Saturday 8/4/07 Greensboro to Raleigh

[Pugslyyy]

Come join me for a leisurely (15mph pace) ride from Greensboro to Raleigh on Saturday, August 4th.

This is a nice rolling route through the rural Piedmont region. From Snow Camp to Green Level it covers the same territory as the NCBC 200 brevet, but with a differing route to provide some variation and uses some quieter and perhaps slightly shorter and maybe hillier roads. Since these roads see less traffic, they get less maintenance and may have a few minor surface blemishes.

The start (Greensboro Train Depot) is about 500' higher than the finish (Raleigh Train Depot), so overall the route is downhill. That said there ARE some climbs throughout, especially in the last 25 miles (east of Jordan Lake). Biggest descent: Jack Bennett Rd approaching Lake Jordan. Biggest climb: Highhouse Rd by Bond Park in Cary.

We will meet at the Raleigh Amtrak station, and take the 7:05am number 73 from Raleigh to Greensboro. The train has a bike rack, so you don't have to box your bike or anything - but you must reserve a bike rack space when you make your reservation. Ticket cost (you and your bike) is $14.90 with a AAA discount.

To buy the ticket, you have to call 1-800-USA-RAIL and talk to a real person (you cannot reserve a bike rack online or by using the automated system).

Related links -

http://www.bytrain.org/passenger/routes/piedmont.html

http://cycling.ahands.org/greensboro-raleigh.html

http://www.bikely.com/maps/bike-path/Greensboto-Amtrak-to-Raleigh-Amtrak

http://forum.ncbikeclub.info/index.php?topic=444.0


For those of you with Garmins, I will be posting the route file.

[KarenG]

you sure it'll be leisurely?? i think i could prolly handle that as long as no one trys to "hammer" back to raleigh. i sure would like to do it.

[skiffrun]

you sure it'll be leisurely?? i think i could prolly handle that as long as no one trys to "hammer" back to raleigh. i sure would like to do it.
do you not know who Adrian is? Guaranteed to be a leisurely pace available.

No insult intended, Adrian.

[skiffrun]

Come join me for a leisurely (15mph pace) ride from Greensboro to Raleigh on Saturday, August 4th.



We will meet at the Raleigh Amtrak station, and take the 7:05am number 73 from Raleigh to Greensboro. The train has a bike rack, so you don't have to box your bike or anything - but you must reserve a bike rack space when you make your reservation. Ticket cost (you and your bike) is $14.90 with a AAA discount.

To buy the ticket, you have to call 1-800-USA-RAIL and talk to a real person (you cannot reserve a bike rack online or by using the automated system).

Related links -

http://www.bytrain.org/passenger/routes/piedmont.html

http://cycling.ahands.org/greensboro-raleigh.html
...
Interested parties should be sure to note that there are 6 (six) bike rack positions available on the train.

[Pugslyyy]

Correct! first 6 reservations get the racks. If we have more than six riders you can still take your bike on the train but it will have to go in the regular checked baggage car.

[KarenG]

do you not know who Adrian is? Guaranteed to be a leisurely pace available.

No insult intended, Adrian.

no, haven't met him, but Pugslyy is "hosting" the ride, so i'm just trying to make sure the pace isn't more than i can handle at this point in the knee recovery.

yea, i saw it was only room for 6 bikes, so i may need to go ahead and reserve my seat/bike.

[KarenG]

hmmm...80+miles....that might be a bit much for me.

[skiffrun]

no, haven't met him, but Pugslyy is "hosting" the ride, so i'm just trying to make sure the pace isn't more than i can handle at this point in the knee recovery.

yea, i saw it was only room for 6 bikes, so i may need to go ahead and reserve my seat/bike.I just assumed this was Adrian's annual trek.

But as Pugslyy is hosting, let me congratulate him on expanding the universe of these type "adventure" rides. Unfortunately, bad timing for me.
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Who is Adrian? Just look around on NCBC, TarWheels, MSingLinks (he's the "info@...), or his own pagina. Read his journals of doing PBP 2003 or ride around Bulgaria. Note his picture. I guarantee you've seen him.

As the captain of the touring tandem (out of Chapel Hill) I seredipitously met Memorial Day said: "everybody knows Adrian".

