My W&OD 2011 ride

Sore knees following the flooring work in our new home, combined with a general feeling of exhaustion from the work, were not encouraging signs of me being ready to go ahead with my old desire to ride the W&OD trail in its full length both directions, starting and ending on my doorstep. All in all close to 100 miles. While riding any Century is a challenge on its own, riding it with sore knees, and solo without any support along the ride typical for organized rides, is a challenge on its own. After some scare and self-pitying, the commitment I had given to myself to ride at least one Century this year, the fact that the weather was very nice, and that my colleague was riding an official Century ride elsewhere that day, made me go out for the ride. That is how I found myself in the saddle that October 2011 morning.

The weather was absolutely gorgeous! Nice and warm but with lots of wind. Considering that it takes about 3 miles to get from my house to the trail, and that I was still wondering about my decision to ride, the wind was actually helping me. Because of the wind, I was wondering which direction to go first rather than whether I could do it or not.

The W&OD trail, a former railroad line, stretches for 45 miles, from Shirlington to Purcellville, Virginia, in a general SE to NW direction. The prevailing wind that day was blowing from the West, which made me go West first. I entered the trail in Vienna and turned in the direction of Purcellville, thinking that it would be easier to ride 33 miles against the wind early on in one stretch rather than 45 miles later.

However windy the ride, it was not as bad as I had expected. Miles were passing by and my knees were not bothering me. Nevertheless, believing that a sudden move could change that, I decided to take it easy and ride accordingly. This strategy worked well and landed me in Purcellville. After a 10-minute rest, the time was to get back. I could not resist exiting the trail temporarily and riding Dry Mill Road, which runs parallel to the trail in the trail’s vicinity. Then, riding Dry Mill Road I could not resist taking a short detour and climbing about half-of-a-mile-long steep climb on State Route 769. This climb was my favorite from previous Reston Century rides.

Have I already said that the weather was absolutely gorgeous? Golden colors of the Fall, mild temperature, bright blue sky, and I am riding my bicycle. That is probably what Horatius had in mind with his “carpe diem”.

To make it short, the rest of the ride proceeded uneventfully. No flat tire, no mechanical failure of any kind. Landing in Shirlington, on the opposite end of the trail, made me aware of the trail’s length as well as of a 45-mile distance. It is substantial. The last 14 to 15 miles of riding were straight against the wind and yet, I was very happy. About the statistics: the total length 97.5 miles and 5 hours 49 minutes.

One of the points of this somewhat self-congratulatory little story is that sometimes we might pity ourselves into thinking we cannot do it. In other words, we could give up too easily. While it is true that we cannot always make it, the truth is that we should try before we know for sure.