20th Annual Ride for Heart Recap
The Heart and Stroke Foundation's 20th annual Ride for Heart fundraiser bike ride took place on Sunday, June 3rd, 2007. I signed up for the 75km ride and raised over $500 for heart and stroke research. I had a relatively disappointing ride this year, but I suppose it could have been worse. Monday was painful. Here's a recap of my day:
For the past week prior to the event, I was obsessively checking the weather forecast. Here in Toronto, the last few days have been alternating between breaks of sunshine and thunderstorms. Ride for Heart is a go regardless of weather conditions (unless it freakishly snows in June or something) so I was hoping for something pleasant. Last year, it poured the night before and cleared up nicely just in time. This year, it was supposed to be overcast in the morning and thunderstorms in the late afternoon.
I stayed overnight at Karl's apartment downtown and set the alarm clock for 4:30 in the morning. I made sure that I had the alarm clock placed well away from the couch so I would actually have to get up and walk across the room to turn it off. Not taking any chances. Took a shower and made myself breakfast: a double helping of oatmeal, two English muffins and a cup 'o tea. Karl doesn't know I emptied out his fridge in one meal. Teehee. Left at a quarter past 5 and was still pretty frazzled trying to make sure that I didn't forget anything.
Started pedaling down Queen St. to the grocery store to pick up a bottle of sports drink and then rode down King St. following the steady stream of other cyclists that were starting to gather like flocks of geese riding in formation towards Exhibition Place. Collectively, we started making our way down to the starting line, which was good for me since by this time I had absolutely no idea where I was going - I just followed everyone else.
We were funneled between fences like cattle and from where I was waiting, I couldn't even see the starting line. The line of bikes extended off down 3 streets in a giant Z and disappeared somewhere around the corner. 5:45 was starting time and somewhere down the line, people started moving albeit it hardly seemed like it since we were virtually walking while straddling our bikes. Here at the starting line, this is where things started going badly for me. Due to the narrow path and the multitude of cyclists, it was a huge bottleneck. We were going so slow that I spent the first 500 metres standing on one pedal and pushing off the ground with the other. It was only until we got on the Gardiner Expressway that things started to clear up, by which time I found my muscles had cramped up. This would end up being a recurring problem for the remainder of the 75km ride.
The Gardiner turned off to the Don Valley Parkway which was a nice periodic relief since it was mostly downhill and flats. Of course, that was followed by riding back up the Don Valley heading around the U-turn at York Mills and I was grinding my teeth as my muscles locked up again. The 75km route took me up and down this big hill for a couple of laps, both of which were excruciatingly painful. I had to swap down a couple of gears and basically crawl my way up the hill.
Around 60km things started getting a little confusing since I was starting to overtake some of the riders of the 50km earlybird ride. I made sure I bypassed the 75km turnaround the second time unless I wanted to make it 3 laps (I think under normal conditions that might have been fun). I tried to mash my way up the on ramp back to the elevated Gardiner Expressway and more or less forced myself to keep pedaling down to the finish line at Exhibition Place. Maybe I'm a bit of a glutton for punishment, but I though it felt good passing that finishing line in pain. I was at least glad that the supposed thunderstorms held off at least until I was done.
Ideally, I had set up my goal to finish the ride at around 2 hours. Unfortunately that didn't happen and I was biting the pain all the way through. Still, it was a fun ride and I have a better idea of what I need to work on for next year. Cardio and endurance is fine, but I need to work on hills (and how to not get muscle cramps at the starting line).
Time: 3:02:49 (ouch)
Distance: 76.64 km
Average Speed: 25.1 km/h (so slow)
Maximum Speed: 54.0 km/h
Comments
It is cross promoted with the bike train but if you take a train you'll have to pay for two overnight stays, because the train arrives after the event starts and leaves before it ends (if you do the longest route) and it travels to/from Niagara Falls, but the event begins/ends in St.Catharines.