# Chilly Hilly



## bigbill (Feb 15, 2005)

Rode the Chilly Hilly today. It is a 33 mile ride around Bainbridge Island in the Puget Sound area. According to the Garmin, I climbed 2600 feet total and burned 3400 calories. The hills were very steep but not too long. The weather was epic, 39 degrees with steady rain. I got to meet pdxmark, jimcav, and kdub. The majority of the riders come over from Seattle on the 8:30 ferry. I am staying at the Navy Lodge at the Bangor submarine base so I started from a grocery store parking lot about two miles from the official start. Note the pedestrian in the crosswalk, that was close for a couple of riders. Kdub and his cool fendered Merckx. He was in a group that came down from Vancouver, BC.


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## bigbill (Feb 15, 2005)

*more hilly*

The humanity of a 4500+ rider event. Note to ride organizers, I used to put together century rides in SC and I would have five porta-johns at each stop. I would get a max of 500 riders. Today's first rest stop had two portajohns for 4500 people. The finish area had chili and sponsor tents. PdxMark had a booth set up for Cycle Oregon. It is a supported, multiday ride through some beautiful areas of Oregon. I plan on doing it next year. The world champion color Specialized helmeted guy is jimcav.


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## mynamesrob (Jul 13, 2006)

Sounds like a pretty stellar time! Are you TDY?

-Rob


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## bigbill (Feb 15, 2005)

mynamesrob said:


> Sounds like a pretty stellar time! Are you TDY?
> 
> -Rob


Here on my own for the weekend to do the closing on my new home. We are transferring from Hawaii to Bremerton.


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## YuriB (Mar 24, 2005)

looks wet. you musta been right at home. minus the sandals.
looking forward to more pnorwet ride reports


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## MarkS (Feb 3, 2004)

Did the route, but in better weather.

A few years ago, I was in Seattle for a few days in early March. The cue sheet for the Chilly Hilly was on the web. I played hookey one morning, went over to Bainbridge Island and rode the route. I had a great ride, albeit a solo one. The weather was chilly, but dry. It is a great place to ride for a visitor to the area -- there is not much traffic and it is almost impossible to get lost.


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## JP (Feb 8, 2005)

Hey, I must have been one ferry behind you guys. Had a fun ride. On the way over, I decided to do a "Mudflap Expose." Enjoy.


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## JP (Feb 8, 2005)

These were all on the ferry on the way over...


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## MB1 (Jan 27, 2004)

The sad thing about this post is that although your weather was fairly bad it looked much better than what we have been going through the last few weeks. Good to see so many folks show up.


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## undies (Oct 13, 2005)

Nice report! I particularly enjoy the mudflap photos :thumbsup: 

No riding for me this weekend. Western Oregon was rounding Cape Horn and I couldn't get motivated to ride. It wasn't the rain so much as the wind that scared me off. Was it real windy up there? Here in the Willamette Valley it was blowing a steady 20-25mph all weekend. I did get in a nice foothills hike with the kids at least.


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## Bertrand (Feb 1, 2005)

I was there too! I brought two friends with me from Victoria. We had a great time.... controlled pandemonium is the impression I had. 

I have to come back again next year. Who knows, the weather may be even worse, and I wouldn't want to miss that!


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## Ridgetop (Mar 1, 2005)

I'm a lousy wet weather rider but it looks like it could be fun. That pedestrian either had big cahones or was a little crazy.


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## llama31 (Jan 13, 2006)

*What?!?*



MB1 said:


> The sad thing about this post is that although your weather was fairly bad it looked much better than what we have been going through the last few weeks. Good to see so many folks show up.


I thought you liked this stuff


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## llama31 (Jan 13, 2006)

*That sounds cold to me*

I can handle 30 deg and dry. 39 deg and wet sounds pretty miserable. But then again, it sounds like a unique event (nothing like 1000s of bikers taking over the road...a lot like the Seagull Century here in MD) so maybe that makes the weather more tolerable.


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## bigbill (Feb 15, 2005)

Bertrand said:


> I was there too! I brought two friends with me from Victoria. We had a great time.... controlled pandemonium is the impression I had.
> 
> I have to come back again next year. Who knows, the weather may be even worse, and I wouldn't want to miss that!



The worst part for me was the flat and rolling section at the end approaching Eagle Harbor. The rain really started coming down and there was no shelter from the wind. I put myself into motor-mode and quickly had a string of people behind me at 22 mph. At that point, I just wanted to be done. It was the only time all day that my hands were cold.


