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Old Guys and Descending

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Fifty Plus (50+) Share the victories, challenges, successes and special concerns of bicyclists 50 and older. Especially useful for those entering or reentering bicycling.

Old Guys and Descending

Old 07-08-19, 06:22 AM
  #26  
freeranger
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I don't feel "comfortable" flying down a descent. Never bothered me on a motorcycle, but the wider tires, rake and trail of the fork are completely different of course. I feel more at ease on my mtn.bicycle than my road bike, guess for the same reason as on a motorcycle.
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Old 07-08-19, 06:30 AM
  #27  
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Old 07-08-19, 06:42 AM
  #28  
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Yes, and I'm also more cautious going "uphill"...I don't strain and use all my strength anymore because I fear tearing or dislodging something. In fact, last year I lowered the gearing in my two road bikes.

Back to down hill: At 35 years old I tried to hit 50 on a long downhill on my old Schwinn Cruiser Supreme. I reached 49.7 on the third try on which I rode passed my "fail safe" braking point. I grabbed the brakes...felt almost nothing, considered ditching against the curb and rolling on the grass or pavement and finally "Flintstoned" to a stop a few yards from cross traffic.

Scared me so badly I literally threw that bike in the dumpster when I got home.

That was 22 years ago and it has kept me from descending with complete abandon ever since. Almost complete abandon...yes. Complete abandon...no.

I bike commute and I've also grown more cautious in traffic.
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Old 07-08-19, 08:17 AM
  #29  
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Originally Posted by Lemond1985
Let's take life advice from a guy who didn't make it to 28.
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Old 07-08-19, 08:37 AM
  #30  
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I'll say that I'm definitely more conservative in my riding that I was 35 years ago.

No braking on long straight stretches, but I do slow down for those corners, especially if line of sight isn't good for one reason or another.

On the other hand, I hit 54.1 MPH a year ago, and am still hoping to break 55 MPH someday, although I need to look for a different hill as that hill is right on the edge of town which is a potential issue.

I hit a few fast loaded descents at Crater Lake a couple of years ago.. I need to reconsider that.
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Old 07-08-19, 09:56 AM
  #31  
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Originally Posted by masi61
I crashed on a fast downhill at 47 mph 2 Octobers ago. I was getting carried away on some really fun downhill sweepers. I was lucky that all I did was break some ribs, break my right pinky finger and wind up with bruises and strawberries on my chest and face. Both my wheels were taco'd and blown. My helmet interior cracked down the middle.

Strange thing is, I'm not skittish or traumatized mentally by the experience. I learned my lesson but I still am an aggressive descender. I got my wheels rebuilt. I pay better attention to my brake pads and their adjustment. I do descend on the drops and make sure to keep 2 fingers on each brake lever. I reduce my speed going into hairpin turns but if I can visualize the exit from the turn and plot my line (cutting the apexes) it is often possible to fly through the downhill with minimal braking.
August 22, 2011. And I have no memory. Helmet destroyed, but saved my skull for the most part, unconcious for 5 minutes. Burst fractire of my T9 vertebra and damaged T7, 8 and 10. Broken ribs, cracked the top 3 vervical vertebra, occipital condyl avulsion... Broken finger, but don't remember which, lots of road rash and bruising... So a friend and I were doing a fast downhill canyon road. I was ahead of my younger friend. He saw me go down, but not WHY, which I still do not know. 40 to 45 MPH. I fly great, but my landings SUCK. I was 48... Not quite old but getting there. at 30 I had a speeding ticket descending once. Nearly 60 in a 35... Took me three years to even get back on a bike... Now I've lost 120 pounds. Need to lose more. I'm on my bikes. I cannot let the bike roll downhill. I HAVE to have the brakes on. But. A couple weeks back I did let it roll. It felt great. Until I saw I was doing 24... And I locked the brakes down to 15... Something my brain can tolerate right now... A year ago, I couldn't even do that..
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Old 07-08-19, 11:41 AM
  #32  
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Originally Posted by CliffordK
I'll say that I'm definitely more conservative in my riding that I was 35 years ago.

No braking on long straight stretches, but I do slow down for those corners, especially if line of sight isn't good for one reason or another.

On the other hand, I hit 54.1 MPH a year ago, and am still hoping to break 55 MPH someday, although I need to look for a different hill as that hill is right on the edge of town which is a potential issue.

I hit a few fast loaded descents at Crater Lake a couple of years ago.. I need to reconsider that.
I will riding Crater Lake in September. I’ll have to look for those descents!!!
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Old 07-08-19, 11:45 AM
  #33  
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On my longest tour (to date), at one point I got to thinking: if I crash now, it's could take 15 minutes before someone comes by here, 30 minutes until they get into cell phone range to call for help, and hour after that an ambulance could get here, and two hours after THAT until they can get me to a hospital.

