The invite came from Randonneur and all-arounder Sol Manion. He wanted to do something to “honor the cobbles” in the rugged, legendary Tour of Flanders (last Sunday) and Paris Roubaix (this Sunday).
Sol’s training often includes short high-intensity trips around Seattle’s Queen Anne neighborhood, and his legs know those cobbled streets by heart. His proposed route promised ~2000′ of climbing in ~10 miles.
We put the word out and two others joined us: High Performance Cycling teammate Coren Linfield, and UW engineering grad student Kaspar Muller.
The sandbagging commenced as soon as I rolled up to the start at Citizen in lower Queen Anne.
Coren claimed he was “out of condition” because he is a new-ish father with a 9-month old. We had all heard that one before and even though Sol and Kaspar had never cycled with Coren they didn’t buy it either.
Speaking of sandbagging, Kaspar rode in running shoes and flat pedals. I’m not sure how he did it: I found myself slipping on some of the “greasy” streets that are always in the shade, and on some of the steeper sectors my bike’s front wheel achieved lift-off when my weight was too far back.
Many of the cobbled sections required a delicate balancing act in order to avoid slipping and keeping both wheels on the ground. One thing that helped was that I didn’t check the pressure in my tires before I left home, and it turns out running Continental 4000s @ 50 psi makes for quite a smooth ride over the cobbles. I ran the risk of pinch-flatting and in retrospect ~70 psi would have been optimal.
In addition to Sol’s passion for long distance cycling and randonneuring, he has a weakness for good coffee, so we made an obligatory stop at Caffè Fiore where we enjoyed sunshine and bicycle banter enhanced by a pleasant caffeine boost.
The Queen Anne portion of the route finished with a technical downhill that involved navigating 180 degree hairpins and a narrow winding pathway through Bhy Kracke Park.
While Queen Anne has a high density of steep cobbled streets, there are cobbles throughout Seattle’s side streets especially on Capitol Hill. I’ve asked around trying to locate a comprehensive cycling map of Seattle’s cobbles and I vaguely remember seeing cobble-focused shop or group ride a couple years ago, but can’t (easily) find such a route on the Interwebs.
Do you know of such a map?
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I’m sure there are a few that could be added to that route. Here’s an obvious one:
Love + Flour
2719 E Madison St, Seattle, WA 98112
SW corner of Madison & MLK
Here’s a route I rode earlier this year, trying to capture the steepest climbs in Seattle. And of course bakeries. A dozen or so of each! It was also on this ride that my friend David G. and I came up with the Cyclo-Croiss idea.
https://ridewithgps.com/routes/35043954