The inaugural edition of the soon-to-be-famous Rickreall Gravel Classic hit the roads of the mid-Willamette valley this past Saturday and despite weather ranging from drizzly to deluge smiles adorned the faces of every rider in attendance.
I was stoked to break in the new shop demo, a Salsa Warbird Ti.
The day began on a farm outside of Salem with a rare bit of sunshine, just enough to make some think about removing their jackets.
Right out of the gate we hit gravel, and the rolling hills that were to characterize much of the course.
Climbing and descending in turn we were greeted by miles of mostly empty roads with the exception of a few short legs on highways.
Before long the skies opened up and heavy rain began to fall. Luckily the temperature hovered in the low 50s so it wasn’t terribly cold as long as you kept moving.
One of the highlights of the route for me was the rolling terrain through the Basket Slough National Wildlife Refuge. The rain had turned to a mere drizzle and migratory birds were out and about in every field and copse of trees. There was even a bit of sun as I rolled out of the fields and into the Eola hills, climbing up to the top of Yampo and Skyline roads before the beautiful descent on the paved Eola hills road back to the Salem side.
Of course, what goes down must go back up, and the return over the hills to Rickreall was punctuated by the brutal gravel climb up Eagle Crest road.
I had to jam back to Portland, so I missed out on the festivities at the farm but Jake Tong of The Wolf’s Mouth was there to document the whole day and I’m sure he’ll have some great pics up in the next day or two.
Hope to see you out at the next events in the gravel calendar- Velodirt’s Rapture and Stampede rides will be killer. Plus we’re bringing out the BBQ fiesta for the post-rapture campout on Cinco de Mayo eve. See you May 4!