I slowed down a bit after that.

I'll still let'er rip when I'm close to civilization, but...There's a great hill near here I avoid when it's windy, because there's fierce cross winds at the bottom. Another nearly two mile ridge, just half a dozen miles from home, where passing traffic has set up a shimmy that was wicked (though I made it out of that one). Another one with pavement slipping, leaving cracks that might be big enough to grab my wheel, so I slow there to go around them.

But on a smooth downhill, will decent sightlines and little traffic? Let's see how fast I can roll.
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Old 07-08-19, 11:52 AM
  #34  
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Originally Posted by jppe
I will riding Crater Lake in September. I’ll have to look for those descents!!!
Crater Lake only pushed me up to about 40 MPH or so, but I was riding the old Colnago with Panniers.



Whew, that old bike has a lot of flex.

The roads were quite rough (gouged) from their plowing, but I think they've been working on them. Also narrow... Are they making them wider?

September has a couple of "Car-Free" days.

Ride the Rim Oregon |

Half of the lake is dedicated to just bicycles, although many do the full loop.

Of course you aren't restricted to those days.

One issue I had with panniers was that whenever one hit a pass, the wind was just wicked... and the panniers were like a big sail.

It was a long ride from Eugene to Crater Lake, and a pretty unrelenting climb from Steamboat to the lake. Nonetheless, the rim ride was more tall rollers than huge climbs.
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Old 07-08-19, 12:09 PM
  #35  
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Originally Posted by shelbyfv
I've seen friends wrecked by dogs, cats, squirrels, chickens and deer. I'm inclined to worry about some dumb animal crossing the road.
On the first day of my recent tour I had to stop for a heard of elk stampeding across the road. (I spooked them when I stopped to take a photo.) A few days later deer ran out into the road three times while I was descending Thompson Pass to Thompson Falls, MT in the rain. The closest call was in 2013. I was descending rather quickly while crossing PA. I said to myself "Stay alert. You never know what might come out of those woods. Not 5 seconds later a deer bolts out of the bushes and runs right across my path. Maybe 15' in front of me. I nearly suffered a coronary.
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Old 07-08-19, 12:20 PM
  #36  
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Originally Posted by jppe
I will riding Crater Lake in September. I’ll have to look for those descents!!!
Done it twice. There are usually some rough patches. One year a guy on Cycle Oregon got a speeding ticket from the NPS police. He was doing 50.

Attached is a map of the route we did in 2007. Looking at the circle around the lake, the roughest areas were roughly between 4 o'clock and 6 o'clock. When I got done circumnavigating the lake I didn't even feel like going down hill 13 miles back to camp.
Attached Files
File Type: pdf
CRATER LAKE RIM ROAD.pdf (364.1 KB, 16 views)
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Old 07-08-19, 02:07 PM
  #37  
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I don't have a bike computer, so I never know how fast my descent is until I get home and check the Strava track recorded by my phone. Fastest ever was 54 mph last year riding down from Monitor Pass in the Sierra Nevada. That was a dead straight, very smooth road section that I felt very confident on. I generally hit a maximum of 45 mph on sections like that on my regular rides around here. However, my local terrain includes very few straight roads and many many hairpins. On those, I am much more conservative than I was in my younger days. Back then, I used to hit downhill blind turns at maximum achievable speed apex-to-apex. These days I hit those same turns but always with a much larger safety factor that includes the assumption that either my tire will blow out in the turn* or that an oncoming pickup truck will have crossed the double yellow line. I play "what if" constantly on descents. Even with that conservative approach, I crashed on a hairpin turn riding Eroica in Italy three years ago, having misjudged how dry the road surface was. Fortunately that only resulted in loss of skin, fabric and paint.

*To add credence to that assumption, I was following a rider down Mount Diablo two weeks ago and his tire did in fact blow out with a gunshot like "crack" in a hairpin. He didn't fall but he luckily had room to straighten up and brake hard. We were both going about 25 mph at the time.

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Old 07-08-19, 02:35 PM
  #38  
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Originally Posted by indyfabz
One year a guy on Cycle Oregon got a speeding ticket from the NPS police. He was doing 50.
I think I'd send a check in with a copy of the ticket, and frame the original.
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Old 07-08-19, 11:27 PM
  #39  
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I've been doing this descent 60-80 times per year for a couple decades. Definitely looks like my fastest years are behind me.

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Old 07-09-19, 07:51 AM
  #40  
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Yeah, I'm a little more cautious. I still enjoy blasting downhill but I'll often recon the route first. No more drafting trucks at 50+ mph. No fast downhill curves unless I'm absolutely certain of the conditions and sight lines. Solo only.

