Legend on the Ladera

[ornoth_cycling]

I’m an old man. I’m not gonna set any speed records (aka Strava KoMs) on the melty-sweltery streets of south-central Texas. Especially in a city full of amateur and pro racers like multiple and current Tour de France participant Lawson Craddock.

However, what I can do is ride frequently, and if you’re the person who has ridden a road segment more often than anyone else in the previous 90 days, Strava recognizes you with their “Local Legend” award (aka LCL).

Looking back from the top of Ladera Norte

So with few century-length rides happening in the unrelenting convection oven heat of summer in Texas, and needing some kind of cycling goal to motivate me, I decided to try to win the LCL on one of Austin’s most notorious hills: the kilometer-long, 100-meter, 16%-max climb up Ladera Norte, where the aforementioned Lawson Craddock holds the fastest ascent.

My first introduction to Ladera Norte (Spanish for ‘North Slope’) was during our apartment-hunting trip last Thanksgiving. We had just completed our second viewing of the house we would eventually lease, and took some time to drive around and explore the neighborhood. Just three kilometers from the house, we randomly turned at a sign for “North Cat Mountain” and up a slope that immediately reminded us of the ludicrous hills back in Pittsburgh, like maybe Hazelwood Ave. It was a huge eye-opener.

Becoming the Local Legend on it wasn’t gonna be an easy task. Not only is it a challenging climb, but the guy who held the title had ridden it over 30 times. I’d have to climb that beast more than once every three days, for three months straight! During… wait for it… June, July, and August.

So I added the climb to the start of my short one-hour recovery ride loop and started doing it as often as I could tolerate. By riding first thing in the morning, I could avoid Austin’s daily 40° C heat, although it gets unpleasantly humid overnight. Doing this route so often really limited my other riding, but I wasn’t planning on many long rides in that heat anyways. Riding straight out to the climb, over the top, then cooling down with my recovery loop became my not-quite-daily ritual.

Because I was riding the same route so often, I became the LCL on a number of other segments along my route: No Hills Drive, Mesa, Greystone, Bull Creek, Hancock. And, eventually… Ladera Norte!

After much repetitive climbing, I finally stole the LCL on July 30th. Having done 30 climbs over 65 days, I’d completed nearly one ascent every other day for 9½ weeks. Mission accomplished, at least temporarily.

See, when you take the LCL from someone, Strava sends them an email letting them know. So the next question was whether the former LCL was in the mood to go out and immediately take it back from me.

It’s been a week since I took the title, and he hasn’t made any attempt to catch up. Meanwhile, I’ve done a few more reps, and our current tallies are 33 to 27. So it looks my status as the Local Legend on Ladera Norte is somewhat secure.

Which means it’s time for me to switch goals, and that’s something I need to do anyways.

Five weeks from today I will be doing my first Livestrong Challenge, which is also my first attempt at a 100-mile ride in Texas, and my first century on the new bike: Pæthos. If I keep doing these dinky 26km morning rides, there’s no way I’ll be prepared to tackle 100 miles, so now I’m changing my focus to: getting lots more kilometers under my belt, and getting better acclimated to the extreme heat of high noon in Texas. Wish me luck!

And of course if you can, it would be wonderful if you expressed your support via a donation to the Livestrong Foundation, which supports cancer survivors. You can do that on my LC rider page: https://give.livestrong.org/ornoth

Thanks for being with me!