Ride Reports

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May 2, 2004. Several of our club members rode in the Chattanooga 3-Mtn, 3-State Ride. ....

About 800 cyclists joined before the starting time of 8 AM EST at the First Tennessee Pavilion in downtown Chattanooga for a mass start out of town led once again by the city’s mayor. The weather was overcast and cool with threatening rain clouds to the west and north. There was a logjam of cyclists all awaiting a spot in the mass peloton as the "Start" command was given. Spouses, children, fiancées, and friends all shouted out hearty well wishes as we exited the downtown area of the city. I was giddy from all the attention that we cyclists got from onlookers as traffic cops held up traffic when we passed through city intersections. We finally passed over a bridge spanning the Tennessee River and from that point it seemed the pace of the riders picked up. Within a few miles after crossing the bridge the 25 mile ride branched off—I saw only one person take the fork for the quarter century route. The rest of us pedaled on with more mileage on our brains paralleling for several miles the banks of the Tennessee River. The first major climb, Suck Creek Mountain, began about 10 miles from the starting point, and once we started climbing the macho folks started passing us ‘weeny’ boys. I did climb the 4.5 miles to the summit faster by several minutes compared to last year’s ride. The official photographer for this event had a cameraman positioned about two-thirds of the way up the mountain. As we approached him struggling to turn one crank arm after another, his plea for us to smile for the camera met at least in my case with a frown. Once I got to the first food stop which came about 15 miles into the ride, I filled up my water bottles—I had started with the empty bottles because there was no water available at the starting point. It took about 3 minutes for me to get on my way, and I had forgotten that there was still some more climbing to get through before we reached the apex of this climb. For the descent down the mountain I decided to not go full throttle, there were some slick spots from a misty rain that was falling. We reached Powell’s Crossroads and toured through the backroads of Hamilton County and Marion County. The countryside was very pretty-the air smelled good. Foreboding clouds hugged Lookout Mountain which loomed ahead and I knew I was gonna be climbing it in a few hours. I was really hoping those clouds did not mean we were going to be rained on as we climbed the backside of Lookout. Not too far from this point I bypassed the second food stop—I had ample water. At mile 42 or thereabouts a decision point comes—take the left fork for about 21 more miles ( a metric century) back to the starting point or the right fork for another 58 miles (a full century). Unlike the lines from the Robert Frost poem "The Road Not Taken", I took the right fork that seemingly invited more pedalers. I was again paralleling the Tennessee River/Lake Nickajack for the next 30 minutes. I missed a turn I should have made at about mile 50 and was headed for South Pittsburgh. After about 6 miles of not seeing any of those lavender road markers, I finally decided I had strayed off course and it was now time to back track. Once I got back onto course, it wasn’t too long until I crossed over into Alabama----Rollllll Tide!—and of course the climb up Sand Mountain began. This was an easier climb than the Suck Creek Mountain ascent.. I rode in tandem up the mountain with several riders and we talked very little as we struggled. I heard lots of groaning and some cussing. It could have been me but I’m not sure. At the top of Sand Mountain we were rewarded with a beautiful view of the valley we had just traversed less than a half hour before. One thing I noticed on the climb up the mountain was all the trash dumped on the side of the road. Among the household trash I saw were home appliances—stoves, refrigerators—it was disgusting to see some of this kind of stuff jettisoned by trashy people without concern of where it might land. A few miles from the scenic vista was the third food stop, and I tanked up my water bottles. The Alabama-Georgia border was not too far from this point. About mile 78 I began the descent off Sand Mountain, and at the bottom of the mountain on one sharp turn there was a cyclist who failed to make the curve and was laying in a heap attended to by fellow cyclists and a sheriff’s deputy. I passed by with a sympathetic look—there was no reason to stop since there was a crowd of people around him. A couple minutes later an ambulance passed by me presumably in route to pick him up for a hospital visit. One last climb remained that being the Burkhalter’s Gap Road. Just prior to this climb I stopped at the fourth food stop to top off my water bottles and next came the toughest climb of the day. My granny gear allowed me to slowly climb up this road which seemed to be far steeper than the other two major climbs of the day. The other climbs had plenty of turns and bends which would give me hope that around that next turn the gradient would ease. On Burkhalter’s Gap Road there were few turns and from the bottom of the climb the road seemed to stretch to heaven with no relief. After climbing halfway up, I had leg cramps so bad I finally had to get off my bike and walk for a while. One fellow who was just ahead of me also got off his bicycle and walked slightly ahead. I asked if I could draft off him as we walked. Some yahoo dressed in a devil’s costume challenged me as I walked past and told me for my sin of walking I was going to have to restart the climb from the bottom of the mountain. Fat Chance!!! The last quarter mile the gradient seemed to become even more severe. Argghhhhh!!! I am not sure if the girls in the bikinis were making fun of me or cheering me on. Maybe that was a hallucination—I don’t know. At the top of the mountain, now about mile 92, I bypassed food stop five and was joined by Melissa Miller—we rode together for 3-4 miles and my leg cramps made me get off my bike for a few minutes. I bid Melissa farewell as she rode off in the distance. Soon came the big descent off Lookout Mountain. Someone at the start of the descent warned me about wet pavement and accidents. My brain failed to register what they said. At the bottom of the mountain was the second serious accident of the day that I saw the results of. A man who appeared to be around 60 years old looked like had slid on wet pavement and had broken teeth and maybe broken an arm. The last two miles traffic cops were at every major intersection directing traffic and allowing us cyclists clear sailing back to out starting point—First Tennessee Pavillion. My wife Emily and daughter Heather were awaiting my arrival and I was certainly glad to see them. The only person from the Highland Rim Bicycle Club I saw on the entire ride aside from those people at the start was Melissa Miller. At the beginning of the ride I did notice Bob Crook, Denny Elston, Ken and Debbie Gamache, Matt Johnson, Terri Jones, Rebecca McCool, Kim Hopkins. I also know that Tom Leanza and Jack Shuttleworth were on the ride but I don’t think I ever saw those fellows. I think great compliments should be made to the Chattanooga Bike Club, and also the city of Chattanooga with their various departments who helped us do this ride. Not enough can be said for those traffic cops—mostly women—who helped us cyclists naviagate the streets of Chattanooga at the beginning and the end of the ride. I had a great time on this ride. My odometer said 112 miles and it took me over 8 hours to complete the ride. I plan to be back next year, and I am envious of all the people who plan to do the Mount Mitchell ride this year. This is a great sport!!! Mike Rutherford   Editor note: last 2 pictures are of Tullahoma resident's bike after a crash at this event.  Details are unknown, but the rider was not hurt badly.	(Photos above courtesy Mike Rutherford)

