A few weeks ago, I got recruited by one of my friends as a “Climbing ringer”. He was taking a group of friends up Zoo hill engaging in an elaborate hazing ritual, and he wanted me to come along because “these guys think I’m a good climber”. Given my distinct lack of form this year, I wasn’t so sure about that, but decided to do it anyway.
So, I showed up at 8:30 AM on Saturday to climb “The Zoo” (so named because of the small zoo on the lower slopes of the climb). I was pretty well warmed up.
I gave my usual introduction at the bottom – “The climb breaks into three sections. The bottom section is very steep, and don’t ride the inside of the hairpin because it’s like 20%. The middle section is the hardest, and then when you turn left that’s when it gets tough.”
It sounds a bit like a joke but it isn’t, especially if you’ve never done this kind of climb before.
At the bottom my friend (who I’ll call Brett because that may be his real name) started us off – I waited for the group to get going and started from the back.
Caught up with Brett after a couple of minutes, and we rode up through the first curvy section to the hairpin. My preference is to ride in the outside of the left lane on this because that’s the smallest slope, but we had two trucks behind us at this point, so I took the lead and the middle of the proper lane, and stood through the hairpin. I slowed down a bit to see if Brett would catch up, and then decided just to keep riding. The top of the first section flattens out a bit, and then you turn to the right for the second section.
The second section is truly masochistic. Rather than the slight gradient changes of the first section, this section. There are approximately 4000 rollers in the second section, and they get worse as you go along, with the gradient of the climbing parts going up and the height of each roller going up. I tried to keep my HR in check – in the low 160s – but on a few of them I was closer to 170, which is where I feel like I’m going to fall over and die. The last roller was especially painful, but there’s a short respite at the top of that section where I managed to recover back to 160 BPM, then I turned left onto the third section, and saw Brett perhaps 10 seconds behind me.
That’s when things get bad. The first turn through there is steep, and it’s really hard to keep riding, but you keep on riding (I did it without tacking, but have tacked in the past), until I reach the top, right as Brett catches up to me.
Brett’s climbing has improved considerably. Probably has to do with something with the 26 pounds he’s lost.
Turned around and rode down to check on the rest of the group. Passed 3 guys on the way down, one near the bottom of the third section, so I went down to look for others. Nobody there so I started up again, intent to catch the rider who was right in front of me.
Right. Try as I might, I couldn’t close the distance in enough time to encourage him, but caught him right at the top. Went off with him (and one other) to go to the gate at the top of the hill (a turnoff to the right of the summit just after you crest the top), which takes you up to an old military installation.
Came down, another guy finished, went back up to the gate with him.
Afterwards, I descended down the south side all the way to the Lake Washington trail, rode north, then up lake hills connector (not bad compared to a zoo climb) and the home.
My polar says 24:05 for the climb, which my website estimates to be 234 watts for the 1300′ of climbing. I added another 400 or so when I redid the third section and the gate section twice.
My last ascent was 27 with my old bike (10 pounds heavier), so I’m a little happier than I thought – I’m about 4% faster even discounting the bike difference.
And the climb lived up to my billing for the newbies, who agreed when I told them “the zoo will change how you feel about hills”.
So, what do you think ?