S2 : Day 4 - A day to regroup

Valencian team dinner... one big vat of Paella

Cafe con leche con coffee addict!

After close to 250miles and over 10k ft of elevation gain, we hard earned a day break. Not to mention the mud, rain, off roading and everything else that hit us, having a day break was well needed. We woke up late-ish, had a nice relaxed hotel buffet breakfast, where my father had way too many cafe con leches.

The day was spent getting sim cards, checking out the hotel a bit, and we browsed a sports store a bit that was across from the hotel. We discovered that the gym in the hotel had 10 state of the art "glute" machines and the oldest set of mini plates known to man. We decided to skip leg day and went back to one of the rooms to look at the route. After Shruti and I looked at the route on plotaroute... we decided we are trying to beat google and decided it was best if we just followed what they were recommending for day 5. :)

Matty and Eric vying for Miss Spain's attention ... 
i swear i heard "i luv green neck scarves too" 

We also grabbed lunch at two different places ... just because. It was the traditional Valencian "lunch crawl".

We headed in to the city via cab, did a bit of shopping, drinking coffee and then tried out traditional Paella which included rabbit and chicken amongst other ingredients. It was ok, but I preferred Shruti's veggie paella and the seafood paella I had later in the trip. The big city restaurants were kind of hit or miss unless you knew where to go. We were basically like tourists in times square eating at some chain restaurant.

We then finished up the night renting a car! This would be a game changer in terms of cycling the rest of the tour. It meant not carrying our full packs. We could bring just what we needed for the day. It was a life saver for the rest of the trip.

The next day we didnt know what was about to hit us. The first 30miles of flat terrain and then 37 miles climbing close to 4000ft... plus head on wind, in the dark and with the team split two and two... 

I dont know why they started doing this in the middle of the street at like 9pm.
There are another 17 pix just like this. It got messy during the full split street competition.

they say i pout when i take pix... i just dont see it??

i think this was a 15th century building

i believe this is the main market building where Eric bought his safron spices.
At dinner he spent 35mins elaborating on the spice 0_o

I was able to read Shruti's mind through her smile .... "riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiice!!!"

the face of a person who just lost their wallet on a bus 0_o
Ericism #3 ... we had to create a ticketing system to catalogue Eric and his mishaps.

All diff types of pork products... all d time

Ham ... ham everywhere! Even for bfast!

having taco bell for lunch in
Spain seems a bit offensive to me... if you open the pic,
you will see my name on the screen :D

S2 : Day 3 - We lose another one

Double the packs - anything for the team!

The trip from Peniscola to Valencia started just before 8am. I had spent 2 hours the night before cleaning and lubing everyone's breaks, chains and derailleurs. I think I finished at 1am[ or later ] The start of the trip had dealt us two really tough days and I was determined to try and make my team's 3rd day as successful and painless as possible. We were in a state of survival at this point and we needed to get to Valencia in one piece for a well deserved break day and a regroup on how we tackle the rest of the trip. I figured if i could take out all the squeeks and annoyances from the machines carrying us over the finish line, it would improve the moral. At the start of the ride it absolutely worked. I kept asking them to try to drip it in their thinking, that the bikes were functioning better, and they were - after all I couldnt make it much worse after all the rain and mud. :)

Castillo de Peñíscola - was super impressive. Didnt get a chance to see it up close, but it was awesome

As we rolled out of Peniscola things were going well. We then hit Parc Natural de la Serra d'Irta which was absolutely gorgeous, but gave us an up and down start to the 3rd day that broke one of us. Before we get in to that, some of our stats:

Ride Statistics
Date ....................... Tuesday January 9th 2018
Strava Link ................ https://www.strava.com/activities/1349228802

Departure Time ............. 7:57AM CET*
Departure Temperature ...... TBD
Time in  Motion ............ 9:27:51 / 70%
Time at Rest ............... 4:07:23 / 30%
Total Time ................. 13:35:14
Arrival Time ............... 9:32 PM CET
Arrival Temperature ........ TBD

Total Miles Cycled ......... 91.8 mi
Total Elevation ............ 3,350ft

Steve Avg Pace|Max Speed ... 9.7 mi/h | 28.6 mi/h
Shruti Avg Pace|Max Speed .. 6.8 mi/h | 24.4 mi/h
Matt Avg Pace|Max Speed .... 10  mi/h | 34.0 mi/h **
* Central European Time
** Matty seems to have missed about an hour on Strava

Tour Statistics
I decided to be extra nerdy and keep a cumulative running total of some key stats. :)
Total Time in Motion ....... 27:35:32 hh/mm/ss
Total Time on Road ......... 41:33:13 hh/mm/ss
Total Miles Cycled ......... 247.1 mi 
Total Elevation ............ 10,881 ft

The traditional morning selfie. The tradition lasted through each day from this and the ride in India

So we started the trek through the park and immediately were hit by very big climbs in terms of gradients. A few of the hills were so vertical, and the bikes were weighed down with our gear, we had to push the bikes up. If we had not had to carry the packs, i think a few of the ones we pushed the bikes up we could have ridden through. At this point since we were going up and down, I thought it was best to teach Shruti the art of the hill climb, or as I usually hit them. I'm sure people have different strategies, but these are the ones that work for me:

1. Get as much speed as possible on the highest gear as you can prior to the hill. Momentum will help carry you at least partially up the other side. I'm not going to get in to the potential and kinetic energy equations, but you get the point.

