Seattle to Portland (STP) is a 204mile (328km) bike ride and is offered as two day or one day option. Not a race but still a great experience and worth a blog post. I knew right away, if I would do it, I would do it in one day. Once my coach gave the green light I was excited and couldn’t wait for this ride. Since I often dread the long rides, this was something different. I didn’t necessarily know how long it would take me, since the focus was to have a good training ride and stay in my target heart rate zones.

Leading up to the ride I heard stories of people waiting at the rest stops for like 30min to use the port a potty or for food. After all 10’000 rider would start this ride. I had no interest in waiting around which wouldn’t make for a good training ride. To prevent that I started out with the first wave of riders at 4:45am. When I started there were maybe 100 riders in front of me of various abilities. All I knew was that I didn’t want to get taken out by some other rider. So I took it easy and stayed safe in this early hours of dawn. After only a few miles the riders started to spread out a little and there was more space available. I started to relax a little and talked to a swede who was doing his second ride and aiming for a 10h cycling time. (Note: people apparently distinguish in this ride between how long it took them and how many hours they were actually pedaling).
Not long after that it got super busy again, I figured the second wave must have caught up with us and we also caught up with some early starters. There were so many cyclists we often filled up the whole streets and that is when I saw the first accident happened in front of me. I was a couple rows back and it wasn’t a real problem but it showed to me that I have to be careful and can’t trust anyone.
At mile 24 was the first stop, I had to use the rest room so I stopped but I ignored all the food/drinks and went on the bike as quick as possible. Since the crowed was moving in.
Only 17 miles later I had to do another quick stop to use a port a potty, at least that meant I was drinking enough. This was important to me since it is going to be a long day. I was still cold even with arm and leg warmers on. After this stop I ended up riding in a group, I was very carefully to leave at least a bike length in between me and the next person since I didn’t know any of them any not all of them seemed to be very safe riders. We started rotating and made good progress.
At the next big food stop (mile 54) half the group continued without stopping and I decided that I don’t need a rest yet. It seemed that only the better riders stayed in the group and I started trusting them more. We made really good progress and skipped the next two mini stops as well. Eventually the urge to use a restroom got big enough that I had to leave the group and make use of another John just 5miles shy of the halfway point.
I reached the halfway point (102miles) in just over 5.5 hours. There I saw some people from the group again and was told that we are leaving in 10minutes. Not that I wanted to rest much longer anyway 🙂
I grabbed one of sandwiches they offered and some other food. It was a plane old boring ham&cheese sandwich on white sliced bread which I ate while riding. I was amazed how good it tasted, I guess my body really needed some solid food.
Unfortunately, at that rest stop a few other riders joined us which obviously weren’t used to group riding. People weren’t maintain a consistent speed and gaps in the group were constantly opening that people had to surge to close them. I didn’t fall for that and maintained my consistent pace closing the gaps slowly when they happened after all I wasn’t riding on my limit were I would be dependent on drafting.
This is also when we ran a stop light. Normally, when we approached a stop or a light the first person would signal and slow down. Our group was just in the process of passing another group where I noticed a guy standing at the edge of the street and pointing at the stop sign. I couldn’t help and laugh to myself because he looked so silly. There was no signal or indication that the two groups would slow down. It was a T-crossing where we joined into a street turning right. I was already at the end of the two groups (about 30 people) whom none of them stopped. I slowed down and check the street to the left and no car was approaching. I noticed about 4 people across the street all wearing yellow/orange reflective vests but didn’t think much off it (My brain clearly not working properly). I made the turn and tried to catch up with the group again when one of the guys yelled my number and wrote it down on a clipboard. I looked back and there was no indication that I had to stop or that I should do anything so I kept going. After that for the next 2 hours that was the single thing I was thinking about. (that is a result of the crazy thoughts one has on these long rides). The whole scene was so weird and I still don’t know what it means. I assume I’ll probably get a ticket for not stopping. But what annoyed me about that whole situation is that I was probably one of the few if not the only one in the group of 30 people who got marked down. I was the only one who even bothered to slow down and I can’t imagine that these few people marking numbers were fast enough writing down more than a handful of people let alone the whole group. Worst of all I was wondering if the first person got marked? After all that person is somewhat responsible what the whole peleton does. Yes I know it is still my duty to follow the law but the whole thing happened so fast and I think the group didn’t slow down at all.
A few people in the group had a hard time to keep the pace of the group which made it even more inconsistent. That is when I decided to take the lead when that happens and make sure to keep a consistent pace. Sure enough shortly after that the group was split in half and we had a small consistent riding group together again. With only 5miles to go to the next big rest stop I once again had to pee and let the group ride ahead.
Once I got to the rest stop at Mile 145 I noticed how tired and hungry I was. I assumed this was because they don’t provide any sport drink at the rest stops only Nuun. Therefore I figured I was missing some calories and ate a whole lot at this stop. Unfortunately, the Nuun wasn’t even ready at this stop since we were 30min ahead of schedule so all we got for liquid was water. People were laying in the grass and enjoying the nice weather and it was really hard to find the motivation to get going again.
Since the others weren’t moving I decided to go by myself and lucky enough at the first stop I caught up with two other which I have been riding with before. The pace was a bit higher than earlier in the day we started to move at a good pace and we also caught up with some other people. But at this point groups weren’t that stable anymore, some of the riders didn’t have enough strength to lead or sometimes even to follow others. I dropped many riders. Not necessarily on purpose but by just moving forward. There were still a few strong riders out there which I was able to ride with. But at times it was riding alone and the road signal in Oregon weren’t that clear which made me wonder a few times if I was still on the right road.
Mile 175 last big rest stop. I ate a whole lot again and refilled my camelbak one last time. I also noticed that I lost the battery cover of my Quarq power meter. surprisingly enough the battery was still there, so I fixed it with some electrical tape.
Onto the last part of the ride, next stop would be Portland. At the rest stop I found some new riders to ride with one of them was bragging how easy it was since he always trains in altitude in Utah and here it is all flat. Guess what it was exactly this guy who wasn’t able to maintain a decent clip and than he also started playing around with his go pro while he was leading the group. After a few minutes I had enough of it and told one guy I knew that I would be going. He didn’t respond but it was time for me. I dropped into my aero bars and started pushing a little harder not before long I had passed the group and was riding alone. I was looking back, but the guy I knew didn’t follow me. So that is it, I am by myself. I started to focus on my heart rate and moving forward and than I noticed that one guy from the group was catching up to me. I slowed down a little so that we could team up. I felt really good at this point and once he was on my wheel I started to push hard (within my HR zone). But my Watts were well above 200. I asked the person behind me if he wanted to lead and he told me he could but he wouldn’t be as fast. As it turns out he was able to push a decent pace as well. But in the end I did 90% of the leading work to Portland. We passed many more riders some of them attempting to hang with us but most of them dropped back withing minutes. Once we got close to the finish I noticed that I was getting tired. As it turns out I averaged 230 Watts for the last hour.
I enjoyed the last couple turns through downtown and finished the ride. According to the volunteers handing out 1Day finisher badges I finished within the top 40. Not bad considering that 10’000 people start that ride 🙂

My time was 11 hours and the actual riding time was just over 10 hours. Average moving speed was 20.1miles/h (32.3km/h)
I drank 14 bottles of liquid, which certainly helped me to keep my performance up. This was only possible thanks to my camelbak. Not sure why I only saw so few people with a camelbak. I definitely recommend it for this ride!
Average heart rate of 129 bpm with an average power of 181 Watts. What a great training ride!

Bike HR and Watts