An event almost 3 years in the making - we finally managed to complete the Gran Fondo from Vancouver to Whistler! This past Saturday, Justine, Nicole and I were up at the crack of dawn, gathered in Stanley Park and joined over 6,000 other crazy people in riding the 122 km up to Whistler. It was a tougher day than expected (more on that later), but we completed it, and enjoyed the day.
The map of the ride from Stanley Park to Whistler.
We were up before the sun on Saturday morning. nervous and excited for the event. The training was done (well, not nearly enough of it…), the plans were set and all our gear was prepped and ready to go.
Nicole had been super helpful in working with us on Friday to shuttle our truck up to Whistler, and stayed with us on Friday night. We picked up our race packages at the horribly organized race expo Friday evening. It was ridiculous, but only the first of many fiascos over the course of the event that made it clear that the organizers were cutting corners. This is not the amazing event it used to be, and bordered on being dangerous for the participants. But we’ll get to that.
We were still feeling good and excited at 7:00 a.m., just before the race started.
Saturday morning started off beautiful. On the ride over, as dawn was breaking, we had an amazing view of the setting harvest moon. It was huge and orange and looked spectacular. The sun rose on a beautiful, clear day as we settled ourselves into the queue for the start of the race. It was a bit warmer than we would have liked, but better than rain.
We slotted in the “6-hour+” range, knowing that we’d not be breaking any records this year. The first time we did it (over a decade ago it took us about 6 hours and 15 minutes, and being a little older we hoped we could match that time. The last time I did the race solo I set a personal best that will never be matched at 4 hours and 28 minutes, but I was planning to stick with the team this time around.
Ready to ride!
All queued up in the park.
An amazing sunrise set us off.
The race officially started at 7:00 a.m., and we heard the cheer go up as the race started. We were way at the back of the queue, and our section didn’t even start moving for at least 20 minutes. It took between 30-35 minutes for us to finally hit the official starting line, and even after that there were so many people that it was slow going as we made out way into the park.
Almost to the starting line.
We made our way through the park, up the hill and onto the Causeway, and eventually onto the Lion’s Gate Bridge. It’s one of the best parts of this event - getting to ride on the road, no cars and look out from the bridge deck. I stayed with Nicole and Justine all the way up Taylor Way, onto the highway and along as we made our way towards Horseshoe Bay.
As we started into the continuous hills (and general ascent) towards Squamish and the halfway point of the race, I started to lose Justine and Nicole. So I would stop at the rest stops and the odd easy (and safe) pull out to wait for them. And try to act as course photographer and videographer.
Now, about the rest stops. I don’t know what the organizers were thinking. They moved the first rest stop, and put it at the top of the steepest hill (that otherwise wouldn’t be part of the course) on the ride. It was insane. Most of the people riding the course couldn’t even ride to the top of the hill (they got off and walked), causing chaos and unsafe conditions for all the people trying to come and go. And then, once you got up there you might well have not bothered. There were not enough washrooms (most people were just going off into the forest), there were limited people doing fills on people’s water bottles and there was no food available, other than some pretty gross looking bananas. It was a joke and people were very upset. I think a lot of people did not pack a lot of nutrition for the ride, assuming there would be gels or bars at the rest stops. The last time I did the ride I skipped all but one of the rest stops, so i don’t know if this was a problem just with this year, or if this downward spiral of event (dis)organization has been happening for a while.
I eventually found Justine and Nicole and we escaped the madhouse that was the “rest stop”. It was so bad the we ended up stopping on the side of the road a few miles later to make our own washrooms. Brutal, and it was only going to get worse.
That disaster of a rest stop was near Porteau Cove, and we stayed together through the next section, and through most of the climb up the hill at Furry Creek. There was a good spot on the side of the road at the top of the hill where I could wait for them, and we celebrated the minor victory that was that stupid hill. From there, we worked our way north, past Britannia Beach and towards Squamish. At this point I had pulled away from the girls, and enjoyed flying along the relatively flat area through Squamish. The next rest stop was near Alice Lake, and I stopped there to wait for them.