[Pugslyyy]

hmmm...80+miles....that might be a bit much for me.

yeah, my sheet says 82.5 miles. it is certainly a good distance, but not too bad hill wise.

[sportingfool]

Jon,
I've been wanting to step outside of my comfort zone and do something like this, but I'm not sure if I can keep-up a 15 pace for 82 miles. I usually top-out somewhere around 15 and have never gone past 50 miles. I'm hoping that with enough food and beverage I can keep-up the pace. Are any others doing this ride with you?

[Pugslyyy]

Hey Andrea. There will be several others doing the route. A number of folks expressed interest on Wednesday, and Erica and Jay have said they want to go.

I decided to go ahead and make my reservation to get the ball rolling.

[BetsyW]

Never mind - we've decided to go try out tandems at All Star Bike instead. Anyone else who is interested see this link for Tandem Demo Days http://allstarbikeshop.com/index.cfm.

[Pugslyyy]

So who all is coming?

[JayC]

Unfortunately my anatomy is not going to let me do this. Im not sure Im even going to do the Cyclepath ride at this point.

[TracyW]

Unfortunately my anatomy is not going to let me do this. Im not sure Im even going to do the Cyclepath ride at this point.Is this something we should be concerned about or is more of something the cat should worry about? :D

[aliepins]

Unfortunately my anatomy is not going to let me do this.

!!!!

[sportingfool]

I'm going to skip Greensboro and just do the Harris ride on Sunday.

[JayC]

Is this something we should be concerned about or is more of something the cat should worry about? :D

Neither.. Ive just been riding too much and things have gotten tender. I logged right at 700 miles last month and rode in a pair of questionable bibs on Sunday that put me behind the 8 ball for the rest of the week. Im trying to recover now :)

[soarallover]

jon, I am going to attach a pannier rack for this ride for extra water sun block etc. I will be filling only one side. Let me know if you or others want to use the second side. Otherwise I will bring just one.

[Pugslyyy]

Thanks Tim, I should be okay - planning on several stops to buy water, etc. Right now looking like it will be just the two of us.

[Pugslyyy]

Well we're back. Tim and I had a great ride, though it was hot as hades. Made us slower and with longer stops - we just had to stop and recover from all that heat radiating up from the blacktop. Even with drinking over 8 liters of fluid on the way, I still lost over 5 pounds today

Because we had to take the train to Greensboro, we didn't really get started on our bikes until after 9am. So we were riding in the heat of the day. The wind was from the south, so we didn't really get a break there either.

Our one divergence from the published route was at mile 44. We continued straight on Chicken Bridge Rd so we could stop at the Frosty Trading Post and reprovision - this is the only available stop in a 40+ mile stretch of the route, so I recommend that everyone make this modification. Straight on Chicken Bridge, Right on Crawford Dairy, stop at Frosty's then right (south) on Jones Ferry to rejoin the published route in a few miles.

There are no "killer" hills on the route, but many rollers / smaller hills (in the 50-100 foot climb range). I show around 4500 feet of climbing and around 5000 of descent on the route - not bad for that distance. The longest climb is on Highouse Road in Cary. One thing I like about this route is that the last 8 miles are a fairly slow/steady descent. So once you make it to the center of Cary the rest of the ride can be a cool down.

It is a good route, I will definitely do it again - maybe on a cooler day.

GPS file for Greensboro Depot to Raleigh Depot (http://trail.motionbased.com/trail/invitation/email/accept.mb?senderPk.pkValue=137994&unitSystemPkValue=2&episodePk.pkValue=3550671)

Ride Time: 5:03
Mileage: 83.9
Avg: 16.6

[Erica]

awesome jon, thanks for the write up. i seriously cant wait to do this ride, but im glad i didnt do it yesterday! 56 miles thru clayton was bad enough in this heat. i wish october would hurry up and get here. should be soooo much nicer to ride in a couple months.

[AHands]

Hey! I'm glad y'all had a good time! I was trying to work out a way to join y'all, but we're in the middle of moving house. I would've probably slowed you down anyway. I'd be up for a slightly slower paced run in the fall/winter, when an after 9am start would be a welcome escape from the morning chill.

[Pugslyyy]

Yeah, it will be a more enjoyable ride in cooler weather.