The Boston 400K Brevet from a Beginner's Perspective, or Learning to Dig Deeper   
                                                                                              by Janika Eckert, June 2002

                                                                                                  
                                                                                         Rob's Tourlite that accompanied my Midlands for the Brevet

This is the pretty gumdrop multicolored Bilenky Tourlite that Rob and I picked up in Philadelphia earlier this spring, which has seen plenty of action so far this year in the Boston Brevet series.  Our "Bike Pick-up Tour", designed to be a training ride of sorts, spanned the time from April 8 - April 26, as we cycled through the extremes of both winter-like weather (including a snowstorm!) to summer-like heat waves.  Great training for the Brevets to follow.

First, a little about how I got interested in randonneuring
I've preferred Randonneur handlebars ever since the late 70's, when my local bike mechanic first recommended them to me, and have owned several pairs on different bikes over the years.  My current wide (45 cm) randonneur bars are actually toss-offs from my husband who preferred a deeper drop.  Anyway, I never knew what a randonneur even was until June 1999 when we were on a camping tour in Maine and ran into another touring cyclist that asked us if we were randonneurs.  Her description of them as funny bicyclists that rode with fenders and lights perked my interest.  I found RUSA's website (www.rusa.org) after returning home and joined immediately, but it wasn't until I'd read several of their publications that I began to understand.  I could say the rest is history, but it's much more complicated than that.  My husband actually got lured first by the idea of sanctioned unsupported long-distance cycling, and it was only early this spring that the bug finally bit me.

I was carless until my 40's, commuted by bike to a night job for years, and never even considered cycling to pace until this year, when I turned 50 and decided to enter the world of randonneuring.  All of the aspects of this sport suit me perfectly, except for the speed.  I'm basically really slow, and never really thought I needed to go any faster.  I suspect I may be one of the oldest women in this year's series.  I know, that's no excuse.

I do love unsupported long-distance touring, and bicycling to places that I have to go to anyway.  Like the seed conference (we own a vegetable seed company) last August in Philadelphia, when Rob and I decided to bicycle there during the biggest heat wave of the summer!  We arrived in Philadelphia to 100 plus degrees of heat and humidity.  We returned to Philadelphia by bicycle in November, and again this past April, both of those trips to visit Bilenky Cycle Works, the bike builder for both Rob's Tourlite and my Midlands Touring bike.  No checkpoints or time limits for either trip!

And now, my story about the 400K Boston Brevet in 2002
When I announced that I was going to record my experiences on this past weekend's 400K Boston Brevet, my husband warned me to not be too linear.  First of all, I'm not as much of a geographic nut as him, nor as into the details of speed and mileage.  All our rides, and especially long touring days (and this year the Boston and Berkshire Brevets), seem to morph into a blurry soup of images and feelings for me once the day is over or the ride is done.  So went last  Saturday's Tour of Massachusetts, as we prefer to call this absolutely gorgeous, up and down ride from Bedford to Ashfield and back.  I wanted to share some of the lingering images and bits of statistics I can recall, before they fade into the past.

Like……..saving the last few ounces of the coke I bought in Clinton for an energy infusion just miles from the finish.  But there's so much more!  So…..here's the story, scattered with images and some lasting impressions.

We live a pretty isolated life out in rural Maine and had heard how great brevet riding was in terms of the social contact with other riders, but we have yet to experience much of it.  Perhaps our slow riding style is one reason.  On the other hand, being an introvert myself, I found the quiet camaraderie to suit me well most of the time.

For the 400K, we started out with 6 plus hours of "rest", but zero sleep.  We live in Maine and drove down on Friday afternoon so that we could sleep near Boston and be at least somewhat fresh for the early start.  We were more than just a little bit excited for the next day's ride, and the quiet rest seemed better than nothing.  We managed to get to Hanscom Field early on Saturday morning, around 12:20 a.m. This was a first for us, as we'd just barely squeezed in in time for the Boston 200K and 300K events.  The DNF we suffered only 2 miles into the 300K is a story for another time, but we rode the Westfield 300 successfully a week ago and managed to get there also in time to buzz around with the other riders pre take-off.  I've decided that being at the start early is key to feeling the full flavor and personality of each brevet.

