Mysore

Date: 13 August 2016

Total distance: 303 Kilometers

Start Time: 2:00 pm on 13 August 2016

Return Time: 8:00 pm on 15 August 2016

With: -

It was a long weekend and I did not have any plans to travel. However, on Saturday 13 August 2016, I was changing the tires on the road bike from the 25 c that I had used from the time of purchase to 23c tires, I wanted to test the 23c tires and what better way to do that than to go for a long ride. My sister had travelled to Mysore and I decided to ride to Mysore and spend the weekend (what would be left of it) with her.

To Mysore:

Date: 13 August 2016

Start Time: 2:00 pm

End Time: 10:30 pm

From: Koramangala

To: Lalitha Mahal Palace Road

Distance: 151 kilometers

Altitude Profile:
Koramangala – Ramanagar – Mandya - Mysore

By the time I decided to travel it was already mid-day; the decision to travel had been fuelled in part since my cousins were travelling to Coorg and I decided to spend the weekend with my sister's family rather than sitting around in Bangalore. Further it was an opportunity to ride which I did not want to miss on. I hurriedly put together a few clothes and packed the bag and the usual cycling gear and energy supplements. Last minute charging of the phone and ipod during which time I had a light lunch. I did not want to have a heavy lunch since it would be difficult to pedal. I was ready to leave post lunch and it was 2:00 pm when I rolled out of the house.

Being August, it was still South West monsoon time and I was apprehensive of the wind since it would be a head wind. However, I was in for a surprise when it was a tail wind and I was feeling lucky. The thought that the return would be a difficult one lingered in the mind however, as I was doing the return journey on 15 August 2016, I hoped that the wind would change direction for the return.

I made brisk progress in Bangalore as I was lucky with the signals and was not bogged down by the traffic. However, as I reached the Satellite Bus stand on Mysore Road, the clouds opened up and it was a heavy downpour. I was forced to stop since I had not put the phone and wallet into a plastic bag. I stopped and put the phone and wallet into the medicine packet and restarted the ride. The intensity of the downpour had reduced and I was able to ride. The road was dirty and within no time I was drenched and dirty. It took about 10 minutes before I could make my way out of the rain and out of Bangalore to be welcomed by traffic. The traffic was heavy and a traffic jam near the Kengeri Bus Stand was not something that I enjoyed. I had expected the traffic to be heavy and knew that I would have to cross Kengeri to breath easily. I wriggled my way in between traffic and managed to get out of the traffic and made my way towards the Nice Road junction. When I got to the Nice Road junction the traffic thinned out and the view opened out. It was 3:30 pm and the Sun was not to be seen, there was a thick  cloud cover and the threat of rain was ever present. It was a pleasant ride as the rain stayed away and the weather was perfect. Although I was making up for the time that I had lost in the traffic, I was beginning to tire and was also feeling hungry. I wanted to make a stop near Bidadi to fill myself up, however I coaxed myself to ride on till Ramanagar since it was too early to stop. I gulped down Enerzal to quell the hunger and sped towards Ramanagar. I reached Ramanagar at 4:45 pm and I was pretty happy with the time and also was not feeling hungry anymore.

I had raced into Ramanagar and was trying to pedal hard and having over taken a couple of two wheelers I was getting carried away. By the time I realised it, I had done just enough damage to the legs which had begun to hurt and cramp a bit which brought down the speed automatically. The roads were wet as it had rained just before I got to Ramanagar. I was happy that I had missed the rain and as I rode towards Channapatna, I rode into the rain, It was a heavy downpour and as I continued to ride, I was drenched. Although I was drenched the shoes were still dry and I made my way towards town, there were huge puddles on the road. Unfortunately in one of the puddles, I entered the puddle at the same time when a SUV came into it and gave me a shower. The water was splashed onto me and I was covered from head to toe. I did not mind getting the shower, however, the water got into the shoes and the squishy feeling in the feet was not nice. I rode on and passed Channapatna town and about 10 kilometers from Channapatna I stopped at Vaishali restaurant. It was 5:15 pm when I stopped and I had covered 75 kilometers, exactly half way through the journey.

I squeezed the water out of the socks washed my face before heading into the restaurant. Rava dosa, plain dosa and lime juice was downed before I got back on the saddle. I had taken 45 minutes at the restaurant; it was 6:00 pm when I left from Vaishali restaurant and I had 75 kilometers to cover.

The ride from the restaurant to Maddur was quick as it was a general downhill. Things slowed down after Maddur as the gradient picked up and I was beginning to tire. I made it to Mandya and being a place which I don't fancy too much, I tried to get out of the place as quickly as possible. Rode my way out and stopped to rest at a bus stand about 5 kilometers out of Mandya. Co-incidentally Priya called just when I had stopped for the rest and said that they are near Mandya and enquired about my whereabouts. I got back on the saddle after the rest and made it about a 200 meters when Gaurav and Priya caught up with me. A small chit chat as I held onto the car and was dragged by the car for about 2 kilometers before they zipped away in the car towards Coorg. I still had 40 kilometers to cover and it was 8:30 pm.