2. As you are peddling up the incline, a bit before you feel it getting tough, flip the front big ring down to the next. 

3. As you are peddling up and after you have flipped that first ring, start down shifting the rear derailuer
4. If all else fails, start zig zagging up the hill. It will reduce the gradient of the incline and make it easier to get up the hill. It will increase the overall length, but you will be able to make it.

Powering up those Spanish mountains and
cheesin' before her fencing match. Baklava :)

There are a few other techniques, but this seemed to work for Shruti as she powered up the hills consistently from that point on. Some other cool links on the park that I found: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_Park_of_Serra_d%27Irta

Nice article on Serra d'Irta: http://www.independent.co.uk/travel/europe/secret-garden-explore-valencias-sierra-de-irta-1667123.html

We made it out of the parc and while on our way to Torreblanca, Shruti was starting to show some signs of wear and tear due to the packs and continuous head winds. After Torreblanca, I offered to carry the majority of her bags. I was determined to get us all over the finish line and in to our rest day. On our way to Benicassim there was the largest uphill of the day, clocking in at 382ft. This combined with headwinds seemed to be the final straw for the day. We rolled in to Benicassim, a really fantastic downhill that I gopro'd, videos yet to be downloaded. Shruti made the decision to call a taxi from there, which was the right thing to do for her and for the team. We had quite a bit of mileage to go [ 93 for the day ] and with the sunlight running out, we wouldn't have made it otherwise.

After Shruti told me she was going to take a train the rest of the way I told her we have to take one "last known photo" of her, just in case. She told me we should take one of me for the same reason! =P

So we left Shruti to relax and grab a train to Valencia, I left her a bag of my stuff so I didnt have to carry it as well. My legs needed it after double packing it for about 20miles. I didnt realize how much of a toll the extra weight had on me until we rolled in to Valencia and I was wiped.

Orange poachers of Valencia!

So my dad, Matt and I put it in to overdrive and headed out of Benicassim. The goal was to shoot along the N-340, which would become our go to road for a lot of the trip, and get in to Valencia as early as possible. As we made our way out of the city, we passed tons and tons of orange groves and sampled a few oranges. As the sun was setting, we made one final stop at a gas station[ i think it was in NUles ] and pigged out on pastries, snickers bars and a red bull. We were heading in to fierce wind with loaded bikes and legs that had 2 days of pain. I checked mywindsock.com and we had 80% headwind for the day... it felt like `120% :P

mywindsock.com analysis ... damn you Headwind!!

So as we road face down in to the wind, I thought to myself, why dont we try to draft? I had never done it before, but I figured with the 3 of us, maybe we could muscle it out. Matt and I gave my dad a break [ i hate to see a man cry :) ] and we took the brunt of the rotations. Checking back at the stats from mile 40 onwards we definitely were in the range of 10-15mph the remainder of the ride. I honestly believe, and I probably always will that the combination of a snickers bar and redbull + Spanish pastries gave us the energy to power through. :)

If you are feeling extremely nerdy and would like to see the speed analysis, you can find it here: https://www.strava.com/activities/1349228802/analysis

So we finally made it to Valencia, the city proper, and we thought we were done. Little did we know that the hotel was on the opposite side on the outskirts/suburbs. I had to drag my body the remaining 6-10miles, i dont even know at this point to the hotel. It was painful to say the least, between the morning climbs, carrying the extra bags and then taking a long session of the wind breaking during the draft, I was wasted. It is probably the most tired physically I have ever been from riding a bicycle. When i did 104miles in India that was a pain too, but there was no elevations, just insane wind that would stop me in place!

I dont think i had ever been so hungry
or tired.  I was wiped out 
and the buffet in Valencia 
was a perfect ending.

We roll in to the hotel finally and find out that Shruti is still not there! We left her about 5.5 hours earlier and assumed she would be there. So now we had the added worry of navigating her back to the hotel. She had multiple train tickets that got cancelled and she finally made it to the city. Cabs wouldnt take her because of the bike so she managed to recreate our trek through the city and made it to us safe and sound! We were all there, safe and sound and filled up from a buffet. I dont think I have ever been so hungry, ate so much and still not been full. We all slept well that night and would be enjoying a nice, well deserved break day the next day. We needed to get mentally ready, physically ready, tend to our wounds as we had 5 days of cycling until the next break!

This is as painful as it looks first think in the morning.

Shruti forced me to take a pic of myself

Team cruising by one of the flat coastal points in the Serra D'Irta.