The 1:00 a.m. start at Hanscom Field on June 8 was cold - thermometers reading in the mid-40s.  I saw a few riders in shorts - brrrrrrrrrr! Most of them ended up pulling on leg warmers, and whatever other layers they had with them…..amidst much shivering and temperature discussion.  It seemed like a big group, and a bit of an eery apparition at this hour of day - brightly clad people clopping around on funny shoes in the dark.  Tracey Ingle gave the starting shpeel, as the riders huddled and prepared to take off.  Before I knew it, we were off, and my partner Rob and I were at the back, again, just like at all the other brevets.  Oh well.  It all happened amazingly quickly.

I guess we all pretty much froze to the first checkpoint, in the sub-40 degree temperatures.  Rob's computer read 33, but it's sometimes 2 degrees low.  There were a few times when the cold would get so painful (fingers and toes, mostly) that I'd think I might have to stop to warm up, and then a sharp climb would send just enough heat into my body to make me tingle.  Rob must have taken a dozen pee breaks during this leg of the ride - I kept riding and he easily caught up each time. 

A robin started singing, too early, somewhere between Groton and Townsend - what time is it, anyway? It was only later we realized that the robin had chirped to warn us not to tarry, as morning was fast approaching.

When we arrived at an open convenience store around 6 a.m. in Gardiner we must have been blue, as the woman at the counter offered us free hot chocolate and suggested we warm up our hands in the nifty little hand-dryer boxes in the toasty restrooms - if you haven't ever seen one of these contraptions, they seem to be made to order for cold hands!

We arrived at the first checkpoint at Bullard's Farm just before what I call the fast group (4 a.m. departure riders) blew in.  We had just parked our bikes and gone in to check out the fuel situation, when in a cloud of gravel dust 4 or 5 riders came barreling in off the road.  One of my personal goals had been to make the first checkpoint before they did. By a whisker!  It was amazing how little time they spent there.  They unclipped their lights, stripped their arm and leg warmers, gloves, helmet liners, and other soon-to-be-extra weight, signed in, snacked, filled water bottles and Camelbacks, and remounted within 10 -15 minutes MAX.  What a contrast to my normal leisurely touring rest stop style.  Plus……what's this about a drop bag? I thought this was supposed to be unsupported long-distance cycling!

The two of us headed out from Bullard's Farm alone together, as Tracey Ingle chortled "See ya in a hundred miles."  I felt semi-wasted already thanks to the frigid first 72 miles,  and 100 miles sounded like a lot right then!

About 20 minutes into what I call Stage 2, we stripped down to shorts and wool jerseys, which worked well for those long 100 miles.  We were passed by the last of the 4 am group about ten minutes later, the last time we would be passed by other riders going in the same direction.  But the weather seemed absolutely perfect, the climb to Warwick was warming, and the long, sweeping downhill from Warwick to Northfield was to die for.

For me, the ride up to Ashfield was one of the hardest parts of the day.  Rob didn't seem to mind it, as the grade was gradual. But a combination of things made the 7 mile long uphill grind seem endless, and the occasional rider heading down the hill on the other side of the road (1 hour ahead of us? 2? 3?) was demoralizing.  I found some relief at the checkpoint in Ashfield, but was aware that I was a bit dizzy and unable to think clearly.  I ate and drank a lot, feeling much better when we left.  The Coca Colas we purchased at the Ashfield store provided excellent rocket fuel for the next stage.  I noticed that each time we left a checkpoint, however, we were closer to the cutoff time.  We left Ashfield at 2, when the checkpoint volunteers had already started the 2:30 shutdown.  Only one other rider was there, Al, a fellow who had crashed early in the tour and whose partner had just purchased him another bike on which to continue.  Dave Jordan was making some adjustments to help Al with sizing, as the bike was a tad small for him. 

After Ashfield, it was all downhill for awhile. Amherst found me in another energy gap, or was it a gulley?  Rob's solution was to find us a lawn on which to sit peacefully with our backs to the traffic, and finish our cokes. Empty our pockets of pretzels and cookies.  We were only then ready to start the long double-whammy climb to Pelham. The rest of the ride to the 3rd control was pretty uneventful.  I found another set of legs, feeling a bit like a cat with nine lives.  I still had doubts about what I would be like at the third checkpoint, but decided to put off thinking about that.

We rode into the last checkpoint at 6:45 p.m., still in our shorts and short-sleeved jerseys.  We were busy there, filling our water bottles with Accelerade, Endurox, and Cytomax powder, washing and stuffing our faces with B & M baked beans (made in our home state!), and putting on more layers, including a helmet liner, long-fingered gloves, and another wool jersey for me.  One of my lasting impressions of this Brevet is of the mess we made for ourselves at each checkpoint in the process of mixing up our drinks. Next time, I think I'll find an empty honey bear or mustard squirt bottle to fill with powder and just blast into the water bottles. My handlebars and bar-ends were annoyingly tacky by the time I left for the final stage. The long-fingered gloves helped!

