I’m
posting this list of Top Ten Tahoe Tips early, so you may want to check back
once or twice before the ride as I may remember some additional items, or
others who have ridden AMBBR may have different thoughts:
1.
It’s a ride, not a race. There are no
timing chips, nobody cares (or will be able to find out) how fast you finish,
if you finish before the guy with the car keys, you’ll be waiting anyway, and
if you don’t stop frequently and enjoy the scenery, you’ll miss a lot of what
makes the ride fun.
2. In fact, there are benefits to starting slow
and finishing strong. The ride attempts
to split the field into 4 different starting blocks, every 15 minutes between 6
and 7 am. However, nobody pays attention
to their starting group assignment, and everybody tries to leave between 6 and
6:15 am. This means that the road is crowded
at the start, and even more so about 15 miles in when volunteers and the county
sheriff deputies check ride credentials of every rider, single file. (Also, make sure you have your AMBBR sticker
on your helmet and your plastic AMBBR bracelet available for the checkpoint.)
3. After the checkpoint, you almost immediately
enter the switchbacks climbing up to the top of Emerald Bay, but the road up the
mountain is filled with multiple riders abreast, with tremendously varying
skills. You will not be able to maintain
a consistent pace up Emerald Bay, and will have to watch out for slower riders
who, despite trying as hard as they can, can’t avoid weaving and can’t stay out
of your way. It’s just the way it is;
you’ll have to spend 20-30 minutes avoiding other riders while climbing. Don’t gripe about it, or you’ll be the jerk,
not them.
4. The summit atop Emerald Bay isn’t a rest
stop, but almost everybody stops there anyway to shed layers and use the park
restroom facilities. If you have a
spouse or friend who wants to be an illegal SAG wagon, that’s a great place to
meet them. (The other great place to
meet is the Truckee rest stop.) Even if
the day is cold at the start, you’ll have warmed up by the top of Emerald and
want to shed some clothing. Just don’t
drop everything; there’s a significant drop after Emerald summit, and you may
wind up going the fastest of the day on the ride back down to the lake, and you
may wish you had kept your jacket and/or arm warmers.
5. Don’t miss the Homewood rest area, at mile
25-30; the new red potatoes boiled in salt water are probably my favorite
cycling food ever. However, at Homewood
– and every other rest area – don’t wait in line for the port-a-potties, where
there’s always a line; the line is always shorter for some reason at regular
rest room facilities, which at Homewood are the restrooms for the ski area, and
at other rest stops, look for the restrooms at the supermarket at Truckee and the
public park restrooms just before the lunch stop at Kings Beach.
6. The turnoff for Truckee is at about mile
35. You can make a game-day decision
whether to go for the century or limit your ride to 72 miles. It’s a slight downhill to Truckee, but that
means a slight climb back to the Tahoe route, and it can be windy. The scenery is nice, you pass the site of the
1960 Winter Olympics, and the route to and from Truckee is a great paceline
opportunity. So if you go to Truckee,
don’t go alone, or find other riders to work with or it can be a long ride.
7. They serve a regular lunch – sandwiches,
chips, cookies, fruit – at Kings Beach, at about mile 65. Make sure you don’t vary your nutrition (in
terms of amount) too much, because about 5-10 miles after Kings Beach is the 1,500-foot
climb up to Spooner Summit, which is 7,000 feet. It’s not a steep climb but it’s about 15
miles long; if you did Nine Mile Hill, you shouldn’t have any problems.
UPDATE: 7A. I forgot to add that after lunch at Kings Beach, you cross into Nevada and shortly after the apex of Crystal Bay, the ride leaves NV-28 to follow Lakeshore Blvd. through in Incline Village. There are a series of 4-way stop signs on Lakeshore, with IV residents in lawn chairs who monitor that cyclists stop at each of them. It's a waste of time and energy but you have to obey traffic laws here or face the everlasting scorn of rich retirees. It's only about 6 miles, so grit your teeth and pretend you're smiling.
8. The rest area atop Spooner is a good place to
get the group back together for the last 20 miles, generally downhill to South
Lake Tahoe. The key word is “generally”;
you’ll drop back that 1,500 feet over the last 15 miles, but not uniformly, and
there will be some relatively short climbs that can totally frustrate you
because you’ve already ridden 90 miles and what’s with the uphill?
9. At the finish, you need to check in with the
Team in Training tent; they track all riders doing a TnT event, and need to
know you’re off the route. You’ll get a
TnT finisher’s medal, and they’ll take your picture. There also are commercial photographers; they
take your picture climbing up Emerald Bay.