I called my sister to inform that I  would be reaching only by 10:30 pm and that she should parcel dinner for me. The 15 kilometer stretch from Mandya towards Srirangapatna is difficult due to the gain in the altitude. As I was assisted by a tail wind, it made it slightly easier to get past this section and get to Srinrangapatna. I reached Srirangapatna by 9:15 pm and made my way towards Mysore. The legs were hurting and small gains in altitude were becoming difficult to ride. I passed a lot of travelers on bikes and cars who had parked on the side of the road for breaks and some of them for a drinks (alcohol) break where the bar is set up in the boot of the car. I managed to get to the Mysore Ring Road by 9:50 pm and was happy that I had reached Mysore. However, my sister's house is a further 7 kilometers from there since I opted to go through the city since the ring road is a deserted place and would be risky in the dark. The ride through the city was difficult since I had to climb again and it took 40 minutes to cover the distance of 8 kilometers. It was 10:30 pm when I got to her house and took a further hour to wash the clothes and freshen up before I could sit down for dinner.

Ride Details:

From	To	Distance	Ride Time (hrs)	Total Time (hrs)	Departure Time	Arrival Time	Avg Speed
Koramangala	Ramanagar	50	2.50	2.50	14:00	16:30	20.00
Ramanagar	Mandya	50	3.00	3.75	16:30	20:15	16.67
Mandya	Mysore	51	2.25	2.25	20:15	22:30	22.67
		151	7.75	8.50			19.48

From Mysore:

Date: 15 August 2016

Start Time: 12:00 pm

End Time: 8:00 pm

From: Lalitha Mahal Palace Road

To: Koramangala

Distance: 152 kilometers

Altitude Profile:
Mysore - Mandya - Ramanagar - Koramangala

The plan was to leave from Mysore at 10:00 am and try to make it back to Bangalore by 7:00 pm. However, a late breakfast resulted in the departure time being pushed to 12:00 pm. I opted to ride on the Outer Ring Road rather than through the city which resulted in empty roads. The road till I joined the Mysore road had quite a bit of elevation gain and the speed was on the lower side, I was not too concerned as I was getting into the rhythm and was not looking at the speed. I was concerned on two fronts for this journey, the wind and the traffic. Fortunately, I had a tail wind which made things easy and the traffic was not too bad till I got to the last 60 kilometers.

I rode at a steady pace till I joined the Mysore road when things picked up. Tail wind and not heavy traffic, I was able to pedal at a steady pace in the high twenties. I reached Srirangapatna within 30 minutes and then started the climb towards Mandya. I knew that this would be the difficult part of the ride other than the climb after Ramanagar. With the wind assisting me, I was able to pedal at speeds over 20kmph and made light work of the climb before hitting the descent towards Mandya and before I felt the effect of the ride, I had crossed Mandya and stopped for coconut water. It was a crowded junction and it took 20 minutes to gulp down coconut water. I had completed 50 kilometers in 2 hours and I was doing very well on the time front.  At the time of starting the ride I did not look at trying to ride fast, however, after having completed 50 kilometers in 2 hours, I began to nurse ambitions of trying to do my fastest time from Mysore to Bangalore. The only deterrent would be the traffic getting into Bangalore since this was the end of a long weekend.

I restarted the ride at 2:20 pm and immediately hit the straps and was riding quickly. I concentrated on keeping to the left of the road and also at trying to keep the pace above 25 kmph on the flats and on the descents. The climbs were done around 20kmph. I crossed Maddur and by the time I reached the mid-point which was 8 kilometers from Channapatna, I was hungry and I stopped at Indradhanush hotel for lunch. 30 minutes to eat curd rice and drink lime juice and I was back on the saddle.

It did not take long to reach Channapatna, but what welcomed me was a huge traffic jam. There were three traffic junctions in the town and all of them were packed and it took about 15 minutes just to negotiate these junctions over 2 kilometers. It helped that I was on the cycle and was able to use the shoulder of the road to good effect to get through this section. Ramanagar came by pretty quickly, but it was traffic woes again in town. Took quite a while to get through this section as well and when I made it out of town, I was relieved to see clear road in front of me. It was time for the climbs to start and I was doing pretty well. I got to within 7 kilometers of Bidadi before I stopped at Coffee Day to replenish on the juice front. A quick 20 minute stop for juice and refilled water to get going again.

It was 5:20 pm when I started from Coffee Day and reached Bidadi within 15 minutes. I was trying to keep the speed up and every time I lost on a little time due to traffic, I pedaled hard to make up for the lost time. Dark clouds gathered and it looked like a heavy downpour was on its way which pushed me to pedal harder to avoid the rain. I did manage to avoid the rain, however, near the NICE road junction I was greeted with another traffic jam. Vehicles were hardly moving and I gave a piece of my mind to a car driver for honking in the traffic. I wriggled my way through traffic and made my way into open air, as the traffic was piled up near the junction, as soon as I got out it was like riding on empty roads and I was able to get into the city easily.

It was 7:00 pm when I got into the city and I made slow progress from Rajarajeshwarinagar to the Sirsi circle flyover since there is a steep rise in the altitude, however, after climbing the flyover things eased out and I made it home at 8:00 pm.

The ride was enjoyable since the weather was good and also since I had a tail wind on both occasions. Having done the ride earlier definitely helped since I knew the places which have elevation gains and was able to pace myself well to be able to do these sections comfortably. Am happy that I was able to do the ride in 7 hours on the return journey and will have to look into the time delays on the journey towards Mysore.

Ride Details:

From	To	Distance	Ride Time (hrs)	Total Time (hrs)	Departure Time	Arrival Time	Avg Speed
Mysore	Mandya	50	2.00	2.00	12:00	14:00	25.00
Mandya	Ramanagar	50	2.00	2.75	14:00	16:45	25.00
Ramanagar	Koramangala	52	3.00	3.25	16:45	20:00	17.33
		152	7.00	8.00			21.71