The Five Glorious Bastards

[PotomacCyclist]

My list is more triathlon-focused, and shorter, mostly because I’m not familiar with a lot of the routes and longer events.

The hardest race I’ve ever done here (on the bike) was the Half Full Triathlon near Ellicott City, MD. I guess it’s not super, super hard, but 56 miles of what felt like non-stop up and down, up and down, on short but steep climbs took a lot out of me. (I also messed up the nutrition. It was a cold day, so I barely drank any sports drink. I relied on that for calories too, so I took in almost no calories over 56 miles of hard riding. Huge mistake. I bonked badly almost at the beginning of the run. Now I use carb chews for calories and water for hydration, instead of combining the two.)

The hardest triathlon race I’ve read about is Savageman out in western Maryland. Triathlete Magazine once listed it as the toughest triathlon in the world. While those “toughest/best/worst/hardest” lists are always subjective, everyone seems to agree that Savageman is a super-hard race, especially on the bike. The Westernport Wall gets a lot of attention becuase it’s so steep, but others say that the longer climbs later on are much tougher. Westernport Wall looks tough enough to me. I’m not sure I’ll ever try that race. Maybe, maybe not. But not in 2014.

Here’s one of the many Westernport Wall videos online:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZtZ-tMjbqDo

And.. that’s it. I know there are many hard organized and unorganized races and rides around the Mid Atlantic, but I’m not personally familiar with them.

[vvill]

I’ve found Jeremiah Bishop’s Alpine Loop Gran Fondo tougher than the Frederick Fondo, although I haven’t done the full imperial century version of the Frederick ride. Both have about the same climbing but the Frederick ride doesn’t have any significant offroad section. I’ve gone back for both rides though even though yeah after the first ALGF I thought to myself, no way I’m doing that again.

SkyMass really isn’t bad if you pace yourself before Massanutten. Kill Bill is mostly an exercise in endurance but with a good group + breaks is more doable than it seems.

I would consider trying Mountains of Misery / Diabolical Double if I ever get my fitness back. Total 200 though… no.

[Jason B]

SkyMass is doable, and probably one of my favorite rides, but it is damn hard. It is easy to forget how hard it is because it is such a nice ride. But climbing up Mass waiting for that damn cabin on the right is a death march.
The westernport wall is part of the DD. It was at mile 6 billion or something. It is so potholed at the start that my track stand skills were not up for it. A definite Bastard! Having to do it during a tri would cause me to bite down on my cyanide tooth capsule.

[JimF22003]

@Jason B 72864 wrote:

SkyMass is doable, and probably one of my favorite rides, but it is damn hard. It is easy to forget how hard it is because it is such a nice ride. But climbing up Mass waiting for that damn cabin on the right is a death march.

This one?

[Jason B]

@JimF22003 72910 wrote:

This one?
[/URL]

Funny, I just became dehydrated and out of breath.
Now, you have posted some beastly rides on the site. Add some of your worst to the list. I thought I read before you did Misery. How bad is it?

[dcv]

I’m waiting for Dirt to organize a fixed gear version of kill bill (would that be kill will?)

[JimF22003]

@Jason B 72912 wrote:

Funny, I just became dehydrated and out of breath.
Now, you have posted some beastly rides on the site. Add some of your worst to the list. I thought I read before you did Misery. How bad is it?

It’s pretty bad Actually it’s a pretty normal hilly century mostly, except for three sections. At about mile 60 you have a medium-length but very steep climb out of Maggie Valley. At about 85 or so you have a little side-loop that takes a bunch of very steep non-stop rollers for 5 miles or so. Then to finish off, after mile 100 or so you have the final climb up to Mountain Lake. Supposedly this average 11.9% or so for the last four miles, but there are some much steeper sections in there.

I’ve done it four times. The third time I had to walk the last half mile to the top.

You have to commit to it early, because it sells out and you need to sign up right away when they open registration. I am probably not going to do it this year.

But I say that every year

The only other really hard organized ride I’ve done is Mountain Mamas out of Monterey, West of Staunton. Maybe harder than MoM because it has more, longer climbs. That last descent into Monterey makes it worth it.

Edited: Oops I forgot Storming of Thunder Ridge out of Lynchburg. This comes before MoM and makes a nice “warmup” ride. It includes the section on the Blue Ridge Parkway that goes from the lowest point to the highest point in Virginia, over about 15 miles, from 700 ft. to just above 4000 ft. Not steep, but relentless. Very good organization too.

[Geoff]

I’ve never done any of the rides Jason listed, but I did try the final hill on Mountains of Misery last summer. This was a couple months before doing a couple centuries. I generally do well on hills and I was using a triple chainring. The first two miles of that final hill were fine, but I had to stop four times on the last two miles. I’d like to try it again, but if I do, I’ll do some serious focussed training first.

Only wish I could have tried it in my younger days.

[Bilsko]

This ride -with Pete, Sean, and Keglsey- had long tough climbs but was well worth it. Gravel only, 23s need not apply.

http://www.strava.com/activities/52564025

Maybe this year I’ll be around and available for Kill Bill. If Vin and Will will ride it SS/FG, I’m in.

