I rode my bicycle 200km

if it wasn’t tracked it didn’t happen

I did my first double metric century last weekend. To set this up: I never thought I’d be a long distance cyclist. But as my fitness has improved over the last few years the rides have kept getting longer and longer. Last year I did some big rides, and after the last freedom unit century in October (starting and ending at our house) I decided that I didn’t really want to ride in 100 mile circles anymore. But I did want to ride long distances to get somewhere. So when my parents planned a camping trip up in the thumb I thought it would be the perfect opportunity to ride out there.

I started at 5 AM, partially to beat the traffic and partially because I wanted to get to camp at a reasonable time. It’s so gorgeous to see the sun rise over Lake Saint Claire before you duck into the Macomb County madness. I actually used Ride With GPS to help make the route just because I was curious what it would come up with, and I was really impressed by how it got me through the stroadie sprawl. The only kinda sketchy spot was Harper to North to 22 Mile, but there was barely any traffic so it was fine. That being said I’m not above jamming on the sidewalk for a little bit if necessary. Also lmao at Urban St in the photo above— I just noticed that.

I ended up making really good time out to Richmond, which ended up being my first water refill spot. I was feeling amazing after the first 40 miles but I knew I was going to have to bring the pace down a bit. Part of the reason I was pedaling so fast was to get off the stroads! From Richmond it was a whole lot of straight dirt roads. Mostly smooth, giving way to smooth with bigger loose chunks on top.

my wife was driving up the next day with some more creature comforts, so I tried to travel as light as possible for that night

I had a legitimately sketchy moment when 2 big dogs took off after me at top speed around mile 70. I almost always have a dog chase me on country bike rides, but they’re usually friendly and I can get them to go home. But these 2 seemed mad as hell, and they were so fast! At one point I was pedaling like 23 mph and they were still on me. I got lucky that one of the only legit descents was just ahead and I was able to get moving at like 34 mph to outrun them. Lesson learned: bring the pepper spray. Yikes.

endless Midwest Gravel™️

I was dogging and in a bit of pain by the time I got to Croswell. I knew I needed a nice hot meal and some coffee, so I went to the Wagon Wheel and got a Pepsi, couple coffees, water, and an omelette with sausage gravy on it. All of that brought me back to life.

From there I had about 40 miles to go. And I couldn’t believe it but I felt basically fresh. I got moving through the only moderately rolling hill sections of the route— they call it the Hadley Hills, which is pretty cute. The rolling terrain added some much needed variety to the ride, I enjoyed the climbing and descending rather than the steady state riding that led up to that point..

on any other day you bet your life I’d be exploring that road

I noticed that the gravel was getting a lot softer, so much so that my 38mm tires were sinking in about an inch. So I decided to cut over to the pavement sooner than I had intended. This proved to be perfect timing because pretty quickly I came up on Boondocks, a sweet little country bar, which was also basically the only spot to grab some road sodas since the thumb is so sparse. The bartender and owner were cool as hell, and the dudes bellied up at the bar were cool too. The owner actually rode up there from Ferndale before, so we were trading war stories. Shout out to the owner of Huco brewing who was chilling there and said he’d buy me a pint if I went by the brewery. Also shout out to Boondocks for the $1.75 Bud Lights.

From there it was basically a false flat downhill to the campground. I was in my aero position cruising and feeling so good. I got to camp feeling so stoked and actually not out of my mind, probably due to the fact that I went through basically the entire 1# bag of Skratch. After a quick camp setup I bathed in the healing waters of Lake Huron, and it was bliss. There’s nothing better than jumping in a cool body of water after a long ride.

I only saw 2 other cyclists out there the whole day— early in the ride on Lakeshore in Grosse Pointe as the sun was coming up and later on a stretch of dirt road like 85 miles in. I’m also happy to report that no one honked at me or made a sketchy pass, and I had no mechanicals, even with tubes.

So I’m not exactly jonesing to do another double metric century, but I’m so stoked to know that I have it in me. I had 20-24 pounds of luggage and was still able to hold 13.4 mph— hard to beat that IMO. It’s amazing what good nutrition and pacing will do for you. I also had virtually zero soreness or pain after the ride. I had some pain between my shoulder blades after, so I ordered a Nitto Dirt Drop stem from Rivendell to hopefully get these bars up just as much as a centimeter. Other than that the setup is pretty dialed, although I think a 45-48mm tire up front could be pretty nice too.

In a couple weeks I’ll do another little tour/weekender, this time on the Stooge MK4 in full on bikepacking mode. Stay tuned for that ride report!