Bay Country Century Ride Recap

Yesterday I had the pleasure of riding the Bay Country Century just south of Annapolis, sponsored by the Annapolis Bike Racing Team and Parvilla bike shop.  The event is in its 17th year and judging by the number of people who participated and the smiles along the way, it is not stopping anytime soon.  Hit the break for the full report.




The route takes riders from Northern Middle School along backroads around most of the Prince Frederick peninsula.  The route was well marked, although I did get lost early (around mile 7), but I think it was my mistake in missing an arrow.  Several ride distance options were available, at 25, 50, 62, and 100 miles.  I decided to ride the full English century (100 miles) and was not disappointed.  Most of the terrain was rolling hills and gentle grades, but I distinctly remember several pretty steep (~10%) kickers being scattered throughout the course.

The kind of roads I spent most of my 100 miles looking at.  Not too shabby

I rode the first 30 or so miles with my good friend Paul and his father (also Paul) before heading out on my own.  I found the rest stops to be well staffed with friendly volunteers and well stocked with all kinds of food (the PB&J sandwiches at all the rest stops as well as the pies at the North Beach stops were the highlights).  A little rain did little top dampen the spirits, and I found everyone along the route was courteous and friendly.  The route was very pretty, most of it on small and uncrowded 2-lane roads.  I was able to ride long stretches of the route alone with my thoughts, and that was really nice.

Some people put performance enhancing substances into themselves to ride bikes, others ride bikes to put delicious performance DEhancing food into themselves.  Pretty sure everyone who rode was solidly in that second camp.

The ABRT crew running the event was also very experienced at making sure the event was fun and safe for all.  I personally know and ride with many of them on the weekly ABRT club rides (another post about that coming soon). Around mile 70 I passed a lady who had fallen over on a steep hill.  When I reached the next rest stop I notified the volunteers, but they already had crew en-route to pick the lady up.

This ride was the test for a lot of new equipment in my quiver and I'll be writing separate posts about each in the next few days.  I rode the newly built up Il Progetto Colnago, and she performed beautifully.  I was guided by a Motoactv GPS, kept cool and comfortable with a Rapha Club Jersey and Louis Garneau shorts, and transferred power using a pair of Bontrager RXXXL Limited shoes.  I finished the day off with (what else?) an enormous Chipotle meal.

Post-ride refueling (Sadly, I did not actually make it through all of this).

The link to the Strava route is below.  I even got a KOM!  Not too bad.


All in all, it was a great day to be on the bike, and I can't wait to ride it again next year!