Silk Sheets 200K Brevet

Janice, the editor of American Randonneur magazine, contacted Kevin Kaiser, the Regional Brevet Administrator (RBA) of Audax Atlanta.  Audax Atlanta is Georgia's chapter of Randonneurs USA (RUSA), and Kevin is our organizer.  Janice was soliciting articles for the spring issue of American Randonneur.  She had seen the Silk Sheets 200K brevet on the calendar, and the name intrigued her.  She asked Kevin to write a ride report or ask someone else to do it.  Guess who Kevin recruited?

Below is the article I submitted.  I'll be curious to see the edited version in the spring issue of the magazine.

Silk Sheets 200K Brevet – A Smooth Ride

By Betty Jean Jordan

Audax Atlanta hosts the Silk Sheets 200K brevet in early December.  It’s one of our group’s most popular rides because it starts in metro Atlanta, home to most of our members, and it’s a great route.

A Little Background

So where does the “Silk Sheets” name come from?  This area in South Fulton County has smooth pavement and low traffic, making for some of the best riding in metro Atlanta.  I live in Middle Georgia, a much more rural part of the state, and am used to such conditions.  However, I’m glad for Silk Sheets because when I do ride in metro Atlanta, it’s one of the few areas that doesn’t scare me out of my wits.

The Silk Sheets 200K also has personal significance for me.  It was the first brevet I ever did.

In April 2012 I was in a serious crash in a cycling road race.  Following a tedious, seven-month recovery, I decided to express my gratitude in 2013 by riding a century a month on behalf of 12 different charities.  I called it A Year of Centuries.

During my June century, I rode with a nice guy named David.  He told me about a type of cycling that I had never heard of, randonneuring.  At the time, I just mentally filed it because I was focused on A Year of Centuries.

A few months later, I was planning my December ride, the last in A Year of Centuries.  I searched online for organized rides, but there aren’t too many of those in December.  Then, I found the Silk Sheets 200K, hosted by Audax Atlanta.  Oh, yeah – that’s the group that guy was telling me about back in June.  So, I first did the Silk Sheets 200K in December 2013.  I’ve been randonneuring ever since.

The Lollipop Stick

Fourteen of us gathered last December for another Silk Sheets 200K.  I was particularly happy to see Neil, our ride organizer.  Only a few weeks earlier, a car had struck him while he was riding.  He even spent some time in ICU due to a collapsed lung.  There he was, though, tough as ever.  Neil is one of my cycling heroes.

The route is mostly out-and-back with a loop at the end.  It parallels the Chattahoochee River, Atlanta’s main water source.  We headed southwest out of Sandy Springs, a suburb on the north side of Atlanta.  Silk Sheets is the only route I know to get out of this busy area.  It’s a strange juxtaposition.  You start out going through some of Atlanta’s swankiest neighborhoods, filled with multimillion dollar houses.  After about 10 miles, the industrial side of town becomes apparent as “eau de landfill” fills the air.

We went right by the entrance to Six Flags Over Georgia, only tens of feet from a towering roller coaster.  Our amiable group obligingly stopped for a quick photo.

About 31 miles in, we finally could breathe a little easier as we got into the Silk Sheets portion of the ride.  Woods and rolling farmland make it difficult to believe you’re in the same county as downtown Atlanta.  One particular intersection in this area always makes me chuckle.

A few years ago, before I began randonneuring, I had done a time trial series in the Silk Sheets area.  The time trial course was a large rectangle that utilized some of the same roads as the brevet.  The first time I did the brevet, I saw a house right at the corner where I had made a turn on the time trial course several times before.  I’m talking about a HUGE house.  I had never noticed this house all those times I was racing, which just goes to show the difference in intensity between a time trial and a brevet!

The Lollipop

The lollipop portion of the route has very few store options.  Therefore, we had an info control.  I found this stop amusing.  First, it still had Halloween decorations up on December 2.  (I’ll take that over Christmas decorations at Halloween any day!)  Also, it had a “See Rock City” birdhouse.  Rock City, on top of Lookout Mountain near Chattanooga, is about 150 miles from here.  However, it’s really not unusual to see one of these birdhouses so far away.  They can be found all over the Southeast.  It’s one of the best low-tech advertising gimmicks ever.

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas - or not.

About halfway through, we had a control at a convenience store in Newnan.  This yielded one of the more entertaining moments of the brevet.  As we stood in line to make our purchases and get our cards signed, another customer asked, “How far are y’all riding today?”  Someone answered, “About 130 miles.”  The guy said, “Day-um!” as his knees began to buckle.  One of the great things about the South is that the cuss words have two syllables.

Back on the Stick

Seven of us stayed together the whole way, making for a particularly enjoyable ride.  We went back by Six Flags.  It had been quiet that morning, but it was open in the afternoon.  A roller coaster car zoomed past just as we rode by.  You could feel the excitement in the air!  Still, riding bicycles is even more fun than riding a roller coaster.

Several of the multimillion dollar houses were adorned in Christmas finery and were quite striking in the lengthening afternoon shadows.  We looked forward to finishing before sunset.  But first we had one last hill to climb – a mile-long, 11% grade, to be exact.  It had been easy (and chilly!) to ride down Northside Drive that morning.  Now, it was rather rude to have to go back up it, especially with more than 120 miles in our legs!

It was a joy to complete the Silk Sheets 200K safely and successfully.

We pedaled the final few miles, glimpsing the downtown Atlanta skyline along the way.  It was another smooth Silk Sheets 200K.