Looks spectacular 
Contrast that to 50miles in Old England and 500ft (I think I went over a few road and rail bridges 
)
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Nice! Western Mass really does have some great riding. Howâd the VT Gran Fondo go?
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I ended up not doing VT Grand Fondo. I was concerned about the weather since it ended up raining most of the day. Donât mind a little rain, but my wife was concerned Iâd skid off a mountain decending at 40 mph in the rain or something 
Hopefully next year!
Looking forward to hopefully doing Grateful Gravel but the really rough stuff yesterday has me wondering what the route will be like. The climb yesterday that really kicked my butt looked alot like this pic (from google for VT class 4 roads) but was super steep and loose for ~ 2/3 mile. I was going 3 mph and trying to keep my front tire on the ground when someone in front stopped and I couldnât unclip in time. I donât have a good way to practice this stuff near me.
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Oh, excellent! Iâll be able to do it again this year!
If I remember correctly (and @The_Conductor or anyone else who did the ride back me up on this), there was only one section of Class IV up Jones Brook Road. After the flooding last week, Iâd expect it to be pretty rideable until it isnât, so Iâm expecting to just walk large chunks of it. Thereâs a large, steep drop-off on the right-hand side going up, so that can discourage people from being too adventurous. I donât really remember anything else that was too sketchy. Compare that to VT Overland, where I remember so, so many sections of very rugged Class iV.
And now that I think about it, that sectionâs not too far from my house, so Iâll scope it out and report back. 
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Yeah thatâs correct. I only walked like 50 feet last year. The descent on Chase Road could be dicey with the recent rains.
I did the Dirty Prouty on Saturday in lieu if the JAM Fundo. Got my ass kicked.
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Iron Bridge Route - The green one was no longer fit for commercial traffic and the rusty one is the new one replacing it.
Near Blue Ridge, Georgia. 55 mile route (5k elevation gain), starting in Suches. Nice and quiet, since the sports car and motorcycle clubs take over the gaps on weekends.
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Toccoa River, for you Band of Brothers fans. 
If that gran fundo is classified âgravelâ, I think itâs a bit of a stretch. At 2" chunks we can cease calling it gravel, itâs ballast, the s#ÂĄt we lay train tracks over. 
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Easy ride today. 320kj chatting with a mate.
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100 mile gravel ride on a beautiful day. 50F at the start in the morning and very pleasant. Got up close to 90F by the early afternoon.
Bonus pic of a moose chilling in the shade by a steam a couple of blocks from our house. The poor guy was panting hard to try stay cool.
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Hains Point Hämmerfest
Washington, DC, USA
Pulled for a bit on lap three but sat in on all the rest. Legs were a bit fatigued this morning even though I didnât ride yesterday. Was hot, too - 82F at 5:30 am.
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Missed this post and @Morzakâs above with the beautiful pics but I was really glad I did Alpe dâHuez before because at about bend 3 quitting suddenly entered my mind but I knew just 5 short bends (damn you frenchies, why canât you count) more bends to the finish
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My beautiful pic after a long-ish breakâŚ
10-days off, and two days back-to-back working on re-basing.
Which means its time to do something stupid!
just 2 seconds!
didnât give it enough gas
Motivation!
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Some local shared paths and gravel tracks and a VO2max segment across the field.
You canât really see it but there was quite a lot of rain yesterday and the bike will need cleaned before I put it away.
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Ugh, Iâve got one of those segments. Iâve got it starred for Garmin live segments, but itâs a smaller part of a longer climb I ride a lot and use as kind of a benchmark. Very annoying. Now I just need to remember to unstar the other segment. Which I could literally do right now in another browser tab, but probably wonât.
Six rides over four years within three seconds of each other. 
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Competing against yourself if fun! And against others:
My 26 year old âadopted sonâ holds the KOM, thats the difference between 335W at 2.6W/kg and 343W from a Cat3 (in 2020) at something like 4.5W/kg
But hey not too shabby for an old dude, the rest of the leaderboard is guys in 20s and 30s and 40s, so I could be their father or grandfather 
And really helps that the guy 1 year younger, the guy that podiums at NorCal races, he has never given that a full gas effort!
I prefer surprises and donât show segments on my Garmin. On the bike I figured that one was right up as personal best, because I didnât drop below 25mph at the top of the overpass.
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Decided to give myself a reason to clean the bike and went out to explore some bridleways. Lol I got an 8th on a gravel road but that was out of less than 50, whereas this afternoons bridleway bash for 6th was out of over 1,500
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Went for an easy evening spin on the MTB. Got a pinch flat. Not quite sure how, as the trail was pretty benign, and I wasnât hammering the descent. The Dynaplug worked a treat in the hole by the tire bead 
Mosquitos had a feast while I was fixing it.
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Now thatâs proper terrain for a mtb
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First three day block since May what was I thinking?! At least my mojo has returned, now itâs a slow slog to get fitness back up.
So the guy thought bought the tires, he is a year younger and retired. He has been hammering out 20 hours/week for at least 2 years, maybe 3, and isnât getting faster. Because he does â~4 hour time trialsâ on every ride, on flat terrain. And is about to do a 10 day block of 4 hours every day.
When I arrived he was toast from the morning 4 hour ride. Iâm like âmy dude, you arenât riding zone2 if you are beat down every day.â He said the younger guys laugh at his training, but he is old school and listens to Ian Boswell podcast and wonât get a power meter and wonât mount a bike computer on the bars of his Tarmac SL6. He doesnât do any short intervals / high power work.
To my eyes this looks like a classic case of riding tempo all the time. We talked for 45 minutes, I gently offered some other points of view. Its sad to see someone invest so much time and not get faster 
You can lead a horse to water, but you canât make it drink.
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