Tuesday Evening Foothills Ride

Every Tuesday, well most Tuesday nights a group of us ride the Foothills Parkway. Check out this site for a better description.http://www.theblueridgehighlander.com/scenic_drives/tennessee/foothills_parkway/



We all meet at a place know to the locals as Coulter bridge. The county was kind enough to pave a lot for us to park in. From there it is about a 3.5 mile warm up to the bottom of the parkway. The problem is, we time ourselves each time we ride. Each of us has a personal best time we try to lower. So the warm up turns into a 24 mph burn. You must make sure your heart rate is below 170 before beginning the climb. You see, the climb consists of two sections each about 6 miles at 6% grade.



Now if all of that doesn't seem tough enough, we race each other to the top. The 2008 16 year old Tenn State champion always wins. Way to go Ricky on the title, remember the old men when you are in the Olympics. He weighs around 120 and climbs like a squirrel. "I think they climb fast with little effort" So far my PB is 55:23. I feel real good about this number, but would love to get under 55. I can't complain, anything under 60 Min's is great and what most riders are working toward.

The parkway and surrounding areas have to be one of the most beautiful and perfect riding areas. We are so lucky to be so close. In a couple of posts, I will tell you about the crazy Sat. morning ride called 3 ways to hill. For a little preview, we ride to the top of the parkway climbing the face 3 different times on 3 different routes. All ave about 12-15% grade and 7,700 ft climbing. Here is the detail from my cycle computer http://trail.motionbased.com/trail/invitation/email/accept.mb?senderPk.pkValue=226945&unitSystemPkValue=2&episodePk.pkValue=6201765 Sphere: Related Content