Here’s my description of the STP. It’s a 200 mile ride (322km on my bike computer) from Seattle to Portland. No, it doesn’t follow the I5! You can check out the route map and see that we were on beautiful country roads the whole time. We even spent over an hour on a bike path! It was 11.5hrs of riding, 14hrs from start to finish – a day longer then IronMan. It was my first time doing the STP, and I joined the crazy 1/4 of the ~10,000 riders that complete the ride in one day.

I rode the whole time with my Uncle Doug*. He showed up at my place on Thursday evening and we headed down to Seattle on Friday at around noon. After an agonizing 2hr wait in the border line-up, the short trip from Vancouver to Seattle turned into an epic 5hr road trip. I guess the epic wait fits into the theme of the weekend where everything is just a bit longer then you would like. We stayed at the residences at the University of Washington along with approximately six hundred 12 years old kids. Oh my, I almost throttled them. I’m sure that I used to be that excited to be at summer camp. But when you’re looking at a very early wake call – having kids running around outside your dorm, is not the ideal situation. So after a non-sleep on Friday night, we dragged ourselves out of bed at 3:30am Saturday morning.

From the dorms, we walked down to the start line in the UW parking lots and threw our bags onto the Portland truck. At 4am in the morning, the UW parking lots was alive! Close to 10,000 riders do this event – most of them over two days. Just before 5am, we started in a wave of about 1000 riders. Riding through downtown Seattle, in the morning darkness, with that many riders was quite an experience. At one point, I think I said to my Uncle, “Are there going to be this many riders the whole way?” And yes, for the whole first half, the road was full of riders. Big trains pulling up ahead of us and following behind us.

I hadn’t even really woke up by the time we reached the first rest stop – 25 miles into the ride. With music, bathrooms, water, bagels, orange juice, and loud speakers, I knew I was in for a cool experience. STP is an extremely well organized event. As a fully supported ride, I had food whenever I needed it, bathrooms, and the ability to splash cold water on my face. It was awesome.

The riding route was another highlight. Most of the time, we were on country roads. There’s no hills to speak of, and we had favorable wind the whole way. As I mentioned, we spent almost 20 miles on a paved, wooded, bike path. It was one of the most memorable parts of the ride for me. There were a couple of low lights on the route. Just before half way there was a section of road covered in chip seal. The incessant rattling of the bike on the chip seal grated on my nerves and almost killed me mentally. I’ve never been so happy to see smooth roads as when that section ended.

With such a long day, there were some other real tough spots. For most of the day, especially the second half, I dealt with the ride in no longer then 1hr pieces. When the clock said 8 hours 23 minutes, I said to myself, “Ok, just make it to 9hrs 20 min.” During the tough bits, I dealt with the ride in 5 min pieces, switching my position or drinking at the 5 min marks, to break things up a bit. One tough spot was riding past all the tents in Chehalias. Chehalias is just past the half way mark, and seeing the tents, I knew that if I was doing the ride in two days, “I could be lying down right now!” Once I got past that mentally tough spot, I settled into the riding again and even found myself enjoying the riding. The only things that hurt along the way were my sit bones and my shoulders. By the end my left shoulder was so tight that I couldn’t really turn my head.

We reached the finish in Portland after a long shlog on the highway and after what felt like a million turns through town. After finishing, we dropped our bikes in the truck, showered in the other truck**, and then headed to the beer garden for some eats and bevvies. And then, we had to face the toughest part of the day – the bus back to Seattle! Ugh! We left Portland around 8pm and arrived back at UW at midnight. After the drive to our hotel, with a stop at the all-night drive through at Jack-in-the-Box, we found ourselves falling into bed at 2:30am. 3:30am to 2:30am – An Epic Ride from Seattle to Portland!!!

*My Uncle Doug is a very strong rider. We rode together for the whole ride (i.e., I sat on his wheel). He would drop me on every hill and then find a shady spot, pull over, and wait for me to arrive. He’s also a crazy man, having completed the BC rando 600km a while back, and has plans to complete the 1000km ride over the labor day long weekend. That’s 3 days of STP style rides in a row. Woah!

**One funny thing about STP is that it’s probably the only time in my life where I’ve seen major lines for the mens bathrooms/showers but us ladies get to walk right in. You can check out this STP fact sheet for the riders stats…