100 Miles of Nowhere: Scarsdale Edition

100 miles is a nice big round number and has I think a special place in the hearts of most riders. A  Century is a landmark ride - I remember my first very well.

It also impresses the non-cyclist immensely.

Traditional century and gran fondo courses will take you up mountains, over passes, along coasts, through National Parks, and around lakes and islands. Events compete to be the highest, steepest and most epic.

So, what to make of an event that goes absolutely nowhere?

The 100 Miles of Nowhere was dreamt up and is run by the one-and-only Fat Cyclist, Elden Nelson.

He did the first one on his own in 2008 and since then it has become an annual charity fundraiser with 500 places available. Riders ride wherever they want in the world and even the date is not set in stone.

The biggest similarities to a traditional Century are the swag bag riders get and the fundraising that underpins the 100MoN. This year's beneficiary was Camp Kesem, an organization which supports children whose parents have cancer.

Nowhere is defined in many ways.

Some riders sit on rollers or a trainer for the full 100 miles, including Fatty himself who did his 100 miles on stage at the Camp Kesem Leadership Summit.

Others (masochists), like Jill Homer, take on hills and rack up over 20,000 feet of climbing.

I felt I was staying truer to the spirit of "Nowhere" than Jill by circling a 2/3rds of a mile loop of neighborhood streets. It is the time of year for base miles and I took it slow and steady.

Heathcote/MacDonald/Wakefield/Carthage/Lebanon/Crossway/Heathcote

Heathcote/MacDonald/Wakefield/Carthage/Lebanon/Crossway/Heathcote

Heathcote/MacDonald/Wakefield/Carthage/Lebanon/Crossway/Heathcote etc.

Perhaps 151 x that list would have been the most appropriate ride report, but then there would have been no room for ruminations on how one lap can pass in the blink of an eye while another seems to last an eternity or the temptations of a warm kitchen.

Repeating a lap 151 times does mean that every feature of the route becomes very familiar.

The points to check for traffic when turning, the angle between the drain covers on the entrance to Lebanon, the metal plates to be bunny hopped on Crossway and the line for the final fast turn back onto Heathcote were all explored, refined and perfected.

As a reminder of the true gran fondo experience there was even a Port-a-Potty on the lap. Authenticity is not the be all and end all to my mind and I opted to use the indoor plumbing at home.

Thrills and spills were in short supply, thankfully. Little broke the rhythm of the laps bar the best attempts of a number of squirrels to hurl themselves into my spokes and the obliviousness of a couple of people walking down the middle of the street.

I had to unclip due to traffic just the once.

In the absence of adrenaline jolts, the day became a great opportunity to look back at the past year of cycling, which had encompassed a whole heap of Somewheres.

The Italian Dolomite mountains provided the location for my top day on a bike at the Maratona of the Dolomites with its seven mountain passes amid stunning scenery with 9,000 others and TV helicopters overhead.

The George Washington Bridge for Gran Fondo New York was the best start location with its sea of bright green jerseys.

The CAT 5 start line at the White Plains Crit, my first sanctioned race was the site of the most nerves (I wasn't dropped!).

The closing miles of the Battenkill Gran Fondo - tired but flying - were about as well I have ever ridden fast.

The Coal Road in England's beautiful Yorkshire Dales was the steepest climb of the year.

Coincidentally, all five of those rides featured glorious sunshine, something that was in short supply in November in New York State. My plan to shed clothing as the day warmed up did not happen and I ended up adding layers as the cold seeped in and the breeze got up.

I had thought that passing the house every few minutes would be an advantage, but it proved otherwise.

The major drawback of a home feed zone is that once you are sat in your own kitchen, in the warm with the full range of food and drink within reach, not to mention a hot shower just a flight of stairs away it take a bit of motivation to pull on the winter hat, strap on the helmet and head back into the cold.

On even long rides I tend to limit stops to a handful of minutes, but my 100MoN breaks got longer and longer as the day went on.

It was late afternoon by the time the Garmin ticked over to 100 miles and I stopped to take the obligatory photo.

As I did so a family was walking past and we exchanged hellos. They said they had been watching me all day as they lived on the route and asked if I was training for something. I explained the 100MoN idea and they were nice enough to express astonishment and admiration that I had covered 100 miles. Pretty much the perfect thing to hear after almost nine hours on a bike.

They clearly did not believe me, however, when I said it had been fun, but as a bumper sticker I passed 151 times put it: "If it's not fun why do it?"

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