High Cascades 100....T minus 5 days....

The High Cascades 100 is right around the corner.  The race is scheduled for this upcoming Saturday, July 19th.  We have reached the stage of believing in the miles logged in the saddle and hoping you have logged enough miles.  What is done is done and no fitness gains or losses to be realized this week prior to the day of suffering.

This will most likely be my least favorite course to date for this race.  There appears to be more road (as opposed to single track) than years past and more 'loose sections' where we will be riding through some beach sand.  Add into the mix that the high country has not yet melted and we will be hike a biking through the upper elevation trails that still have significant snow drifts.

There are a couple of other factors that will contribute to my pre-conceived notions of my least favorite HC 100 to date:  The enduro and Oregon 24 races were on part of the course of the HC 100 in the 2 weeks prior to the HC 100 race day...reading between the lines, these sections of trail will be trashed and loose as riding in a sand pit with brake bumps to match.

The upside is that there will be less climbing so theoretically the course should be faster (although course condition in the high country and the aforementioned trail conditions might offset that).

The other wrinkle for me as a singlespeeder is that the race won't spread out for longer and my guess is there will be a huge bottleneck going up Doudenem.  There is a 400 ft punchy climb about 14 miles in where the field won't yet be spread out.  I will be at the back of the pack due to the course until that point (mostly flat pavement with a fire road climb).  This means I will most likely be trying to grind a SLOW gear going up the punchy climb as I will be stuck behind those geared types : )  This steep and punchy climb is loose with little to no room to pass so I fear for the worst...having to either push a really slow gear behind them there gearies (and using way more energy than I want to due to having to go at that super slow cadence), or having to dismount due to the pace.

Once we get through that first uphill, things should start to spread out a little but it is going to be a bit of a buzzkill for that initial climb.

The other little detail for this course is that the big climb comes late in the day when the legs will most likely be fried!

At least the weather folk are forecasting a slight cool down into the low 90's on race day so perhaps the weather gods will smile on us as we are out there suffering...

the course as posted: