The forecast was not leaving much room for optimism as we headed off for Georgia Saturday morning. Despite the fact that a number of local riders had already decided to skip this year's Six Gap Century, a few zealots remained. I was driving up with Mignon, while John Maurin and John Chauvin were to meet us up in Dahlonega. The weather on the drive was beautiful, which made Sunday's forecast all that much harder to believe. We must have checked and re-checked the forecast a dozen times throughout the long drive, each time hoping for just a hint of improvement. None was to be had, however, and about the best we could do was a 50% chance of rain. At least is wasn't going to be particularly cold.
So we arrived at the town square in Dahlonega around 5 pm, picked up our packets and transponders, made our rendezvous with the two Johns, and made our way over to Ro's house where we'd be staying overnight. Steve, who was our contact with Ro, had needed to cancel that morning. Our hosts fixed us a nice dinner, and after a couple of glasses of wine we went downstairs to watch "
Chasing Legends" on their big home theatre system. The documentary on the 2009 Tour de France did not disappoint. I recommend it highly. In fact, the Tulane Cycling group will be getting together to watch it on Friday.
Sunday morning we made an early getaway in a light rain, arriving at the big school parking lot around 6:15 or so (the 6-Gap start was scheduled for 7:30). Fifteen minutes later, just after I'd pulled the bikes out of the car, there was a heavy downpour. I jumped into the back of the Volvo wagon and watched it come down as I contemplated my clothing options and wondered what those 45 mph downhill switchbacks would be like when wet. Luckily, the rain eased up and practically stopped half an hour before start time. Mignon and John Maurin were on the fence as to whether of not to do the full 104 miles or skip some of the misery and do the shorter "Three Gap" ride. I was committed to doing the full ride, but my focus was definitely going to be more on preventing hypothermia and road rash than on posting a good finish time. Considering the guaranteed rain, chill, and wet descents, this was not going to be a fast one for me. I was going to be using a 39x27 for the first time on this one and was kind of looking forward to a little less time standing on the pedals at the tops of the big climbs. I finally settled on two jerseys, arm-warmers, a chest protector and toe-covers. In my pockets were my Oakleys (mainly because they have stick-on reading lenses), a full flask of HammerGel orange (I'd bought the last bottle at the Expo the day before), and an emergency PowerBar. On the bike was a small bottle of water and a large bottle of water with HEED electrolyte mix. Because of the wet roads, I'd stuffed three spare tubes into my saddle bag, just in case. The bike felt like it weighed a ton. So did I.
Fifteen minutes before the start I said goodbye to the the others so I could make my way down to the start early, lining up near the front with the "under 6 hours" group composed mainly of active racers from throughout the southeast. We rolled out in a light drizzle. The bulging group was very cautious for the first twenty miles or so, and I was glad that the rain was relatively light. We made our way over the first little climb at 12.5 miles and around 20 miles in finally started the long climb up to Neel's Gap. Things got quieter as the group started to string out and up ahead I could see what would become the lead group already pulling away. I settled in to a moderate pace behind another rider. I knew better than to try to stay with the front group so early. The really hard stuff wouldn't come for another twenty or thirty miles. I came over the top of Neel's with a number of other riders and after a fast descent we regrouped with what I guess must have been the second main group. I was not feeling particularly strong and had been surprised at how quickly I'd resorted to the 27. The next two climbs, Jack's Gap and Unicoi Gap, both topping out at around 2,900 feet, were similar, but toward the end of the Unicoi climb most of the group was a minute or two ahead of me.
The descent from Unicoi is awesome, and would really be our first real fast test on the wet roads. The rain had been going back and forth between heavy and light, and everything was soaked. I'd long since taken off the chest protector and given up entirely on the glasses. I came over the top and immediately accelerated downhill, squinting to see as the raindrops stung my face at 45 mph. The traction felt surprisingly good and I dumped in into the 53x12, grabbing handfulls of both brakes as I approached the blind curves, but generally passing a lot of more timid, or careful, riders. Toward the bottom I could see a group up ahead and I got together with another rider as we chased our way back up to them.
