Santa Fe Century Bike Ride

Santa Fe Century Bike Ride

Date: 05/20/2012
Race: Santa Fe Century
Location: Santa Fe, New Mexico
Course: 100 mile loop outside Santa Fe
Weather: Absolutely perfect! 50s at the start, mid-70s by finish and clear blue sky
Teammates participating: Chris Cadwell, Me.  I know there were other Divas there, but I didn’t run into them.
Goals: Do a century after only getting up to 40 miles in the weeks beforehand with minimal pain.

I have wanted to do this ride for years, but it is such an early season ride that I never seem to get the mileage in ahead of time. This time, I just registered anyway and took my chances. I am doing the Bike Tour of Colorado next month and I needed to get a century in. I won’t find the time to do it on my own.   

The first aid station was 20 miles in.  It takes me a little while to warm up on rides like this, so I wasn’t really worried that I felt kind of sluggish at first.  After stripping off gloves, jacket and arm warmers, the ride went through the cute little town of Madrid (which I heard someone pronounce “mad-rid”) where part of the movie Wild Hogs (ok, not a very good movie) was filmed.  The next section to the second aid station was a lot of rollers and side winds.  I was hoping that the gusty side winds were not going to be something we would have all day. 

The ride profile showed a pretty flat course, but I kept hearing people talk about Heartbreak Hill.  One guy in the group I went with had done this ride many times.  When I asked him to describe Heartbreak Hill, he said it was like Olde Stage, but about 3 times longer.  Another woman told me to ride in the middle of the road because people on the right will just stop, get off their bikes and start walking. Heartbreak Hill was just after the second aid station.  The description and the advice were right on target. I decided that my goal was just to get to the top without getting off the bike.  I did it, but near the top, I had to do some big s-curves to stay on.

The rest of the ride was pretty uneventful.  There were plenty of aid stations. The weather did get warm, but not too bad.  There was wind, but it wasn’t too bad either.  It was good to get it done.  I felt pretty good the whole time and didn’t even have to take any Advil, so I made my goal.

One thing that I noticed was that there were NO police officers directing traffic on the course, even when we had to take a left to an on-ramp for I-25.  I am used to seeing them on Colorado rides.  Is it a law in Colorado to have law enforcement?