I don’t remember how Pack Monadnock came to my mind and I became obsessed with it for the 4th of July weekend, but I am familiar with it for sure now after cycling (we cyclists call it “climbing”, just with two wheels) up the summit for 3 times in a row in 3 days.
Oh now I actually remembered. My coworker Mark proposed this idea to climb up two summits in one ride – Pack Monadnock and Mt Wachusett, and the route is conveniently called “Twin Peaks”. It is one of the classics of our local cycling club routes. We tried to do it together last year, but an unexpected thunderstorm cut it short – we thought it’d be a bad idea to be on top of mountains when lightings strike. For 4th of July this year, we were both in town, and he proposed to try it again at first. But then he doubted if he could do it, and instead, he wanted to only go up Wachusett. I convinced him to get back on the original idea, because JJ never backs down.
Now a little background on Pack Monadnock: It is one of the hardest climbs that are close to Massachusetts / Boston area. It has its own PJAMM page. It is 1.2 miles long with 12% average grade. It is tough. But it is one of the few mountains in the area that cyclists can climb up, so it becomes a classic.
But how did I end up doing it 3 days in a row for 3 times? Let me explain… I’m not crazy, or insane.
Day 1
I had an appointment with Hot Tubes – the carbon repair / paint shop to repair my cracked carbon frame on the gravel bike – in Shirley, MA, which is not too far from New Hampshire. When I looked at the map, it occurred to me that, if I were going that far to drop off the frame for repair, why don’t I bring my road bike with me and go for a ride? And since I was already close to NH, why don’t I try to climb up Pack Monadnock by myself for the first time? (even though I was going to do that again with Mark the next day, totally makes sense, right???)
So I laid out a route from the carbon repair shop, which doesn’t open until 9:30. I arrived at 8am and started my ride right away.
It was very muggy, humid and hot. But in the early morning when I felt good, I was ripping fast. It was nice until I hit one small but very annoying problem: due to the high humidity, my sweat kept dripping down into my eyes, mixed with the sunscreen I put on my forehead. That stung really bad, and it always happened to my right eye. I tried to wipe off the sweat, which didn’t really help that much because as long as I was pedaling, I produced more sweat. At one point, I was riding with my right eye closed, in tremendous pain, with cars driving by fast. I found a safe place to stop, and started wiping off my head and forehead with my jersey. I also tried to wipe off any sunscreen residual on my forehead too.
At that point, I noticed I was going at a pretty fast pace, averaged over 160watts for the first 1/3 of the ride. I felt really good, I was flying over 20+mph on flat roads, which felt amazing.
When I turned onto NH-101 highway, there was a long, 6-10%, hot climb to the state park entrance (where the Pack Monadnock climb starts) on narrow shoulder with cars ripping by at 50+mph. It was miserable, but not particularly hard for me because 6-10% isn’t really something I was concerned about, so I pushed hard. Even at the bottom of the mountain, I felt good, chatting and laughing with the lady at the entrance booth. I was confident that I would be able to ride up the summit without blowing up my legs.
It wasn’t too bad at the beginning, and then it suddenly gets really steep. I was still confident that I could make it up without waving, or zig-zag (to reduce the grade), and from my experience on Blue Hills, I could power through the first steep section, and take a breath at the not-so-steep (aka 8%) section in the middle.
However I completely underestimated the mountain. It was hard, and I was pushing too hard after already climbing 3000ft that day. Sweat kept dripping into my eyes, and I couldn’t stop pedaling – on the steep sections, once I stop, I would fall; or if I had the chance to unclip, I’d never be able to clip in again until I walk to the not-so-steep section.
Hikers must have heard me screaming. I finally made to the flat-ish section, and I knew I had to stop for a few minutes. I stopped to catch my breath, had some water, and just wasn’t sure what the hell happened in the past 5 minutes to my body. I felt I was gonna die. From the data I saw after the ride, my heart rate went up to 199 – the highest ever recorded in my life. When my HR went down to 130 or so, I decided to start climbing again. It took me a few tries to clip in, but I kept going eventually. I decided to take it slow, and waving up the summit if necessary. Even with that strategy, I was at my limit when I got to the summit. I felt like I was gonna throw up. I threw my bike on the grass, sit down on a rock in the shade, unzipped my jersey and just took long breathes. There is a store too, with running water. I dipped my head under the faucet and it felt so good.
I took my time to drink water and eat a bar, bought a Gatorade, took some pictures, and I was ready to descend. The road is pretty bumpy with a lot of potholes. I was warned to be careful on the way down by the lady at the entrance. So I kept my hands on the drop to have more leverage for the brake levers – definitely not to be aerodynamic… And squeezed the brake hard on the way down. I was very careful, but almost my whole body weight was on my hands on the bar, so by the end of the descend, my hands hurt a little. Shortly I got on my way to Peterborough for lunch.
Mark recommended me a lunch spot Twelve Pine in Peterborough, and I decided to stop by. The descend into Peterborough was really fun – great road conditions because it’s state highway, and I hit 42mph. While I was gobbling down the chicken salad wrap (with apple slices and walnuts – delicious!), I was trying to figure out what went wrong on my climb. I never expected I’d have to stop to catch my breath in the middle of the hill climb. I did Mt Ascutney last year which was 3x as long and just as steep, and I never had to stop. The grade profile of Pack Monadnock is a bit interesting: the first 1/3 is very very steep, but the middle 1/3 is kinda flat at around 8% with some real flat sections to catch breath, and the last 1/3 is even steeper than the first. So I underestimated the difficulty and pushed too hard on the first 1/3, which forced my HR to explode and forced me to stop.
I started my way back after the delicious lunch, and I expected it to be way easier, and oh dear was I wrong, so wrong. The storm started rolling in, and I tried my best to ride as far as I could before getting wet. Peterborough is in a valley, so heading out is still a hard climb. Again I found myself pushing hard again. Inevitably I still got caught in the rain storm and got soaked. The route was planned in such a way that I’d take the most direct, fastest way possible back to Shirley. That means there’s a long stretch about 15 miles on NH state highway. The rain was pouring, I was soaked, and the water washed sunscreen again into my eyes. I was descending on wet roads in the rain with only one eye open. After enduring that awful pain, I decided to take a break. Still in the rain, but I managed to wipe off most of water from my head and forehead. The 15 miles stretch on the highway was definitely a grind. I kept looking down at my navigation, and the distance to the next turn was just not moving, or moving so slow, which was so discouraging.
As I was approaching MA again the weather became nice, and I was properly cooled down by the rain. I was even dried off after a while. I started enjoying the ride and the view again. Time flies when you’re having fun, and I didn’t remember what exactly happened in the last stretch of beautiful ride. But when I got back to my car, I was happy that I was done with the ride. I took my time to change my shoes, put the bike in my car, and get ready to drop off the cracked frame to Toby at Hot Tubes.
And I wouldn’t know what to expect for the following day.
TO BE CONTINUED.