Hogpen Gap is the pretty much acknowledged as the hardest climb. It's about 7 miles long, topping out at almost 3,500 feet, and it usually pretty well shatters the groups. It didn't take long for me to deploy the 27 once the climb started, and as usual I spent most of it riding pretty much alone at 6 to 10 mph. It take a very long time to ride 7 miles at that speed. For a change, I was never really completely out of sight of other riders, though. Up ahead, I could see a number of riders, all strung out and struggling up the hill alone like me. As I came over the crest, I noticed a bunch of the riders who had been ahead of me stopped at the rest stop. Right about that time the rain turned really heavy and it started to get quite foggy. I knew that if I stopped I'd freeze, so I shifted to the big gears and let gravity do its job. This downhill is quite a bit more technical than Unicoi, and there were a few times where I had to brake hard coming into sharp switchbacks on somewhat sketchy asphalt. As on all of the downhills this year, I was burning a lot more brake rubber than usual. I can't even begin to imagine what it must have been like for riders with carbon rims and cork brake pads! Anyway, I just absolutely loved riding these fast sketchy downhills in the rain. There's just something about the way it demands your full attention that find irresistible. The biggest problem from my perspective with the downhills this year was the chill. My legs were freezing by the time I got to the bottom of each long descent. There was one bit of excitement on this descent (I think it was this one, anyway). As I came flying around a particularly sharp and blind left-hander I suddenly came upon a rider who had slid out on the outside of the turn. He was just getting up, standing in the middle of the road, with various bike parts and water bottles still rolling across the wet asphalt. Luckily I was already on the brakes and was able to pick my way through the debris safely. A little while later when I caught up to a few more riders they asked about it. Apparently there had been two rider who had gone down. I don't really remember seeing a second rider, but of course all my attention at the time was focused on getting around the curve safely so I might have missed him -- or perhaps he's gone over the barrier??
As usual, I was pretty much cooked after Hogpen, but with the help of another rider I found myself back with a little group for a while as we made our way toward the last big climb of the day, Wolfpen Gap at 3,364 feet and 77 miles into the ride.
Wolfpen is one of the prettiest climbs on this ride, and as usual I climbed it mostly alone. All I could hear was the rain falling through the forest, the water rushing over the rocks in the stream below, and my own breathing. I was really quite a peaceful, albeit painful, climb. By this point I had become very good friends with my 27 tooth cog, and although I'd failed to adjust my derailleur carefully enough for smooth shifting, I had figured out its quirks enough to keep it from auto-shifting too much. Wolfpen and Woody's Gaps, which come one after the other, have, I think, some of the steepest grades, especially on the inside of some of the switchbacks, but they are, relatively speaking, short. The descent from Woody's Gap is a fast drop from 3,200 feet down to about 1,700 feet in about five miles, and is a lot of fun. Of course the wet roads again limited my speed, but along the way I hooked up with another rider or two for the final ten miles in to the finish. The last five miles of this ride are, by some accounts, the hardest. The road is smooth, but there are a number of nice little climbs that can seem particularly painful once your legs are shot and you're thinking about the hot pasta waiting for you in the school cafeteria. For some reason I was feeling relatively good along this section. I was still with one of the guys who had descended with me, so we kept rolling pretty well along this stretch. We were probably just four or five miles from the end when I saw a distinctive red, white and blue rain jacket up ahead. It could only be Debbie Milne, who I'm sure had gone all-out on the two timed KOM climbs of Hogpen and Wolfpen Gaps. As we came up on her I tried to get her to get on, but she looked pretty cooked and just said hello and let us go. When I saw her later she said she had gotten really, really cold and had to drop off from the group she had been riding with to limp in to the finish. Anyway, I think we finished at just under 6 hours. I don't know for sure because the rain eventually got to my computer and it reset itself a couple of times during the ride. I guess that under the circumstances, and the fact that I hadn't gone into the ride with any sort of goals, it was a decent enough time. From what I heard, the fastest time was around 5:08, nearly an HOUR faster!
By the time I got back to the car John Maurin had already departed. He and Mignon had decided to do just the 3-Gap ride, so Mignon had already gotten dried off and cleaned up. I grabbed a plastic shopping bag and headed for the bathroom to peel off my wet clothes and shoes. I think it had been a hard decision for Mignon to do the shorter ride, but probably a sensible one. I saw a number of people huddled under blankets at the rest areas trying to warm their way out of impending hypothermia. We waited around for a while for John Chauvin, who had started out with Mignon and John, but continued on for the full 104 miles after they decided to do the shorter route. When we were down at the finish line waiting for John, we saw a rider come walking across the finish carrying his bike. I immediately recognized the Tulane medical center jersey and realized it was one of the Tulane Cycling guys (can't recall his name, of course). He said that he was coming down a hill just ten miles or so before the finish when a rider forced him to the outside of curve. His handlebar had slammed into the post supporting a barrier, breaking it completely off and damaging his front wheel. Luckily he'd pulled his hand away at the last moment. It was amazing that his only injuries were a cut on his finger and some light road rash! We eventually left a note on John's car and headed south for the long and rainy drive home. Nine hours and half a gallon of coffee later I arrived back home shortly before midnight. Finally, the rain had stopped.
