Race Report: Hillier Than Thou Century
by Steve Scheetz

This day began with me showing up just in time to start the race. After putting my bike together, gathering all of my supplies, I ran over to register, and then rode down to the starting line with about 26 seconds to spare! Shortly after I pulled up next to my training partner, Doug L, the race started with the entire group being lead by a pace car, and followed by a chase van, and this went for the first 4 miles to the bottom of the first climb.

This ride was through areas Doug and I have ridden several times this year. During a double century I did myself, the double I did when Doug met me 73 miles into the ride, and on the Jersey Double, we KNOW these areas, if not the roads.

There were 4 hills that stood out...  That is to say there were four that one could consider the worst! The first and second were placed before the second rest stop. It was a long stretch of suffering, followed by a shrieking descent. At the bottom, we checked in to the time station, and then proceeded to climb back up that shrieking descent we came down 5 minutes before… Anyway, as a point of interest, it was a straight grade of 14% the whole way up, and the hill was at least a mile and a half long… (if not longer) It was in and out of the Delaware Water Gap... On a side note, at the top of the first portion of this climb, we were all treated to one of the most awe inspiring view I have seen here in the east coast!

After this, there were some climbs, then some more climbs, and then there were some hills scattered about in-between, but at mile 72.5, we were treated to suffering of biblical proportions! It is a road called Fiddlers Elbow.... After climbing half a mile, you  ride across a ridge for about 100 yards, AND THEN, we turned onto the climb... about two-thirds of the way up this climb, the road levels to 12%, before crushing you with a solid 25% for the last 300 yards.... On the “level” 12% section, there is a horse farm. I was remembering Doug telling me about how the horses would laugh at him while he was suffering up the hill, 10 years before, when he trained on it regularly.  I looked over at the horses, I saw one looking at me, and then I said: “I DARE you to LAUGH!”

A mere 8 miles later, we found ourselves climbing a road that has to be seen, to be believed.... Iron bridge Road... We started climbing, and after a while, I noticed the iron bridge...

I said “Hey Doug, it is the iron bridge, on Iron Bridge Road!!” He asked “So?” Well, I thought it was over, I thought we would be at the top when we got to the bridge, and said: “This is good, right?  It is the iron bridge on Iron Bridge Road??” He responded with deafening silence. After we got to the bridge, I realized that I was mistaken. It turns out that the bridge represents the bottom of the climb!  (About 2 miles of 18%) For those of you who know Henning road, it is 2 miles of that!
However, we did manage to get our behinds up all of those hills and in to the finish before they would put a "DNF" next to our names! 7:44 on a course we really didn't belong on, in the first place, and that includes getting lost while looking for water because the one time station ran out. We screwed around for at least half an hour in the trip looking for, and then getting water....

All in all, it was a good day... I got 4 T-shirts... they gave me 2 of last year's because they didn't have my size, I was happy about that!!

Oh, I had some ICE CREAM afterward!