I have a slot in the 2014 Frederick Gran Fondo (courtesy of my broken hip and the generosity of the ride organizers in letting me defer a year)

Not that it will be terribly difficult, but I will be aiming to do my straight through GAP + C&O this spring. Not the first, as Bicycle Times featured a couple from PIT who did it in the fall on their tandem in just over 24hrs.

[hozn]

As I mentioned on some earlier thread, I’m thinking of doing the Diabolical Double next year, as the “epic ride” for the year. This year was Total200. I think it was Jason B that said that DD wasn’t all that awesome. I’m curious if MOM or one of these others is more scenic while still being something that is completely doable in a day (with drive to/from) and still all-day tough / epic. I have very few day passes so I’d like to make it count!

That gravel ride that Bilsko posted looks like it’d be pretty epic.

As vvill said, Kill Bill is more about endurance / being out all day in the saddle; it’s more of a social ride than a tough ride. It’s a great way to learn fun new places to ride in Arlington area. I understand there is also a more “focused” (faster, fewer stops) version of Kill Bill, that probably would be much more grueling.

A couple buddies did SavageMan this year. It sounded tough, but they said the Westernport Wall wasn’t as bad as other climbs. I guess they both got their names on bricks — or whatever the award is for making it up. Apparently it wasn’t bad enough to scare them away from planning to do Diabolical Double next year.

As an aside, the most epic ride (‘race’ technically, but my goal is just to enjoy the route and make the cutoff times) I have done has to be the Revenge of the Rattlesnake mountain bike race out in Davis, WV. The course is always short (like 35-45 miles depending on the year) but still always takes 6 hours and is just stunningly beautiful. Usually it rains with temps in the 50s. The field splits apart quickly and there’s no one else out there. The trails are just lots of rocks, loamy soil, and moss everywhere. The first race they ran us up the ski slope to start and then we were on Dolly Sods (before it became a wilderness area, closed to bikes) which was misty with little streams of water flowing everywhere. There were sections where you’d just be riding through 3-4 inches of water for hundreds of yards. Then there’s the fields of red ferns and the Moon Rocks. And it ended with us fording Blackwater River, waist-deep carrying the bikes. Surreal. I’ve gone back for that race 4 times now. Skipped this year, but may do that again next year — though the idea of doing that on a rigid single-speed (my only mountain bike now) makes me a little nervous.

[DaveK]

Nothing much to add but I’d say SkyMass doesn’t really belong in that list. It’s a good hard day but not on the scale of DD or even Kill Bill.

[Jason B]

You guys are hardcore dropping SkyMass from the list. It’s meets my barometer of difficulty of 1K in 10, in this case 80m with ~8k. There are a couple cat 2’s and few 3/4’s, it’s a bastard, and lets face it, it is probably one of our most famous/epic rides for visitors. I am getting too old. I might substitute Front royal to Big Meadows and back, but that is an out and back, not really a ride, just penance.

That WV mountain bike race sounds amazingly cool. I would love to try it, but is sounds too serious for a century rider like myself.

[Justin Antos]

Where’s the button to Elite an entire thread?

[jabberwocky]

@DaveK 72947 wrote:

Nothing much to add but I’d say SkyMass doesn’t really belong in that list. It’s a good hard day but not on the scale of DD or even Kill Bill.

Yeah, I did SkyMass a few years ago when I wasn’t even much of a roadie and certainly not in the best of shape, on my cyclocross bike. I trailed off the back of the group the whole day, but finished ok. Its a difficult ride for sure, but aside from Massenutten the climbing is mostly of the “grinding 7% grades for hours” variety. Mass sucks bad, but its relatively short.

@Jason B 73007 wrote:

You guys are hardcore dropping SkyMass from the list. It’s meets my barometer of difficulty of 1K in 10, in this case 80m with ~8k. There are a couple cat 2’s and few 3/4’s, it’s a bastard, and lets face it, it is probably one of our most famous/epic rides for visitors. I am getting too old.

I don’t think people are saying its not difficult (because it is), its just not quite the same caliber as some of the other rides on the list. Like I said, theres a lot of climbing, but most of it is relatively tame grindy stuff. Its not the really steep stuff that destroys your legs (aside from the massenutten climb, which absolutely is the steep stuff that destroys your legs, but its only one climb).

[Jason B]

Yea, I guess you guys are right, SkyMass doesn’t belong,,,,,but what a ride! It is hard for me to make a non organized bastard ride list. I don’t ride with GPS much so many of my rides are out and backs, which really don’t make the cut.

To revise The Five Glorious Bastards organized list a tad

1. Mountains of Misery May 25th
2. Diabolical Double June 21st
3. Mountains Mama Aug 2nd
4. Fredrick Fondo August 24th
5. Jeremiah Bishop September 28th
**** Storming Thunder Ridge may 18th ( just a little too packed in May to fit the list)

Zoinks, didn’t realize Mountains of Misery was a double metric!!
My goal for any of these fondos is simply not die and finish. Hopefully I’ll hit a few this year

[Author]

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