The only other rider we saw at this point was Al, the guy who'd crashed early on.  He left only minutes before us, actually looking relaxed, or was it tired and sore?  I was feeling very late, since we left the last checkpoint at Bullard's Farm just as it was closing.  We'd had an hour to spare at the first checkpoint, ½ hour at the second, and now were down to the wire.  The only consolation was that it seemed that the organizers had allowed for a slower riding time during the last stage, as we had almost nine hours to ride 69.8 miles.  Whew!  It took us an inordinate amount of time to claw our way through the first 16 miles of this leg, and I realized I had basically run out of steam, again!

The roads and towns seemed vacant, particularly as it got darker.  Route 62 through the netherlands of Hubbardstown just had to be the darkest place on earth, plus her choppy roads were an unwelcome challenge to negotiate at night. 

Rob, worried about my snail's pace, finally made us take a break under a street light in the tiny hilltop berg of Princeton, parking us and our bikes on a teensy traffic island.  We force fed ourselves some Clif Shots and I choked down some more  pretzels (the food discovery of the 300K).  It felt like we were in the twilight zone, with the quiet and eery electric light glow, roads dropping off in every direction, and a glowing white church steeple just in front of us. A bell tolled eleven times. Desolation.  5 cars drove by. 2 of the 5 stopped to see if we needed anything, almost as if to say  "If you're stuck HERE at this time of night, you might really need help!"  Giddily we released a totally sticky white plastic bag into the breeze  (a no-no, but…..) and watched it turn into some kind of friendly night animal, a specter gliding along the streets and following us down the hill and out of town.

I'll have to say that night time memories were much more vivid than daytime, without even including my hallucinations:  When I started to slow down on the descents (but some of them were so steep and broken up!), I knew I was in a bit of bother.  The visions in my head were unsettling……..like approaching a bend in the road with Rob behind me and seeing a tapestry of trees and haze in front of me and not being able to pick out the road - luckily this hallucination faded before I had to make the turn.  Some of the other hallucinations were pretty curious -  seeing a flourescent shrine imbedded in bushes to the side of the road (a fire hydrant); next, a glowing message someone had left me tacked to the side of the road, and somehow knowing I shouldn't stop to read it; and, finally, seeing the paper mache-like wall that Rob almost rode his bike through, as I called out to him to "Be careful!"  I was beginning to feel like I was in another world from the one I'd inhabited earlier in the day.  Shouldn't all long brevets be held under a full moon?

The hills kept rolling.  Except, of course, for that amazing flat spot between Princeton and Clinton where there's usually a tailwind (according to Bruce Ingle.)  That was good, oh so good, and much faster.

In Clinton we fueled up with hot chocolates and a shared coke, a few ounces of which we saved for me, for when I next bonked.  A guy smoking and leaning up against the building told us that Al had gone through only minutes earlier, looking pretty wasted.  We pushed on, time at our heels. 

The rest went by quickly, except for the last long oh so long hill up Bedford Road.  It was really long, and I was bushwacked.  But from Clinton on, assisted twice by the remaining few gulps of Coke in my water bottle, I rode steady and fairly strong.  We arrived at Hanscom Field at 3:08 am, 52 minutes before the cutoff time of 4 am. We made it!  Al had arrived just before us -  I was amazed when he told me he hadn't had good lights for his dark solo hilly journey back.  I had used many - four on the back, and three on the front…being the light fanatic I am.

Other memories came back to me on Sunday after consuming a huge omelet breakfast, followed by a trip to Dunkin Donuts: There was the lingering good feeling of a frigid morning ride ending in hot chocolate.  And…..the entire ride was a pretty incredible, pastoral journey through beautiful areas of  Massachusetts.  Plus the wildlife - my favorite was the time I looked over at dusk into the brush, and saw a deer take a break from drinking at a pond to look straight at me and become a statue.  How much more vivid all the images and memories seemed to be at night, even the self-induced ones.  Thinking about riding through the countryside at a good clip, in the dark, and feeling the desolation -  as if all the people and cars just somehow disappeared.

We are both very impressed with the Brevet organizers and network - here's this small organization with uniform guidelines, staffed mostly with volunteers,  which puts on well-planned and amazing events that are not only cue-sheeted but staffed at all the checkpoints. Thank you to all who helped us enjoy and finish this fun brevet.