Several months ago, Bicycling magazine had an article in which a few top American riders (Levi, George, etc.) shared their training routes, with maps. I'm sorry I can't remember which issue it was, exactly. Sometime around the Tour de France. Can anyone remember?

We tried that century ride that Levi ride in Sonoma county this spring, and almost died!!!!!!!!!!

That was BY FAR the toughest ride! The first 20 miles were easy. Then, like, 40 miles of climbing straight up with grades kicking up to over 20% consistently (sometimes 30-40% for a brief moment).

We were going like 2-4 mi/hr, for extended periods of time. A century took us about 10 hrs, we were close to running out of daylight!

Then a NASTY descent (the scariest one ever), the road quality is awful, and they are twisty-turney. Yeah, I suck at descending and NEVER enjoy it--but that was like suicide mission. My hands were cramping like crazy from squeezing the brakes.

Crappy pavement everywhere.

And that's not all. The WORST is that there is NOWHERE to get water for miles. We were close to totally passing out from complete dehydration. Some kind farmer that we were lucky to run across (after being without water for 3 hrs) gave us some water. In reality, it would be idiotic to do this ride without a camelback. Apparently (as we found out later) Levi has people accompanying him in a van when he goes on those rides.

Since after doing that ride, we refer to Levi as THE ASSASSIN. It was quite an adventure, and I'd think twice before doing it again!

Inga