May 30, 2003. We rode in the first Tennessee Tandem Rally, hosted by Tim and Sharon Patterson, in Alcoha, TN ( greater Maryville). We had a great time, due to the hard work of the hosts. Everything was well organized, with lots of special steps that left me thinking - "Why didn't I think of that". They worked hard for the benefit of 100 folks that attended - some from as far away as California. 

On Friday, we did the 1PM ride, that started east of town.  We rode along the Little River, on the other side of the river from the main highway,  to Walland, which is on the west end of Townsend.  At this point, we could have turned around, for a total of 18 miles, but since the forecast for Saturday was poor, we pressed on with the 36 mile option. It is hard to judge what folks mean about "hilly", and this option was to take us over a gap, into a valley just on the other side of Cades Cove. We were towing Brian - our 65 lb payload.  Well, the climb was not bad, and the scenery was great. We stopped at the river, just inside the Great Smokes National Park, for a rest and to let Brian stretch his legs.  We found that we were some of the last ones in - we could slowly pass some of the flatland folks who don't get to train in the hills, but our play stops moved us to last. We repeated our tail-end-charlie status every day after that.

During the ride briefing, before the Friday ride, Brian was rearranging the rocks in the hotel landscaping, and he was soon joined by another boy Ryan. They hit it off quickly. Ryan(4) and his older brother Austin(6) ride with their parents Tom and Donna on a quad Co-Motion with 2 child conversion kits.  Thereafter, Brian was always looking for and asking "Where is Ryan?"  We played with them a lot but we just could not keep up on the road.  The one time they passed us, Brian started yelling " pedal harder, pedal harder."

Saturday's forecast was poor - rain and 20-35 mph winds.  It turned out not as bad, just 25-35 mph winds.  Looking at the numerous route options, we decided to do the remote start, that would cut 4.5 miles each way, and allow us to stretch out further to a neat destination - the Chilhowee dam. I almost had second thoughts when the crowd gathered for the mass start from the hotel, but we would have been dropped pretty quickly, on some fairly busy roads. At the remote start ( the park which was the lunch stop later) ,the road out of the park seemed straight up, and it seemed like I got loaded up on lactic acid right from the start.  Then we turned into the wind.  That was tough until we got further out of town, into the rolling hills. After a while, we started descending to the Chilhowee river , and that was a little easier.  When we rounded the curve, at river level, we were pushed by a tailwind.  We were supposed to follow the river for some miles, but I thought we don't need to be proceeding so far downwind ( a lesson from my sailing days), and we turned around at the boat dock. The quad with the kids went roaring by on their return leg.  We headed back, and after fighting the headwind, got into the climbs.  Later our direction shifted and we had a good tailwind returning to the park.  We made it back 1/2 hr before lunch was over, and ate a great lunch, provided by our hosts. We rode a massive 39 miles - others did 110 and went into NC !

