70 miles, much less 150,; not even in my vocabulary.
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Rode a total of 0.47 miles at Egg Harbor (New Jersey) BMX at the Northeast Gold Cup Championship - Day 1.
Amateur pro tip: Do not start your BMX career at 63 and think that at 64 you can win. These guys been doing this since they were kids.
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Loops on the A21. A bit sketchy with all the traffic but no near death experiences.
Power meter kept cutting out but still accumulated enough TSS to make the grade.
Wont use that route again unless I can find a quiet time maybe for continuous tempo rides, countryside hills much safer for threshold repeats.
It was nice to go fast under power though, instead of crawling up hills looks like I made 54kph …
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I think I learned how to do no footers at egg harbor in like 94ish? we showed up to race and they were cancelled for some reason, the EMT guys had shown up and were like heck we are here for safety have at it.
Had a race yesterday, different kind of race where it is basically a time trial up a rail trail path (the end of the Great Allegheny Pass) from Cumberland to Frostburg but you are racing the trains time not the other competitors. For safety the train starts after everyone has started and they time the train.
I had planned to try and shoot for 300 watt avg but was sick all week started off hitting that to feel it out and decided while I possibly could do it that seemed like a stretch so backed off. Beat the train by about 7 minutes coming in just under an hour and was 22nd out of 101 (102 if you count train). Happy with my result given how I felt (still feel) and now have a better idea how to pace it for next year if I do it.
nice
Logistics of the race were confusing, like are we allowed to ride back down or does that interfere with people coming up (the trail wasn’t closed so there were others going both ways anyway). Was awards at the top or bottom (still never figured that out). Anyway I figured I had some downtime and planned to ride further up and hit the continental divide about 8 miles further up the trail then head back and see what was going on. I started to see people leaving so figured trail was open and was feeling less than great from my cold and was going to just head home (90 minute drive after 15 miles back down) I gave it another few minutes and my poor judgement set in, off to the continental divide… Was able to control myself and kept a very nice even pace up the 8 or so miles. The return was then 23 miles downhill but somehow seemed to have a headwind and felt hard at times… I was probably just tired.
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Today was a regular group ride. My head wasn’t in the tiny descents at the start though, fortunately I warmed into it and tagged on a solo 14miles loop before the rain. Oh and I unpaused my ride before waking up the power meter by mistake after the cafe.
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@mrtopher1980 this is great! I still have a bucket list item to bike from Pittsburgh to DC on the GAP and C&O (I live in Manassas). I’ve seen the train race but never had this level of detail. Might have to add that to my list, too. Thanks!!
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I’ve wanted to do the whole c&o in a single day since I learned you could ride it and had never even been on it. Heading up to Cumberland definitely reignited that and may attempt it next year if I can get the GF to agree to supply me along the way.
The whole route since Pittsburgh never really interested me until I had my daughter and now I think we might try that before she’s out of the trailer. Maybe not single trip. GAP in one round C&O in another, helps we have family on both ends.
As for the race, information was very hard to find about it. No results from previous years, no strava segment. Which now makes sense as the course start and finish are iffy safety wise. I found one guy on a local cycling FB group saying they did it so his time of just over an hour and saying he beat the train was my only point of reference after I stalked him on strava. This year was against the backup diesel locomotive as the scenic tour steam one is broken again. Not sure if that changes the time much since the train is just running it’s normal Saturday afternoon tour. Trail crosses the tracks a half dozen times and there was a tunnel you aren’t allowed in while the train goes through so that was another answer to why not race the actual train I couldn’t find before. Trail started paved and may have had some paved sections in a few areas around parking lots/road crossings but don’t remember. Condition was great, few spots the crushed quartz was a little thick and you had a woah moment if you weren’t ready. But most of it was compacted and smooth. Much better condition than the c&o. Shoot me a message if you want and I’ll can get you the file to look over.
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If you decide to do this, and want company, please message me. I’m not in shape to do 184.5 miles in one go right now, but might be with some targeted training (like late summer / early fall). I’d train up to Cumberland the night before and meet for an early morning start.
More near-term I’m looking to do my first bikepacking overnight on the C&O with my 13yo son (hence starting the Bikepacking Mega-Thread).
Anyway, awesome job!
