High Pass Challenge

So after a tough half iron race last weekend I was signed up for a nice casual ride with some buddies a week later. Yeah right.

The High Pass Challenge is billed as a challenging and beautiful ride up to Windy ridge through the blast zone adjacent to Mount St. Helens. The description should just be "A cold, windy, hellish survival fest".

I arrived at the Packwood starting line at 6:45am for the 7am start, got my bike prepped and found my buddies. Now this is late September which is normally a beautiful time of year in western Washington. Not this year. It was overcast and cold with the tempeature in the low 40's at the start. Our goal was to get the gold medallion which required that you finish the 114 mile ride by 3pm.

Our group of 7 headed out from the start in a casual paceline for the first 22 miles or so at around a 20mph average. The first climb wasn't long but it was telling as our group imploded within the first minute of the first climb. We regrouped at the first rest area at around 27 miles and fueled up and headed out.

The ride continues to climb from here for several miles and it was evident that this was not going to be a fun group ride with buddies as our group was already spreadout all over the climb and it was quickly becoming every man for himself.

I climbed well not pushing the pace much slowing moving up through the riders ahead of me. The ride rolls steadily over the next 19 miles or so to the next rest stop with a lot more uphill sections that averaged about 5% grade. I waited a few minutes for others in the group and realized I may be there a while so I continued on alone. It still hadn't warmed up.

This is where the fun really starts. The ride is pretty much a steady climb from here to Windy ridge. Now I know why they call it Windy ridge, as you climb out of the trees into the blast zone the wind was howling and swirling and it was cold. This section seems to go on forever. I finally made it to the top of Windy ridge to the rest stop but there was no stopping as there was no shelter, the wind was blowing around 30mph and the temp was in the mid 30's so I refilled my bottle grab some food to go and headed back down.

On the way back down I saw several of my buddies that I had started with still climbing and was glad I hadn't waited for them as they were anywhere between 15 and 30 minutes behind me. The decent back down was a screaming fast descent. Just after the mini stop I caught a group of 7 riders and we got into a tight group decending back to the last major rest stop. This was touch and go at times with 8 riders bombing down hill on tight roads going at an average speed in the mid 40's topping out at 52 mph. It made it interesting as there were spots in the road that were torn up and gravel and dirt. We'd come around a corner at 40 mph and everyone would hit their brakes to slow and negotiate the unpaved road surface. I'm surprised no one went down.

I though things were going to no problem at the last major food stop so I headed back to the finish line over the last 34 miles on the "nice country roads". This was the roughest part of the ride. It was hilly and the roughest chip seal road surface I've ever ridden. I rode with one of the others from my group of 7 that I had started with who I had caught at this last stop. We rode together until I finally bonked with about 8 miles to go. I struggled to the finish about 5 minutes behind him at just after 2pm to take home the gold.

It was a long tough day. I'll be better prepared for the weather next year.