Sunday was our last day.  The ride options were 25 miles, with a remote start, or 39 if one started from the hotel.  Again, we would have liked to be part of the mass start, but the hotel checkout time and our pace dictated the remote start. The remote start was from a park on the lake. I tried to outsmart the system, and drove to the remote start early, with the hopes that the group would come by and we would get to chat with everyone, but alas, as it turns out, the routes were slightly different, and we saw few of the faster people. We did cruise in a group of 4 bikes for quite a while.  Although we did not have the big climbs, we had more short steep pitches. At mile 18, we supposedly were close to a ranch with camels, lamas, etc, but we missed them. This was a pretty route, again with many homes out in the country.  I suspect that much of this area is occupied by folks who work in Knoxville. Near the end of the route, we frequently rode alongside the lake, dipping up and down on the rolling terrain. - Stuart Coulter reporting

May 17th, 2003.    Rimmers Assault Mt. Mitchell Again
 By Bob Crook, Road Captain, Touring

May 17th, 2003. Stuart and Jeanie led a ride to Pope's Cafe on the square in Shelbyville.  We try and do this annually, on the same date as the Mt. Mitchell ride, to give the slow pokes a fun destination.  This year, the weather just about halted the event.  It was raining at dawn, but cleared up in the last half hour before the 7 AM start, so even though the forecast was poor, I felt we had to go with blue skies overhead.  Rebecca and Rick joined us.  On the way we ran into JoAnn and did a little flat repair. We had a good breakfast at Pope's which fortunately was not too busy, and returned on the same route which was a good plan since the wind had kicked up from the storms brewing around us, and was right in our face.  A bad storm arrived about 1/2 hr after we got home, causing damage in town. 

2002 Elk River 100 - We had our usual turnout for the ERV 100 and good weather.  The breakout of who rode what is:

The course was blocked for a while by a crash (that did not involve any cyclist)

Pictures:

	click on thumbnail to view	photos - Kevin Uehlein

2002 Murfreesboro and Huntsville Centuries. 

For those of you trying to find new century rides to attend next year, each of these are good choices. Each has a post-ride meal, where we enjoyed talking with folks we see year after year. – Stuart Coulter reporting

2002 Assault on Mt.  Mitchell.   Bob Crook wrote an excellent review of the trip of several of our club members to Marion and Mt. Mitchell NC. 

Eleven members of the Highland Rimmers Bicycle Club completed the notorious Assaults on Mt. Mitchell and Marion on Saturday, May 18. This was the 27th running of this group ride, sponsored by the Spartanburg (SC) Freewheelers bike club.

Melissa Miller, Al Hennigan, Mike Rutherford and Kevin Zysk completed the extremely difficult 72-mile Assault on Marion. The remaining riders continued on for another 30 miles to the Blue Ridge Parkway, finishing at the top of 6684-ft high Mount Mitchell, NC, the highest point east of the Mississippi. They were Tony Zarraga, Debbie Gamache, Ken Gamache, Denny Elston, Sam Harper, Brian Bacon, and Jim Herron.

Over 1600 riders started the assaults in Spartanburg, SC at 6:30 AM in near darkness, 69F temperature and light-to-heavy rain. A persistent headwind plagued the riders for the entire event. After about 90 minutes the rain let up and the skies gradually brightened. The riders were forced to alternately wear and then remove their rain gear in response to the ever-changing conditions. The hosts of the ride provided several food stops along the way, which enabled the riders to get a little rest along with some nourishment.

The mass start of the Assaults is always a spectacular sight. All the riders are packed into five lanes of traffic about 500 yards long. The electronic clock on the marquee of the Spartanburg War Memorial counts down the last few seconds and at the GO! signal, one can hear only the sound of 1600 pairs of bicycle cleats clicking into their pedals. The group then moves off at a very fast pace, the lead riders already bidding for position as they try to beat the course record (about 5 hours for the 102 miles). The group sweeps through the city streets with all auto traffic temporarily halted. As the ride progresses the riders naturally stretch out into a very long line, eventually separated by as many as 30 miles.

Each of the Tullahoma riders attained his or her personal goal. The 72 miles of the group finishing at Marion, NC has been described as "challenging". This is a charitable description. This segment of the ride contains many tough hills, several in the last few miles. The four Marion finishers were very happy to have attained the finish line. The finish is at a park in Marion where a meal is furnished and good bathroom and shower facilities are available. Each rider is encouraged to send a bag with dry clothes ahead to the finish line. This was a particularly good idea this year.

