Horribly Hilly Hundreds

Blue Mounds, WI
Horribly Hilly Hundreds Saturday June 18, 2011
by: Angela Catalano

This event was a horrible disaster for me, most of which being my own fault. Coming in to the ride, I’d been recovering from a calf injury in my right leg, but felt like I’d still be able to get in a decent ride. My training wasn’t great due to school, and I had defended my M.A. thesis the day before the event. Essentially, I was injured, undertrained, and mentally exhausted, but I was really looking forward to hammering up those hills.

My boyfriend and I were fine tuning my road bike on Friday night, and right at 7 PM when we were just finishing up, my front derailleur cable exploded. No shops were open, so option #2 was to throw the road wheels on my cross bike and hope that I could make it without a compact crank. This should have been yet another indication that my ride was doomed, but I remained ignorantly hopeful. We spent Friday night in Madison, and arrived at the ride early Saturday morning to quickly grab my packet and take off.

This ride is no joke: it’s horrible, and it’s hilly. You hit the first wall of a hill a few miles in, and there’s little reprieve after that. That first hill made my right calf seize, so I knew I was in for a long day. The rolling hills were excellent for recovering, but just as I’d build up some momentum - BAM! Massive, demoralizing hill. The pressure and cramping in my right calf was intense, and I had to stop and ice it at the first feed station. Everything fell apart after that - I clearly didn’t have enough gears to make it up those hills (which one compassionate rider pointed out while laughing), and my right calf wasn’t having it. Each significant climb meant I rode half of it and walked the other half, and by mile 50, I threw in the towel and hopped in the sag car.

I’m really disappointed that I couldn’t keep it together, and I’m definitely going to try to get into the ride next year to repair my wounded ego. The organization, course marking, and feed stations were incredible, and I’d recommend any Midwestern rider to take this on next year.