I had every intention of getting up Saturday morning for the Winter training ride with SIR. It looked like a fun course on some well worn roads. The puppy that we were dog sitting had other ideas. She decided to start yapping until she got sick of it, only to repeat the process every 20 minutes. From 11pm to 7am, she started whining and barking from her kennel. I’ve never felt so angry and violent towards an animal before. It took everything I had to stay in bed and not get up and strangle the poor thing.

I had pretty much committed to supporting Matt on the ride. Chris had gave me the impression that he might back out of the ride anyways, but he let me know the night prior that he was in for it. I texted him at like 4:30am (sorry, Chris) after I had been up for a couple of hours straight to let him know that there was no way I was getting up to ride my bike all day.

Around 9 or 10, after getting a little slower start, I asked Chris if he would still be in for a shorter ride around West Seattle. I had splurged a little on the dinner and dessert the night prior. I needed at least a little bit of activity. Thankfully, he was in.

Paul Johnson was nice (and crazy) enough to let some of us newbies take the reigns on mapping out a course for the 100k this summer. I’ve had a collection of leg breaking hills that I’ve been trying to string together for a while now, and Jane showed me an amazing one that connected Delridge to as far as California across West Seattle. I knew it would be perfect for the ride, if only the pitch wasn’t too steep.

You can look at our Saturday loop here. I am positive that we won’t be able to get away with every turn and street on the map, but that isn’t really the point right now. We are still fleshing it out. Somehow we squeaked out 2,000 feet of climbing in 15 miles or so. The last 5 miles is mostly downhill and was strictly to get us back home.

The general plan is to keep routing south, possibly as far as Dash Point and swing back up, starting and ending in the general South Park area. It will probably be a top heavy ride as far as hills go. Whoever doesn’t bail out from leg cramps should be treated to a pleasant second half… maybe.

South of the Fauntleroy ferry, you climb a hill and then dip back down into a neighborhood (Shorewood?) that rests at sea level. There is a fantastic switchback followed by a completely epic climb. Oh lord that hill is amazing. Once you crest the top you are treated to views of Mount Raininer and the Puget Sound behind you. If we luck out with a nice summer day, it should be a stunning ride.

Considering the neighborhoods we are running through, we’ve found some nice low traffic streets. It isn’t exactly the country, but we aren’t putting you on I-5 or anything. Wait… that isn’t a bad idea… Sorry Paul. You gave some city boys the ball and we are going to run with it.