For the seven who continued on to the top of the mountain, the conditions this year were among the toughest that any of them had ever experienced. The ride is very difficult, even with good weather, with a constant grind along the last 27 miles. The never-ceasing head wind and the continually dropping temperatures made this section of the ride a real test of fortitude and endurance. Conditions at the top were 39F and extremely windy. After quickly drinking the hot tomato soup provided by the Freewheelers, everyone got into the first available bus for the ride back to Marion. At Marion, larger busses were available for the drive back to Spartanburg. All bikes were collected from the riders as they finished and put onto trucks for transportation back to Spartanburg.

This year, for the first time, the Tullahoma group had the luxury of a personal "sag" wagon, driven by Bob Crook. He had dry clothing and food and drink and bike tools and was available via cell phone to come to the aid of a rider in distress. Happily, no mechanical difficulties were experienced and the sag wagon was barely called into service.

A difficult ride like this so early in the riding season means that extraordinary training regimens are necessary. Most of the group either rode as much as possible during the winter or trained on indoor bikes. When the Highland Rimmers' scheduled rides began in April, many of the rides were designed with plenty of hill climbing. The central training event used by most of the riders was the standing after-work Monday afternoon ride from Alto to Sewanee and Sherwood and return. This 34-mile route provides a pretty fair simulation of the Blue Ridge Parkway and Mt. Mitchell State Park gradients with its two strenuous climbs. Of course the route also affords the fun of two screaming descents, something not possible on the one-way-only Mt. Mitchell ride.

Tullahomans' participation in this ride has a long and chequered history. Bob Crook and Stuart Coulter made the first Assault on Mitchell in 1988. They repeated it the next year with Greg Wannenwetch, then of Manchester. Participation gradually grew to the present level. The ride has become so popular that the Spartanburg club has had to restrict the number of riders to avoid problems with the National Park Police and the NC State Highway Patrol, who objected to the hordes of bikes with their support vehicles clogging the narrow roads and small parking areas. Therefore it has become a race when the application blanks are mailed to see who can get the scarce Mt. Mitchell slots. It's hard to believe, given the agony of achieving the finish line, but generally the conversation on board the bus soon turns to making plans for doing it again next year. story by Bob Crook

Joint Huntsville Ride - On April 28th, we met many fine folks from Huntsville for a joint bike ride.  We met in Fayetteville, ate breakfast, and then headed out for a hilly 40+ miles in the Coldwater area.  There were tow tandem teams, each towing Burleys with a wee one onboard.

Pictures from our Spring 2001 Garbage Pickup:

Fall/00 - Brian, Denny, Joe, and Rita rode in the Murfreesboro Hot 100 ride in late August, and Denny, Mitch,Stuart, Jeanie and Brian rode in the Huntsville All-You-Care-To-Eat ride in mid-September.

Sunday Breakfast Rides - we have had some good rides to the Cracker Barrel for breakfast in the last few weeks.  Call Ken at 455-3252 if you are interested.

Alabama Tandem Weekend - Jeanie, Brian, and Stuart Coulter attended the 6th Alabama Tandem Weekend, April 14-16th, in Auburn Alabama.  44 teams attended. The event was held at the Auburn Univ. Conference center, and was very well organized.  Fortunately, the forecasted terrible weather did not materialize.  On Saturday, we rode out to the lunch stop on the intermediate loop route, and directly back for a total of 35 miles. Several other loops were available - a team could ride about 75 miles, on the well marked route, if they wanted too. The whole gang had a pizza party afterwards. Sunday we rode about 25 miles.  The team behind us ( pictured ) had a blowout that sounded like a gun shot, which fortunately happened just before a long decent. We saw a few triples, and one family of 5 with the parents on a tandem, 4 and 2 yr old children on a trailer-cycle, with a one yr. old in a trailer hitched to the trailer-cycle ( pictured).

_{(Click on thumbnail to view)}  

Elk River 100 Photos - intrepid photographer and club member Mike Ruthorford captured these digital photos of club members participating in the our Elk River 100 century ride held 9./11/99.
(Click on thumbnail to view)

Rotary Road Race - was held on July 10th; co-sponsored by the Tullahoma Rotary and the Highland Rimmers. 
(Click on the thumbnails to view some pictures.)

The registration tent was a popular place during the early morning rain.	Start of one heat	Finish	The ladies did a good job at the registration desk as usual !

Several Highland Rimmer club members Assaulted Mt. Mitchell, and all succeeded. Results:

                               Time            Place
Kevin Uehlein         7:34             411
Brian Bacon           7:36             416
Denny Elston          8:15             497
Jim Herron             8:24              513
Mark Ennis             8:30             539
Doug Abel               9:54             645
Joe Migliaccio      10:38            679
Dave Bond               Time Unknown