LMRA Bicycle Club Message Board

[Daren]

31 May 2008. The Real Ale Ride is being held for the areas around Blanco, Texas (50 miles or so north of San Antonio and 50 miles west of Austin). There are 15, 30, 50, 65, and 80 mile routes for the ride.

This link has last year's course maps and the elevation profiles for the routes.

[Daren]

The brief take on the ride – it was hot and hilly. The 50-mile route was very reminiscent of the Paluxy Pedal Ride out of Glen Rose with lots of ups and downs. If a person likes riding the Muenster Metric or the Paluxy Pedal with their hills, this ride may be one for you to try. There were over 1300 riders at the ride if the registration rider numbers were correct --- says a lot for the first real ride. This ride was the second annual ride but last year’s was cancelled due to bad weather.

Some negatives about the ride right off the bat: $45 registration fee, $5 parking fee, and only one 1-lane road to the brewery to register and park the car; that single-lane road was also the road for lining up the riders to start the ride. The sponsors started to force cars to park elsewhere with about 20-30 minutes before the ride to enable bikers to get in position to head out.

I had done a reconnaissance on the 65-mile route the day before, as I headed to my camping spot I drove the route to see what I was getting into. There were either three of four hills I thought I was going to have major problems with, and I chose to drop down to the 50-mile route to enable me to at least finish on my own power. That was a good decision because 50-mile route had a few of its own difficult climbing hills – there were at least three on this course but they were not as difficult as those on the 65/80 mile route(s). The Garmin estimated there was about 2450 feet of ascent for the 50-mile route, and that was about 200 feet less than the ride at Muenster; the Muenster ride was about 10-miles longer also. According the readings from my Garmin, there were six hills on the 50-mile route with grades 10% or more. The maximum was at 16%.

The ride sponsors sent riders out in waves and that was probably a good decision on their part. People who showed up late were at the back of the line, even those who were riding the 80-mile route and had to reach a certain point in two hours. If sponsors had sent out the riders at once, it would have been very similar to the Muenster ride for those of us who were in the middle of the pack that day. It would have taken lots of miles to unravel the group and that would have been very painful.

The first 13 miles or so were on county roads that barely had room for two vehicles to pass each other, and there were bikers now using the road also. There were no problems with vehicles because traffic was very sparse. The next 12 miles or so were on another county road, but one with at least six cattle crossing guards in the road. Other than one particular cattle crossing, they were just bumps that made some humming sounds as one rode over them. I don’t remember any vehicles other than the sag wagons passing me. The rest were either FM or state roads with minimal traffic.

The rest stops were spaced about every 12-13 miles apart and they were well kept with supplies. The people running the stops were friendly, helpful, and talkative. I cannot say enough good things about the local folks or a couple of guys providing sponsored goods. No beer samples at the rest stops, but plenty of cookies, pickle juice, crackers, water, Gatorade, fruit, and at one stop they had peanut-butter sandwiches.

After I finished the race, I had to pack up the stuff and find a place to fix a poorly inflated car tire. I didn’t stay to hang around the brewery for the burgers and beer, but other riders seemed sitting around and chowing down with no problems.

So in closing, I would have no hesitation to do this ride again. I do think that this ride will become a more popular one out there as years pass by. I had fun even though it was very hot and a couple of the hills made me nearly want to cry. I just hope that I get better as a rider to attempt the 65-mile route.

[Daren]

Here is a report from another person who had done the ride at Blanco.

http://bikenoob.wordpress.com/2008/05/31/real-ale-ride-leaves-me-ailin-ride-report/

EDIT - A video presentation of the 50-mile route.