Maximum Vertical Pain Adventure!

[Chris Watt]

So DOWN Finlayson? You're probably right (but yikes)

[Chris Watt]

Barton- proposed route (it's changing by the minute but it the theme is hills till our gums bleed) is roughly:

Munn's > Finlayson to Goldstream > Malahat to Mill Bay > back UP Malahat > Goldstream Ridge > back to Malahat > up Finlayson > Munn's > Millstream/Ross-Durrance > LEFT on Willis Pt (down t the water) > back up and over Willis Pt > Observatory > home.

Roughly.

[Josh.E]

i'm gonna map that on bikely, see where we're at.

stay tuned for a link......

[Dave Spiers]

Bad luck for me, I'm out, still pretty swollen from this mornings crash> Hope yuo guys have a great ride. I'm jealous

[Josh.E]

http://www.mapmyride.com/routes/view/42 ... e=1#climbs

check out that route. I cut out the left down willis point rd as that put us at about 115km. If we go right, and go over and hit an observatory, it's 102km.

Mapmyride claims only 1566m of ascent though. That doesn't seem right to me at all.

edit. I see, thats 1566m of "categorized" climbs it's calculating. The highlighted sections in the profile, not total ascent.

[Chris Watt]

Thanks for doing that Josh- hopefully someone's got an altimeter on their computer. See you Douglas Starbucks 6am? Off to bed...

[spearson]

So here was the route -
Munn, Fin Arm, Malahat, Mill Bay Ferry, Malahat, Shawnigan Lake Rd, Goldstream heights (for those that didn't get lost ), Shawnigan Lake Rd, Malahat, Fin Arm, Munn, Prospect Lake, West Saanich, Observatory, then straight to coffee.

Total climbing for me was 7,198ft in 140k. Totally missed the goal which can only mean that we're going to have to try this again.

Well done Mike, Matt, Josh, Barton, and Chris.

Here's my Garmin track.

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/101247927

[Josh.E]

yeah, 10,000 feet of vertical in 100km (loop, or out and back, but no hill repeats) is not easy to do 'round these parts.

We're going to have to revisit the route, and ride less needless flat kilometers....

The ride today was pretty epic though. We ended up just over 8000 feet climbing, I believe. Simon came in slightly less as he missed the last part of goldstream heights due to navigational errors. He does, however, win the day for doing the whole ride on his cross bike c/w cross tires on it. Simon, your Garmin track says 7842 feet climbing, btw.

[Chris Watt]

Epic day gents; it was a great ride in every way. Josh, Mat, Simon, Mike L., Barton- thanks.

Simon- awesome job doing it on heavy bike- and on those tires- man oh man. I agree this was just a first attempt to max out the vertical/horizontal ratio.

Some thoughts in the ongoing quest for 10,000 feet of vertical
- come straight back up the Hat (eliminate the flat section along Mill Bay Ferry Road- though it sure was beautiful)
- somehow tack on Bear Mountain, Mt. Doug and Tolmie
- throw in some of those side roads off Munns (Talon Ridge etc)
- LEFT off Prospect Lake Road > Willis Point up/over/and back THEN Observatory

Not sure if that improves the V/H ratio but it would surely put us over 10K...the challenge with this thing isn't so much maxing the vertical it's minimizing the horizontal- we had to cover a fair bit of ground between some of those climbs.

Next one?

Cheers,
Chris

[Josh.E]

If anyone is wanting to help us on this quest, the goal is to find a route that gives 10,000 feet of ascent in less than 100 continuous km. No hill repeats, out and backs are allowed. Start point of the 100km can be the beginning of the first climb of the day.....

[jeremy]

It's probably only 5km from goldstream park to triangle mountain, and if your already in langford throw in the lagoon and neil rd.

[mat_baker]

Went in search of maximum vertical pain and ended up on a truly beautiful ride. Great route, perfect weather and great company but.... the stats show that we are still a little shy of our full allotment of pain.

dist - 134.6km
rolling time - 4:48:57
max - 76.1km
min - v.slow (ie standing and grinding in a 34/28)
average - rather not say (u do the math if you must)
max grade - 19%
vertical - 2,449m (8,034')

conclusions - 599m (1,966') short of hero

Lessons learned:
- Bring more food (breakfast smoothie with an egg, 1 brioche, 1 bar, 2 gels, 2 packs of gummy's and a tea BARELY got me back to Fantastico/Fol Epi).
- When the grade hits the teens Josh is a beast.
- Be sure to follow Simon to coffee. He probably has his eye on that flowery raspberry cake in the display case.

Another chapter in the search for cycling perfection. Thanks gents. See you next time.

[barton bourassa]

It was a great ride. I had to bail at Francis King Park water stop, missing about 250 m along Prospect Lake and the Observatory. My legs were so done by the time I got home after 124 K of up and up and up! Next time!!!

Barton.

[mlawless]

That ride was very very terrible. The vertical was really rather vertical - I could hear Isaac Newton laughing at me - at one point I had a crowd of ants on the ground looking up at me discussing how to carry me off the hill as a snack - I could actually see them looking up at me considering the matter - I was going that slowly. Then on Finlayson Arm Road on the way back I was standing and climbing and the front wheel lifted off the ground - that is steep! You know the road is going to be a bit 'off' when you see a road sign that says "Two-Way Traffic; One Lane Road"

I lost contact (and colour vision) at Francis King (as I do not know where that is) so I continued along to Prospect Lake Road where I watched Barton go ripping by. After a brief pause, I started hearing more banjo music so I took off along Prospect to West Saanich and then along Royal Oak to my house. On Royal Oak I saw my wife and daughter walking back from Booster juice and as I had run out of fluid on the trip down from Goldstream Heights I swiped a sip of my daughter's drink Strawberry smoothie = Happiness.

My total ascent was 2478m in 131.2km. I think that climbing with standard chain rings and a 26 tooth cog was not the best set-up but c'est la vie!