Thank god for other riders

The ride

To be clear, I don‘t mean it was torture socially. I mean it was torture suffered socially. Conversation distracts from pain (unless you‘re my buddy, in which case when I try to talk going up long climbs, he tells me to shut the F up). Misery loves company. Etc.

Anyway, today was brutal. It started with about 14km of flat, and then it went up. For almost 40 soul-sucking kilometers and about 1700m. And then, of course, the descent was only like half of that. And then the final 60km of flat were in a valley oriented directly east-west, with me heading west, and the wind heading east.

(The evil valley)

Simplon simply the worst

In comparison to other mammoth climbs (Stelvio, Ventoux, Lamoille canyon), Simplon has a lot of drawbacks. It felt like it was 2/3 galleries, and it was heavily trafficked (also by RVs), which meant really unpleasant riding conditions, a lot of noise, and no view most of the time. When you did get a view, it was pretty nice though:

(Note: this was taken on the 2km of available side road)

(Glaciers! Not for long though. Womp womp. I‘m too exhausted to make a joke of climate change. Depressing.)

The saving grace to the climb was a guy named Jonas who I encountered with about 30km to go, and with whom I then rode the rest of the climb with. I may have gone faster without him, but I would have suffered infinitely more. So, thank you Jonas!

And the sights at the top and on the descent were marvelous.

(Don‘t ask me the names)

A 10kph loser

For those of you who haven‘t heard the term „false flat“, it‘s where the road looks flat, but actually goes uphill. It messes with your mind, because it‘s harder than it looks. Well, my last 60km were DOWHNILL goddammit, I was riding with the flow of the river, and still the wind was blowing hard enough to bring my speed down to 20kph. With no wind and the same effort, I‘d usually cruise around 28-30kph. After having gone uphill into a headwind for 40km, this was the last thing I needed. There were lots of unpleasantries uttered under my breath, and a few screamed into the wind, only to be swept away like the remaining shreds of my will power.

Then, with about 30km to go, a lady blew past me on a short uphill into an intersection. But after the intersection, she slowed down a bit, so I caught back up and proceeded to suck her wheel (ride her draft) for 10 minutes or so. Then she pulled off, gave me the full arm sweep to say „I‘m not pulling your ass the entire time“, and I thought my free ride was over. But it wasn‘t! I was able to flatter her (sorry, can’t pull through, you’re just too strong) and paint myself as a lost cause (to be fair, I was).

She let me draft until the next hill, then proceeded to drop me like a sack of potatoes. Until I found an inner reservoir of strength (the agony of potentially losing my draft propelling me onward), and I put in an effort to hook back on which very nearly cost me my lunch. Then she pulled another 15 minutes, before easing off and starting to socialize. We chatted for another 20 minutes or so, and before I knew it, I was only 10km from the hotel. Hallelujah! I swear, immediately we said our goodbyes, the wind picked up.

I made it though. Lived to see another today. Thankfully, tomorrow I‘m headed in the other direction, and I don‘t have any 40km climbs planned. Woot!