You need to remember the time or batch number that they call out when
you pass the photographer, so you know which group your photo is in; otherwise,
you’re reviewing thousands of photos to find the invariably unattractive one of
you grinding up the hill. TnT doesn’t
have much in the way of food for free at the finish; there are vendors selling
food, but you’ll need to have cash with you.
Instead, we may try to organize some drinks and snacks in the parking
lot where bikes will be picked up after the ride.
10. Weather can be highly variable, so bring
layers. It’s usually cool at the start,
but one year it was in the low 40’s and wet, so you needed leg warmers,
multiple layers, and winter gloves, and another year we started at 65 degrees
in shorts with arm warmers only. The
high never usually gets above 80, and the problem usually is on the cold end, like
the year it sleeted for the first 2 hours, and the fog was so thick you couldn’t
see across the lake even after the sun came out. So be prepared for highly variable conditions
that can change dramatically during the course of the day. And wear sunscreen.
That’s
your day. Starting shortly after 6 am,
most people doing the century and visiting almost every rest stop should finish
by 3 pm, although the sun is up until 8 pm and there’s no shame in finishing at
5 pm, and if you finish at 2 pm or before the bulk of the group, you may wind
up waiting for us because the slower riders will have the necessary car and
house keys anyway.
Other
tips and thoughts:
Don’t
forget to bring rags to clean your bike, especially if it rains. The rental house won’t have them, and while in
past years, the Marriott has made old towels available for their riders, that’s
not guaranteed and those of you staying other places shouldn’t count on having
bike rags available. You also may want
to bring an old sheet or bedspread, which could may be useful if we have to
transport your bike in a rental car with others to or from the start or finish,
or to meet the trailer for pickup or dropoff.
It
will be hard to do a team photo, though we’d like to have one. Most times you have to do one at the start,
but then people are in layers and you can’t see the kits. It usually never works to take a photo at the
end, because people are doing different distances and some need to leave as
soon as they finish. Whatever we do,
some people will be left out, and my apologies in advance.
UPDATE 5/19: AMBBR requires that all riders sign in individually, there's no way to register everyone for the ride in advance. However, riders who signed up early enough to have TnT handle your registration will pick up ride ID and sign waivers at a special TnT distribution, which is usually very efficient. Riders who had to register personally have to go to the regular AMBBR registration, at Tahoe Sports in the Raley's shopping center in SLT. The line can be long at Tahoe Sports in the morning, so if you have to sign in yourself, I recommend going in the late morning or early afternoon to avoid the rush.
Finally, I’ll be sending around information on
bike pickup and dropoff next week, and also will ask if anyone is interested in
a short spin on Saturday morning or afternoon.
Some riders want to warm up the day before by riding from South Lake
Tahoe to the top of Emerald Bay, which is about a 30-35 mile ride and helps you
understand what you’ll face on Sunday.
However, I’ve never managed to get to Tahoe early enough in the day on
Saturday to ride, and it’s never seemed to diminish my enjoyment on Sunday, so
a Saturday spin is truly optional; it just depends on whether the timing would
work for you and the bike transport Brews crews.
UPDATES 5/19: AMBBR riders, especially TnT riders, have been coached to call out road hazards and always call out "on your left" when passing, even when the hazard is "Asphalt!" and there's absolutely no point in calling out passes. Be aware that even schlubby riders will expect you to politely say "On your left" when passing, even if there's no safety issue involved, and you'll often get yelled at for not calling out passes even when it doesn't matter. Just call it out every time you pass a rider with a TnT jersey, or one of those funny/stupid team logos on their helmet.
Rest stop strategy: Stop at the top of Emerald Bay, at the park restrooms, and not at the first official rest area about a mile up the road. You also should skip the rest area halfway up Spooner and instead just keep spinning until the rest area at the top. Otherwise, you want to stop at Homewood, Truckee, Kings Beach, and Spooner, if only for the views. You'll also finish with more food than when you started if you do. And if you can, it's good to regroup at Spooner, and then wait for stragglers about a half mile from the end, at the right turn to the back of the finish line parking lot, so everybody on Team Andy (who can) can finish together.
I had a very good swim, especially considering
the surf, waves 1-2 feet and maybe more by the end. The picture may make the waves look worse due
to foreshortening by the camera, but we had to duck under the waves until we
swam past the breakers to the main course.
The race was wetsuit optional; water temperature exceeded the level
where you could wear a wetsuit and have an official time. Everybody else with TriScottsdale wore a
wetsuit, but I was fine without (and in fact next time, won’t wear a tri top,
even a pre-worn top and Glide didn’t stop all the chafing in salt water.)