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## PdxMark (Feb 3, 2004)

It was a fun ride. I rode my Vanilla fixie figuring that at 33 or so miles, even a ride with "hilly" in the name wouldn't be a big deal. The trick, as it turned out, was that a few of those hills had grades over 10%, and I bet a couple were 14+%. I was shameless in my zig-zagging up those steeper ones, but really liked the route for a fixed gear ride anyway.

As with most multi-thousand person rides, everyone spreads out over the course pretty well so that you are riding amongst no more than a hundred folks within the a couple hundred yards of you at a time. There was a wide range of riders including serious commuters with lights & fenders, mud-streaked roadies, folks with comfort bikes of various sorts, a few kids in trailers or tag-alongs (including a side-car trailer), and even a crew with alternative bikes that had been "chop-shop" modified into various configurations including a couple impressive hi-risers.

The weather held pretty well for us, but it got cold and wet while we were at the Cycle Oregon information table. It was great to meet BigBill & Jimcav. We stayed on the island the night before, so we didn't get to see what one rider described as a big Washington state ferry with its car decks FULL of bikes.


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## rideorglide (Dec 3, 2005)

I'm especially digging the last last photo of the dirt splatterred BB/Crank etc. 
Kinda looks like my bike -- Crank Bros. Quattros, what looks like a Campagnolo Crank What's that a 52/39? (Just a guess), Conti Gatorskins? (another guess), same Garmin thingy, black dirt, orangey-red metal. Nice snakes! -- those my bike definitely does not have. And our dirt here on Long Island, well it's kinda sandy.



bigbill said:


> Here on my own for the weekend to do the closing on my new home. We are transferring from Hawaii to Bremerton.


NB Kitsap to you! ;-)


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## Travis (Oct 14, 2005)

Nice pics guys, Bill, hope your house closing went well

I have a few pics to contribute but need to figure out how to reduce their size. I wanted to take some pics of the hills but soon realized that stopping at the bottom was not in my best interests. After getting to the top of Baker I was too interested in getting my breathing under control to turn and shoot. Baker also rounds off at the top not making it the most photogenic

The rain during the ride was very tolerable but standing around waiting for the ferry with a nice sweat cooling off wasn't so pleasant. Wouldn't you figure, monday turned out to be a reasonably decent biking day


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## Vettekid (Sep 16, 2005)

JP, nice concept and execution on the mudflap study.

I was doing well and as I expected to finish the event with a minimum of walking on the most severe hills. Next time back the goal will be to stay on the bike.

The weather was fine for me. I haven't ridden in the rain much but I have done plenty of other outdoor stuff through lots of winters so i didn't notice the rain I ran through on the later part of the ride hardly at all. I had a fleece vest that rode most of the ride on the rear rack. I am suprised that I didn't feel too bad this morning. Last weekends training push paid off well.

The maiden voyage of the new rendition of the Trek Multisport went well also. This is my first bike put together from collected pieces. It fit well and performed reasonable well. The instructions for the new CoolStop Salmon brake pads said "some breakin to be expected." I am hoping they improve with time. They didn't seem to brake as well as I would want on the downhill stretches but did well enough for the day.

I enjoyed meeting PdxMark. He was supportive of my efforts:^)

My experience of the whole day was indeed positive.


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## bigbill (Feb 15, 2005)

This thread is great. Is this the first Group-Group Ride report? If anyone has pictures to contribute, please add on. In case anyone else is interested, I keep my camera set up for VGA format so I can post without altering the picture. What I see in the viewfinder is what you see here. 

As a bonus, the skies cleared enough today to take these shots from my new house.


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## Dick Rhee (Jun 15, 2005)

PdxMark said:


> We stayed on the island the night before, so we didn't get to see _what one rider described as a big Washington state ferry with its car decks FULL of bikes_.


Here you go! I posted these in the PNW forum but came over here to check out some of the other Chilly Hilly related photos. 

All in all it was a pretty fun ride. My insane co worker and his friend took off for an extra lap after we were done and I was just too damned cold to think about going around again. While not going on the Chilly Hilly after paying for your registration seems like a waste of money, going around twice in weather like that seemed more like a form of punishment.


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## guelch27 (Feb 24, 2005)

I must work just down the road from you. You near the business park there in Poulsbo?


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## PdxMark (Feb 3, 2004)

bigbill said:


> As a bonus, the skies cleared enough today to take these shots from my new house.