I had expected that the fiasco that was the first rest stop was a fluke - but no such luck. While this one was better suited, it was over run with cyclists (probably because no one got anything useful at the first rest stop and were now getting desperate), and so it was a bit dangerous at the entrance. The volunteers were trying hard to get people off the road, but were not very successful and so riders were veering out onto the part of the road where there traffic was still zooming past, trying to avoid the backlog of people trying to stop.
And the worst part was that this rest stop was no better provisioned than the last! There was water and electrolytes, but still no food (but someone did mention that the bananas were edible this time…). It was ridiculous. Fortunately we had brought enough food with us to properly fuel us for the distance, but many people were not that well prepared. I ate a bar and waited for the girls. It was getting hot, and a new challenge arose - a strong headwind.
After the girls caught up and we had a short break, we started off again. The ride from Squamish to Whistler is basically uphill the whole way - sure there are a couple of descents, but it’s long a grueling. We were over half way at this point, but it sure didn’t feel like it!
We kept our rhythm going - me pulling ahead, then waiting for the to catch up through the third rest stop. This was through one of the most scenic and beautiful stretches of the ride. This section had one of the best stretches of downhill that I had been looking forward to for the whole ride. I remember it being fast and smooth the last time. A totally different story this time. The headwind was insane. I was going downhill, in an area where I should have been able to carry 60-70 km/h, and I was having to pedal hard to no maintain 45 km/h and not slow down! Going down the hill!
It seemed to take them longer than expected to catch up, so as I waited at the third rest stop, I was a little concerned. This stop was great in terms of its physical location, but just just as badly provisioned - still no food. Just bad fruit.
When Jus and Nicole got there, it turned out that Jus’ knee was bothering her. She was feeling sharp pain when climbing hills - and there were still a lot of hills to go, so that was concerning. She went to see the medical tent - at least there was one of those - and they did what they cool. They wrapped her knee with a tensor bandage, and it seemed to help. But more damning for the “race organizers”, the medical people had no real supplies either! They were given some tiny first aid kit, but nothing to help with sports injuries. Many of them used their own supplies because they were not given what they needed. It’s kind of insane.
Despite the pain, Justine was a trooper and kept on going!
A bit worried about Justine getting through the last ~30 km, I made a few more stops and waited for them a bit more frequently. I stopped at the turn off to Garibaldi Lake, and managed to also get a short video of them going by.
The ride up to the last rest stop has lots of long, gradual climbs. And with the soul-crushing headwinds, it was a real slog. The last rest stop was… amazing! They finally had real food, lots of room for people and were organized. This is what all of the rest stops should have been like. Not surprisingly, by this point the road was littered with people that had to stop on the side of the road. You saw lots of people resting in the shade, stretching out muscle cramps and just trying to gather themselves for the final push.
I left them at the final rest stop and made the long climb up to the Village. It doesn’t seem like it should be hard, but after 100 km of riding, the final stretch is hard. Especially on this day with the wind. Soul crushing. I’ll bet it added an hour to our time.
Eventually I crossed the line after an elapsed time of just over 7 hours. I never would have thought it would take us that long. My “moving time” on my Garmin pegged me at 5:29, but that’s just an estimate at best. I certainly got a chance to take in the scenery and enjoy the ride in a way that I didn’t when I was pushing myself for a time. Justine and Nicole came through about half an hour later and we celebrated finishing the ride!
Success!
After picking up our medals, we got cleaned up and changed and headed over to the post race party for a well deserved meal and beer! This part of the event was pretty good - the food was good, Red Truck provided the beer and we sat on the grass and rested our poor legs.
All cleaned up after some beer and food - feeling much better at that point!
The finish line (a while later).
Eventually, it was time to head for home and our final destination - the couch!
The brutal north wind that I have complained about throughout also blew a ton of smoke from forest fires in around the province. As we headed back towards the city, the smoke was starting to become more and more apparent; you could smell it in the air and it makes for some atmospheric photos! It was a good thing the race wasn’t a day later!
While we were glad we did the ride, the lack of professional organization certainly left a bad feeling about the event. They’re going to need to do a lot better before I’d think about doing it again. Here are a few stats on the ride, and some details from my Garmin.
