Notes from the Gruppetto
Finding something awesome and doable, mostly
Rise to diy occasion
After sitting on my trainer during lockdown, and then riding outside again as the world emerged, I cast my eyes around to see what was possible. Because, damn it, I would do something awesome this year. It seemed like everyone and their dog was Everesting this past summer. For those of you who are not familiar with Everesting, it consists of riding one segment up and down until you reach a cumulative elevation of 8,848 m. Records seemed to get smashed every week. In early July, Emma Pooley broke the women’s world record with a time of 8:53:36. On the men’s side, Irish cyclist Ronan Mclaughlin clocked 7:04:41 to take the men’s Everesting title from none other than Alberto Contador. Just how fast are these riders? My friend Travis Streb, a sublime climber who lives at the base of Mount Seymour, Everested in 14 hours 33 minutes (including rest time).
While a full Everest was beyond me, how about a half? There’s an awesome 12-km loop segment around a lake near my cottage in Haliburton, Ont. Each loop has (according to Veloviewer) 350 m of elevation gain. The views are stunning. So I called Chris Welsh, a fellow rider in my club, Morning Glory, and friend who is on my lake. I pitched the idea: we could park a car with a cooler at the start/finish. Thirteen laps later we’d be golden. He was in.
The next morning we rode out. The first two laps were joyful. This would be easy. Then I looked down at the Garmin, saw the elevation gained – 550 m, just 275 m per lap – and panicked. Chris and I started calculating. At this rate, we’d have to ride 16 laps to be sure. But the Strava segment was supposed to be 350 m per lap. Which was right?
We kept riding. By Lap 5, we were starting to feel it. We realized we’d need close to eight hours, two more than we had planned. On Lap 6, I called my wife. I asked if she could bring me food and drink. And I asked if she could pack the kids in the car so they could all drive over for 1:30 p.m. when lap 9 would be done. She loves me (or doesn’t want me to dehydrate, which is kind of the same) so she came. By Lap 11, the Garmin had registered 3,000 m. I started making deals with myself. If I hit 3,500 m, that would be a personal record, right? I could quit there. Chris looked at me with scorn. Then he dropped a bomb on me, “If you quit now, your article will suck.” That was it. Journalistic pride demanded we continue. Lap 13 arrived. I was barely seeing straight. Now we were doing more math. OK, we were on pace for 4,100 m. But that would fall short of half-everest. But what if Strava was right? We might already be at 4,500 m and could stop then. Still, we pushed on. My heart-rate monitor stopped. Lap 14. We crossed 3,900 m. I suggested to Chris we just quit at 4,000 m. We got to 4,000. We decided to finish. The Garmins read 4,100 m. We uploaded to Strava, hit “correct elevation,” and then hit refresh.
And there it was: 4,530 m gained. We had done it. We had unofficially halfEverested. We waddled to the lake and sat there. We opened beers. And then we drove home. I was so addled I forgot a chair by the lake. And fell asleep during dinner with my wife. It was a great day.
What’s the lesson of this fool’s errand? Simple: if your year hasn’t panned out the way you thought, it’s never too late to do something delightfully, perversely big. You’ll never forget it. And the beer will never again taste so sweet.