Bill - great view. That'll be a nice place to wake-up to each day.


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## rideorglide (Dec 3, 2005)

It almost looks like you moved from Hawaii to . . . well some kind of Hawaii with pine trees instead.



PdxMark said:


> Bill - great view. That'll be a nice place to wake-up to each day.


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## bigbill (Feb 15, 2005)

guelch27 said:


> I must work just down the road from you. You near the business park there in Poulsbo?


I am about 3-4 miles north of the Walmart and Home Depot just off Pioneer Rd before the gravel pit (Lofall Rd).


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## Kenacycle (May 28, 2006)

It was a very fun ride! I wish I hadn't gotten cramps in my legs which slowed me down and necessitated stopping a couple times. 
Next year I'll get a 25T cog in the rear to make it a bit easier.

It was nice meeting you Bigbill


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## guelch27 (Feb 24, 2005)

I work over in the business park over there on Twelve Trees Lane off of Pioneer Way.


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## jimcav (Jun 15, 2003)

*sorry to miss you at the finish, bill*

my seattle friends stopped too long for me at the mid-pt chili stop. i started to get cold so took off, went pretty hard to the finish, then headed straight off for my 13 mile ride back home. kind of wished i drove at that point. 60 miles at that temp was enough--was fine as long as i did not stop.

great view from your house!

some great riding out there to port gamble and indianola

jim


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## bigbill (Feb 15, 2005)

jimcav said:


> my seattle friends stopped too long for me at the mid-pt chili stop. i started to get cold so took off, went pretty hard to the finish, then headed straight off for my 13 mile ride back home. kind of wished i drove at that point. 60 miles at that temp was enough--was fine as long as i did not stop.
> 
> great view from your house!
> 
> ...



I was frickin miserable during the last five or so miles. I started riding with your friends from the halfway stop but quickly put them behind me. I wanted to be done. I stopped for a while and talked to pdxmark and was pretty much hypothermic by the time I rode to the car. Riding warmed me up a little since it was all uphill to the car. I think that I will invest in some nice Lake winter shoes and a Showers Pass or Gore jacket before I start commuting this fall. I will buy a second car as well. I think that a 40 mile round trip commute in the wet/cold might be a bit much everyday. Maybe I can build up to it.


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## Vettekid (Sep 16, 2005)

bigbill said:


> I think that I will invest in some nice Lake winter shoes


Were you in your famous sandals? j/k ;^)

I was quite bundled and very comfortable. Maybe that comes from years standing next to rivers waiting for steelhead and not being afraid to overdress.


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## jimcav (Jun 15, 2003)

*i thought you were ahead*



bigbill said:


> I was frickin miserable during the last five or so miles. I started riding with your friends from the halfway stop but quickly put them behind me. I wanted to be done. I stopped for a while and talked to pdxmark and was pretty much hypothermic by the time I rode to the car. Riding warmed me up a little since it was all uphill to the car. I think that I will invest in some nice Lake winter shoes and a Showers Pass or Gore jacket before I start commuting this fall. I will buy a second car as well. I think that a 40 mile round trip commute in the wet/cold might be a bit much everyday. Maybe I can build up to it.


because i waited for them at that chili-stop near the kids park, then had to leave i got so cold. I was going 23-24 when not uphill. I guess that 2 port-o-john stop took a long time and chilled you down
btw, my ergomo had 12 % on one section of the twisty climb toward the end.

jim


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## bigbill (Feb 15, 2005)

jimcav said:


> because i waited for them at that chili-stop near the kids park, then had to leave i got so cold. I was going 23-24 when not uphill. I guess that 2 port-o-john stop took a long time and chilled you down
> btw, my ergomo had 12 % on one section of the twisty climb toward the end.
> 
> jim


My garmin had 14% on two different hills. The hardest part for me was climbing in a pack without the ability to pick my line. People would be climbing at a slow pace and then just stop to walk. That is ok if you are to the far right of the road, but people were doing it all over the place. I was riding a standard crankset (39/53) with a 12-25 cassette. I needed to climb at a higher speed to maintain an efficient cadence, but the crowds kept me slowed down to a crawl. Bainbridge will make a nice loop from the new house. I could ride to Poulsbo via Finn Hill and head to the island via Lemolo and do the east side of the island and loop back through Port Gamble to get home. Should be around 35-40 miles. 

Do you think MB will keep this as a sticky until it reaches 1000 views?


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