The other Ted is moving to Boston, so looks like the King Ted challenge will have to wait.
Crush the Commonwealth 2010
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I think I'm in this year. No fixed gear this time though. Probably.
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Dan, I think your ride to somerset, or however far you made it deserves mention as one of the craziest fixed-gear tricks ever pulled.
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Somerset, yeah. I still maintain that I would have been as okay as anyone else had I not been drenched and freezing for 12 hours straight. Or if would have had fenders. Or if would have not been wearing a messenger bag. Oh well, live and learn.
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Do a lot of people ride this race without fenders? I would think they would be a must have given the distance and potential for any type of weather conditions that time of year.
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Some do, some don't. I always have, might not this year.
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I made a Facebook page for this last night. I feel a little ashamed.
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Thinking about moving the start date up to May 14th, I've got a serious scheduling conflict.
Yeah or Nay?
Or don't give a hoot?
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May 14th would be better in some senses and worse in others.
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as someone who is in no way committed to this i vote for the 14th
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I'm preferring the 7th, but I can work with the 14th.
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May 7th it is. The ride goes on, with or without me!
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Whoo! No one else planning on heading to Philly on Tuesday night or Wednesday morning, are they (I'm planning on visiting family before the ride)? Will be riding the 2am greyhound if not...
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Hey, yinz. I'm working out my travel arrangements...planning to head out Thursday late AM. Took an idle look at U-haul, and found that a 10' truck would be less than $200 to rent for transit from hither to yon.
That's not cheap, but, well, you could fit a lot of bikes in a 10' truck. Anyone interested in chipping in a few bucks for bike hauling, PM or email dan.blumenfeld at gmail.
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Can anyone help me find a place to crash Thursday night? My sis lives in Harrisburg so I can get dropped off but I can't ask her to get up at midnight to drive me over on a work day.
Thanks,
Adam
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I'm officially out for this year. Bummer.
I may make it to the start, shoot a few pictures and head back west, we'll see. Mostly debating if I can trust my 22 year old motorcycle to make the trip. I won't do it if I have to drive a car by myself.
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(Bumping)
U-haul is reserved. Seats are spoken for, but I'm sure I can fit in a spare bike or 5, if that would ease anyone's travel arrangements. Current plan is to leave the 'Burgh late AM and drop off the U-haul in Manayunk around 6 PM on Thursday. -
hey, i just took amtrak into philly. i slapped together a few cardboard boxes and shoved my completely dismantled bike in. its about 4 ft X 2 ft and i had no problems with transporting it on the train with me! i put it in the overhead carrying thing. not one person raised any issues about it! except when i tried to buy coffee in my socks, the dude wouldn't sell me coffee unless i had shoes on.
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Good to know Nick.
I updated the blog about the bridge closure in McKeesport, but the ped/bike bridge is open.
If anyone riding this wants to call, email or text me, I plan to update the blog while the riders are riding.
ericmckeegan ---at---- gmail
412.980.0662
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I'm surprised there hasn't been more activity in here since this is coming up so quickly. Any idea of how many people will be at the start?
What are first-night goals looking like? I'm going to try to make it to Cowan's Gap Park before dark. If that fails, there's a really rural ballfield/picnic pavilion/church maybe 20 miles west of York that works for stealth camping. For night two I'd like to get to one of those primitive campsites along the GAP before needing sleep. I'd like to make it to Point Park sometime Sunday morning.
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you're stopping to sleep??? :-)
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As usual it will be a surprise to all how many people show. Although there was a lot of early buzz about the ride, things have cooled considerably leading me to expect a small turn-out this year.
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First night, I'd like to hit Bedford before sleeping...Breezewood would be okay too, and Somerset would be nice, but is pretty unlikely.
Weather looks decent for Friday, but cold and rainy for Saturday.
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2 years ago Max and I rode to Rockwood which is something like mile 300 without stopping for more than a hour. It was pretty brutal. It took us 32 hours. Things got worse after that.
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Chris (fxdwhl) reports 13 starters left the Liberty Bell at 5:10.
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This sounds like fun :) Good luck!
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Anyone want to ride out on the GAP tomorrow to cheer on those crazed maniacs on bikes?
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Update from Darren about 30 miles after the start:
I headed down the Schuylkill trail to meet the riders as they come up from Philly...Here's the way they passed me at 6:15/6:30ish....
By the time they hit Norristown on the Schuylkill River Trail the group was already spend across five miles...Three guys at the front (Dan and two others carrying messenger style bags). 4 mins back another group of three. Two of the guys were from the Pottstown area and they were all traveling very light. I didn't even think they were part of the race, because they only had small bags. Another mile or so back was 'Bill' from Pittsburgh area.
I turned around at that point and headed in the right direction. Getting off the Trail onto the S route two guys came from my left, clearly having gotten off the Schuylkill trail at the wrong place, but some how finding the S route. I leaped-frog these guys and Bill out to New Holland. Never saw the front six again. At New Holland I turned around to head back home. Passed Chris and his riding partner headed to Denver for their first beer of the day. Another sole rider went passed, and then finally two more guys just west of Morgantown, still on Rt 23.
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dem boys is crazy
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Michael and Mark Tressler called in from the Point at 3:51 this afternoon.
34:38.
That is a fine piece of work.
Dan checked in last night at 8:03pm in Breezewood, and again at 8:35am from Somerset, one of the worst stretches of this route. He can't be far behind the Tresslers.
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As I suspected Dan pulled in at 6:28.
That's some fast riding too.
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WOW!!!!!!!
You guys are amazing!
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34:38? Holy farking chit.
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Amazing!
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That is the proper reaction Dave.
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Hey, I'm curious about what yinz are doing out there, can somebody post a map/link, I'd like to see the route.
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OK, nevermind I see the info was posted earlier in the thread, amazing, no sleep until Pgh, congratulations to anybody who finished this or even tried.
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Jim Logan, Dan Goldberg, Eric Greenburg arrived at 3:30 am.
Two riders pulled out at Somerset, Adam Newman due to hail at 10:44 last night, and Bill H at 8:30 this morning with no explination.
That is 8 riders in or off the course, leaving 5 still out and riding.
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Second hand account of 2 more riders pulling out at Somerset, 7am Saturday, Ben and Adam.
That leaves 3.
Nick, you still out there?
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That one's gonna leave a mark. :-)
I'll do a overly verbose ride report later.
Day 1 went smoothly (one flat). I made it to Bedford by 9:30, waffled on whether to push through to Somerset or not, then saw a cheap motel and took it as a sign to rest. Spent way too much time there...got a solid 5 hours of sleep, for a total off-bike time in Bedford of 6 1/2 hours.
Day 2 started not with a bang, but a whimper. The leg from Bedford to Somerset was just soul-crushingly awful. Rain ranging from steady to heavy, high winds (headwinds, of course!) knocking down tree limbs, and what was effectively more than 20 miles of steady climbing of varying degrees of suck, before it leveled out and gave me a break. Made it to Sheetz in Somerset after something ridiculous like 3 1/2 hours, hung out there drying out and warming up (did I mention the 40-degree temps?) and forcing myself to eat sundry breakfast items. Rolled down to Rockwood, picked up the trail, and found that I simply couldn't keep up any speed: 12-14 mph was all I could muster, for W A Y too many miles of limestone. Got to McKeesport, crossed to Duquesne and fought my slug-like way up 837 and back to town.
(Hope the Tresslers come out for next year...I wanna see what they can do in the easy direction.)
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just got a text:
"Jason Oddo and Nick Lubeki are going to finish this race or die trying"
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Dan, the miles from Breezewood to Somerset are just flat out miserable.
Did you ride the last steep hill before the miles of rollers start? I've pushed it every year.
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Didn't push once. Thought about it, but, well, I take this sick pride in wobbling up hills at 3 miles per.
Probably the only thing that kept me from throwing in the towel in that stretch was realizing that I was so far in the boonies that I'd have to ride out anyway so someone could pick me up.
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Has there been any other over age 50 finishers over the years? Or do I get old geezer bragging rights?
The winds coming over the mountain from Bedford to Somerset were just incredible Saturday morning. The first time I've had to stop going downhill due to wind. I also had to walk across turnpike overpasses due to the sidewinds.
Unfortunaty, once in my past, I left the Yough trail, and turned the wrong way away from Pittsburgh. The GPS was mildly complicit, but the route look familiar (cause I was there before the last time I made the mistake). So I led Dan and Eric astray 5 miles or so. Then it started to rain harder... On the plus side, my lights were great for trail riding for our group. Plus I knew where the Walmart was in Somerset, so Eric Greenberg could buy some cold weather gear.
As a bonus, at 3:30 AM, my story "Can I use a bathroom, I just bicycled from Philadelphia?" worked at the Hilton.
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Bill H here.
It's a big, fat DNF for me.
I had a pretty strong first day. 178 miles to Cowan's Gap park, which is actually the longest one-day ride I've done so far. Camped out there with no problems.
Things fell apart on day two. I couldn't find the abandoned turnpikes and ended up doing some horrible climbs. Flatted on the way in to Breezewood. Then, in the stretch from Breezewood to Everett, I missed a turn and ended up on some secondary Bike PA route...in the end I ended up wasting most of the afternoon and doing probably 50 needless miles which took me right back to Breezewood.
Then the wind killed me. I had to stop just about ten miles short of Somerset. Completely exhausted from fighting headwinds for most of the evening, I camped out among some pine trees. Overnight the temperature plunged, it rained, and my tent leaked. Fearing hypothermia in the morning I ended up calling for a bail out in Somerset.
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