We made it through Serra d'Irta ... we needed a coffee break.

Sandwich eating pics are catching on! :)

double loaded pack on the way to Benicassim

Street oranges were everywhere!

S2 : Day 2 - We all made it!

Ride Statistics
Date ....................... Monday January 8th 2018
Strava Link ................ https://www.strava.com/activities/1347547306

Departure Time ............. 8:42AM CET*
Departure Temperature ...... TBD
Time in  Motion ............ 8:54:40 / 66%
Time at Rest ............... 4:30:34 / 34%
Total Time ................. 13:25:14
Arrival Time ............... 10:20PM CET
Arrival Temperature ........ TBD

Total Miles Cycled ......... 79.5mi
Total Elevation ............ 3,061ft

Steve Avg Pace|Max Speed ... 8.9 mi/h | 31.3 mi/h
Shruti Avg Pace|Max Speed .. 8.3 mi/h | 23.5 mi/h
Matt Avg Pace|Max Speed .... 9.9 mi/h | 36.7 mi/h
Going to remove Eric and Dad as they don't really use Strava
* Central European Time

Tour Statistics
I decided to be extra nerdy and keep a cumulative running total of some key stats. :)

Total Time in Motion ....... 18:07:41 hh/mm/ss
Total Time on Road ......... 27:57:59 hh/mm/ss
Total Miles Cycled ......... 155.3 mi
Total Elevation ............ 7,531 ft

Day 1 gave us a hard wake up in terms of what we were in for on this trip. We weren’t ready for the weather, temperatures, baggage and elevations and terrain to all hit us at once. This led us in to a day 2 where we started weary, hurting and a lot of our gear and clothing still wet.

The route took us from Salou to Peniscola clickng in at almost 80miles with a 3000 elevation gain. Personally i had only trained for about 1500ft per session, but I did do some running and stairclimber which I think helped.

So we head out at 8:40am, point ourselves south and down the coastline of salou towards our destination. The coastline is great and the teams spirits raised seeing the coastline. Within a few hundred meters we experienced our 2nd bicycle failure. Erics chain snapped. I was thinking to myself that this trip is jynxed. Bad weather, the team didnt Train collectively enough for the distances and our mapping preparation was not right.

So i took out matts multitool, was broke the bad link off of erics bike and reassembled the chain. He was down a couple of links, but the bik was working. We stopped for our morning coffee and pastry or tostado, selfied it up and headed off.

We cycled down the coast, through some small beach towns and had one of our 3 major climbs before lunch. We hit a great pier made from stones and after cycling to the end of the concrete i decided to risk it all and clamor out on to the stones.

at the end of the stone pier. Behind me is a light house.
The rock size is deceiving. Each one is half the size of a small car!

We stopped for a really nice lunch and more patates bravas in the town of
L’Ametlla de mar. We pretty much instituted a meal selfie routine that we only broke once or twice on the whole trip. ( you can guess that i am not writing this in real time )

After lunch we headed down the coast and had a bit of ups and downs with some cool tunnels and a bit more pushing. The weather behaved itself with sun and not too much headwind.

Eric's bike started causing us a bit of trouble as it just wasn't made for long distances and was wearing down on the poor guys knees. Shruti and I went ahead as the elevation + distance, plus the shorter amount of daylight hours was causing us to get a bit chilly and cycle in the dark. We have lights and clothing, but it isn't comfortable. Matt and my dad were on Eric duty, making sure he got through it.

I was waiting for the
McPollo ALLLLLLLLLLLLL day :)

Shruti was about to become a human icicle so we decided to stop at Decathalon where we bought her thinner tires, some gloves and a light windbreaker. [ it is very nice and I think I am going to buy one myself before I leave Spain. ] Matty, dad and Eric roll up to the Decathalon, get some supplies and we head over for a delicious Mcd's dinner [ it was too late and we were too tired to go any where else ] I have been seeing signs for the McPollo for miles and had to have one. It was tasty!

The ride was a success, but a bit tough because of the number of hours on the road waiting and making sure everyone made it through ok. This would be Eric's last ride for a long while, but he does make another appearance on Day 8. 

We cycled up to our airbnb, which was up another mountain 0_o ... and all cleaned up. I spent the next hour opening up Steve's bike shop and cleaning/regreasing the chains, front and rear derailleurs and brakes. Thankfully, I found half a staple in Matt's tire and removed it before he had a flat. Will post a pic on day 3.

So we ended a bit cold, but we ended all together. It would be the first and last time for the rest of the trip that all 5 of us made it together through the day's journey.

one of many cool tunnels we hit on the trip

sunrise leaving Salou

First coffee and pastry stop of the day!

up and downs around the coast was very scenic... and completely desolate!

lunch after the pier

pushing up the hills and gravelly roads. Google thinks everything is a bike path!

climb climb climb!!

daunting

end of day McD's and pouty duck face :P

rowwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr ... McPolloooooooooooooooooooooo