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I was at Egg Harbor BMX in New Jersey today (Fri through today actually) for the Northeast Gold Cup. Were you at the BMX track in Jersey or a different Egg Harbor?
I rode a total of 0.67 miles today at the Egg Harbor Township (New Jersey) BMX track for the Northeast Gold Cup finals in 61-65 Cruiser class.
They handed me a #2 plate which I gladly accepted being my 2nd year on a BMX bike.
Guys were talking nostalgic about the BMX bikes they had as kids. I said I still ride the very first BMX bike I ever had; bought it last year.
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Saturday’s ride was a 200km audax from the Gold Coast through northern NSW. Beautiful scenery. A few big climbs which I was expecting, but I think it’s all the pimple-sized rollers that wrecked me. Struggled to get into a rhythm for large sections. Anyone got any tips? Hit me up. 
Had nutrition & hydration dialled the night before but shot myself in the foot by forgetting to take my 3rd bottle out of the fridge which had my carb solution. 
I solved the carbs issue by changing one of my two hydration bottles into a carbs bottle, meaning I’d need to stop more often. Thankfully it was a cool day so I could get by.
First hill broke the group up a bit. I let myself drift off the back, taking it easy knowing it was a long day, passed two on the descent, then caught the front group of three at 29km. Then just 3 km later broke a gear cable so I was off the back again. I had a spare so I wasn’t stranded, but rescuing the shorn-off cable end out of the lever & setting the new cable up cost me 23 minutes in two stops.
Rest of the ride went pretty well. Had some rain on a long climb, but reflected that for both cooling & safety it was better than getting the rain on a descent. And the road was dry by the time I got to the next descent (or maybe, fortunately, it just didn’t rain there). Felt pretty smoked at about 130km, still with 3h & 600m of climbing left, even though on the map it looked much like dropping down to sea level & riding fairly flat land except for a 100m climb. Moral of the story: don’t ever take a 10000-foot view of the altitude profile! And don’t try to memorise it but actually print it out. Rejoiced when I reached Wooyung on the coast for the last 40km northbound stretch, on which the road was actually decently flat with a bit of a tailwind, then I could just rest on the aero bars & churn out the kays back home.
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Hm it’s a bit different it’s longer and the climbing is a bit different, as the first climb is relatively short with40-45m and the second long but shallow for long sections. The big difference is the relatively long valley between Biasca and Airolo that is a lot of false flat uphill with some steeper short sections, where having a group is important but not going to hard as well… I would say they are very similar, but the last climb goes to altitude of 2400 so if you explode it’s imo worse then the Alp… On the other hand the marmotte has often heat to consider while o September it can already get pretty cold in the swiss Alps. Overall it has a bit of a less competitive vibe then the marmotte imo their is no ranking you just get your time but it’s not ordered in the results.
I like it but you have to register early as it sells out fast and there are limited places to stay in Andermatt.
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Club run 10km, sad to see the running lights coming on. Feels too early in the year.
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I wanted a recovery ride tonight but with the winds in the flat Fens I ended up getting up to a Z2 HR as I led the beginners group round for what could be the last beginners group ride of the year as we are running out of light and tonight was clear.
As an aside it looks like my front light when I switched it on was blocking out the power meter.
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My kids never were to happy sitting in the trailer for too long so going out for a ride was never really an option nice to be able to do that
It’s been too long since she had ridden with me. She’s three now and between 1&2 she came a lot, mostly 45-75 min rides with my wife and I. My wife was pregnant the last 9 months and I got a lot more serious about my riding, so my rides had just been solo.
We did an hour yesterday. After 30 mins she wanted a break but I was able to bribe her with a stop at the playground if we made it to an hour, so that did the trick.
I could easily bring her tablet and put on a movie and she’d be good for much longer, I just hate doing that on a bike ride. I can live with it much more on long car rides.
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We bought this trailer at a yard sale about seven years ago with the hopes of one day needing it. Last year, we received our first baby in foster care–Lord willing, to soon adopt!–who is now 19 months old. I’ve taken him on a few short rides around the (hilly 
) neighborhood while the wife rides her e-bike along with us. It takes a little adjusting to it being there, but I enjoy it, for sure! I look forward to more of it as the weather cools. We recently did a respite care for a couple days, so I put the two of them in the trailer. That was a little tough but still fun! They both actually fell asleep.
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