Chronicle reporter Alex Brown bikes along the Willapa Hills Trail on an assignment in April. Brown is attempting to ride the Seattle-to-Portland Bicycle Classic this weekend despite almost no preparation.
I still don’t have a helmet.
A few days before the Seattle-to-Portland Bicycle Classic, Lycra-clad riders from around the world are descending on the Northwest with their Schwinns, saddlebags and cycling shoes in tow. Saturday morning, I’ll be among them, wearing gym shorts and tennis shoes, pointing the front tire of a borrowed bike south, totally unprepared.
I signed up for STP in March, thinking it would make a fun first-person feature story for The Chronicle. It wasn’t until July, after all. I had plenty of time to prepare. For months, the ride has been somewhere in the back of my mind, my rusty old bike languishing lonely on the porch.
With the event nearly upon me, I scrambled into action this week, arranging to borrow a friend’s bicycle, buying a train ticket to Seattle and lining up a shuttle from Portland with Chronicle photographer Jared Wenzelburger. As far as preparing for the ride itself? I may be beyond hope.
“I’m a little worried for you,” said Cascade Bicycle Club executive director Richard Smith, upon hearing my plight. “Accept that your lack of preparation may impact your ability to complete the ride. … I’d love to see you succeed and finish, but I would say your approach is not the ideal approach.”
Cascade puts on STP, and Smith has been among the 10,000 riders who make the 200-mile journey each year. He did it in one day; I’m attempting to do it in two. Sleeping in my own bed at the halfway point in Centralia gives me at least one advantage over my better-prepared counterparts, he said.
“You’re a step above everyone else,” he conceded, although my mattress won’t make me any more fit than the riders camping out a few blocks away at Centralia College.
Cascade recommends a five-month training schedule, with charts showing a steady build-up of miles starting in February. I’ve been on a bike twice all year, totaling maybe 20 miles. I have been doing plenty of trail running and hiking, which Smith said should at least give me a cardio head-start. But certain muscle groups and sore spots can only really be conditioned through long-distance biking.
“Your butt’s probably going to be a bit more sore than those of us who spend a lot more time in the saddle,” he said.
During the five years I lived in Washington, D.C., I commuted by bicycle most days, spinning around the city on a heavy 10-speed my dad bought at a garage sale decades ago. I once took that bike 40 or so miles on a trail to Mount Vernon and was none the worse for wear. But I haven’t biked regularly in more than a year, and I’ll be heading into STP more dependent on my stubborn streak than any cycling acumen.
With temperatures forecasted to exceed 90 degrees, Smith warned me not to become a cautionary tale.
“If you hit your limit, don’t push yourself any further,” he said. “I caution you as both the host of the ride as well as just another rider.”
He recommended drinking at least one water bottle every hour and loading up on food, sugar and carbs. With lots of aid stations along the way, Cascade ensures riders have the support they need. Smith also noted that it can help to befriend other riders who move at a similar pace, both for encouragement and pacelining — cyclists’ term for drafting. Riding in a line can be 30 percent more efficient.
After graciously showering me with advice, Smith said I may not be a hopeless case after all.
“I think you’ve got it in you, just take it easy,” he said. “If you complete it, you’ll look back on it as a real accomplishment. … The biggest advice would be don’t do it [unprepared] again.”
Chronicle editor Natalie Johnson also offered some advice: “Don’t die, please.”
I’ll take their words to heart. First, though, I need to go buy that helmet.
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Alex Brown is a reporter at The Chronicle. He has hiked the Pacific Crest Trail and regularly goes on adventures in his new home of Western Washington.