I avoid maximum effort downhill blasts around cyclists I don't know well. I've seen too many group rides with crashes. Fortunately most are minor, but there was a bad one last week right in front of me on a downhill, with the injured fellow traveling around 25+ when he nicked a raised seam, lost balance which deflected him into a vicious pothole, then crashed and slid headfirst into a curb. He'll be looking at a long recovery.

Looking at my handlebar video, I saw too many mistakes among the group on that downhill, despite clear warnings from the ride leader during a stop just before we tackled that segment. Fast downhills are fun, but too many folks take them too casually.

We don't have any long, steep descents and it's a challenge just to hit 40 mph for a few seconds. But I still don't take them lightly.
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Old 07-09-19, 07:55 AM
  #41  
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When I was living and racing in Colorado, I would routinely hit 60mph + on big descents. Once hit an indicated 75mph on a huge descent in the middle of a race.

Now that I’m older and more sensible, I have sworn off that behavior. But then, last month, I went back to Colorado to do a race with a friend of mine. At the time, I told him, “I’m gonna keep it mellow on the descents.” And then we topped out at about 50mph.
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Old 07-09-19, 08:28 AM
  #42  
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I get scared for sure.

My only serious crash was because of a tire failure, and that was at only 24 MPH. The laws of physics being what they are, it gets a LOT worse from there as speeds go up. And anything can happen. Blown tire. Wildlife. Hell, I even got hit by a rock skipping down from a cut in the road some time ago.

So while I love twisty, technical descents ... I'm not so much a fan of the high speed descents. A little voice on my shoulder tells me to back off when I get to 30MPH or so. I ignore that voice every once in the while (most recently on that Eastern Sierra Double where I hit something like 46 dropping down into Adobe Valley), but it's always there.
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Old 07-09-19, 10:51 AM
  #43  
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A wise cyclist once told me: Save the speed for the uphills
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Old 07-09-19, 11:25 AM
  #44  
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I think I've hit 50 mph twice - it was exhilarating. On my normal ride I can get 45 once in a while and that seems totally in control and not scary. But once I came around a sweeping turn and there was a cow in the middle of my lane. Even at 40 mph, I'm always thinking about how I would respond to a blow-out or critter impact... but at 40 I'm pretty sure I could handle it without tragedy since I know the road so well.


My injury crashes have not been descending or speed related - but I do have a healthy aversion to broken bones since then. A little exhilaration goes a long way now.
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Old 07-09-19, 11:46 AM
  #45  
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Originally Posted by Riveting
A wise cyclist once told me: Save the speed for the uphills
+100
Descending = speed is not my friend. Things happen too fast, recovery takes too long, hospital bills become too expensive. These days I get more joy holding 25mph on the flats (for a bit) than any speed record descending. Just for reference I've gone 57mph on a straight downhill run - riding as a single on a tandem. I'm sure I've never attained 50 on a single bike.
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Old 07-09-19, 11:47 AM
  #46  
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It's all relative.
I'm not sure I'd be any different when I was younger, to be honest.
How fast I go depends on how smooth the road is, how far ahead I can see, how gusty the wind is, how stable the bike is.
I think the fastest I've ever hit was around 45, and normally try to keep it around 30-35 max on a downhill.
It's not like you're gonna win some big prize for making it to the bottom first.
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Old 07-09-19, 11:53 AM
  #47  
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at 60, I go too fast. it's not fast, but it's too fast. especially with traffic. I would love to try "fast" on what I imagine are the lonely flatlands of Illinois with no traffic. I broke a spoke at the top of this hill & probably should have stopped when I heard that weird sound instead of continually looking for a problem when I should have kept my eye on the road. clearly, I'm too stupid to go fast. anyway 29.9 mph is fast for me. I have reached 32 on this hill w/ traffic. again, stupid. but to be fair I do feather brakes, this isn't pedaling like crazy then a full on tuck & dive type run


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Old 07-09-19, 02:44 PM
  #48  
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I descend hills/mountains as fast as I can at age 60. I have less life to lose than I did when I was 17.
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Old 07-09-19, 04:03 PM
  #49  
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I really admire the down hill decent speeds here. I know I can't/won't attempt them. Just be sure you understand the risks.. carry on.

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Old 07-10-19, 05:01 AM
  #50  
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I'm turning 71 in a month and I have slowed way down. Even 10 years ago I loved fast descents and I still love the feeling but I don't want to court falls. I broke my hip and my shoulder in crashes a few years ago and, despite the fact that they were dumb slow.moderate speed errors, they have led to caution. In particular I have noticed slight feelings of imbalance on turns and riding close to railings on bridges. In those situations and on descents I drop the speed back until I feel comfortable and fully in control.
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