed into Oakridge with thoughts of a cold beer and a hot slice of pizza, not to mention my 2nd massage of the week. It was a little windy for the last couple of miles into camp, but I was still beaming from the great ride. I pulled into Oakridge and quaffed my chocolate milk.

As I was heading to the tents, I ran into Lon who informed me that Lingy had wrecked on the descent. Shit! Our group had been so fortunate thus far that mathematics dictated that one of us should have gone down by now. Of course it had to be Lingy... the guy with the nicest bike of all of us his full-carbon Colnago masterwork. I stopped by the first aid station and didn't see Lingy, so I decided to head over to the RVs to see if he was there, but first I went and exchanged my awesome loaner bike for my trusty Ellsworth. I bullshitted with Dax (the Trek rep) for a while and got my bike back -- and immediately took it to the Bike Gallery station for a lube job on the bottom bracket. "It'll be ready after announcements, the gal told me when I dropped it off. Free bike repair, sweet.

I walked the fair distance from the tents to the RVs to see how Lingy was doing, and noted that the wind was still gaining strength and the clouds were beginning to look heavy with rain. The RV folks were pretty solemn and the news on Lingy was that he was pretty banged up, but OK for the most part, but no one was sure whether he would keep riding or not. I grabbed a beer and chatted with Ed and Roland for a bit, then Keith popped out of the RV and pulled out some tools and supplies and quietly began to work on getting Lingy's bike back in order.

The comraderie of the week was completely underscored by this brotherly gesture from Keith -- he put Lingy's bike up on the repair stand and meticulously went through each component cleaning it and inspecting it and make sure the bike was up to snuff. I suddenly realized how fortunate I was to be with a group like this. Not only was everyone strong riders and fun people, but there was a unspoken bond that everyone had everyone else's back. It's sounds kind of corny writing it in retrospect, but it was a pretty awesome realization at the time. Lingy hobbled over right about that time and while he was obviously in some pain, he was in good spirits, and wasn't at all put off by having to repeat his story a hundred times. It turns out he hit that very same "XXXXX" bump I mentioned earlier, and came down crooked. He was badly scraped up and bruised, but maintained he would continue riding. I felt like a weenie.

The rain started later that evening, and when I stopped by the RVs after my dinner and massage, no one was around. I figured this would be a great opportunity to catch up on some rest and reading, so I retired to my tent around 8:30 and called it a night.