Hillacious Hills Ride Report--the Yankees take control

The Man, the Myth, the Mapmaker, Dave Miller, aka Silent Dave, showing off a thing of beauty, his latest creation, a map for his Hillacious Hills ride.  Easy to read, cue sheet on the back, too many bits of information to list here, it is a document that rivals the Federalist Papers.  Good turnout of around 45 for clearly what is not for everyone, a heck of a hilly ride. 

A sparkling, clear, sunny morning for a bike ride with unusually low humidity and start temp of 49 degrees.  Some of central Ohio's elite climbers showed up lead by Dustin Reed (Old Chubbs), Steve Oxley, John Day, Scott Young and then some of the boys up north (the Yankees) rolled in led by Marty, Tym Tyler, Pete C and Cornell. 

Silent Dave gave the usual cautionary statements about not doing stupid stuff and then called out those who intended to ride the full century and off went the majority.  I had things to do so I had to opt for a shorter option and watched....

.....as first the century and then everyone else rolled out.  I bunched in with Mark C, Flyin Tuna, Mitch O, Mark V, the Kendas, Jeff S and a couple of others.  Mark C led a splinter group of weaklings who wanted no part of the Hillacious route and instead, broke off at mile 3 for the flat lands of the southwest...sissies!  The few, the brave, the elite kept going but now I found myself with only the Kendas and we rolled in to Lancaster where I saw something you don't see every day.  A man and woman were, I thought, walking a dog but as we drew closer, it was a raccoon walking up behind the two.  The woman began screaming at first, then shrieking while doing a little dance. We kept going, hitting that evil little climb on Stump Hollow before stopping at the bottom of the hill.  We decided to do more than our planned 60 miles and headed south to Sugar Grove and after a too long stop there, headed up Savage and eventually pulled back in to Lancaster.

Along the way, Kenda Janet had a cable issue that limited her to a two speed bike and so they headed toward a flatter return via Pleasantville Road.  Meantime, as we were stopped, Marty, Pete C, Tym, Cornell Scott Young and Dustin rode by.  All the others had dropped off their hard charging pace and later I saw Marty had set a number of new KOM times along the route.  As I arrived in Canal Winchester I was, yet again, overtaken by the lead group but now they were down to Marty, Pete, Tym, Cornell and Scott, finishing the 99 miles in a total time of 5:43, ride time of 5:15.