Some climbs in Simingshan

31st of October 2015

Matteo, Servaas, Stephane and I wanted to have some climbs for a one day trip from Shanghai, but where to go, the usual packed Moganshan or somewhere else? Finally, we choose Simingshan area, between Hangzhou and Ningbo. Pictures of Bjorn ride look amazing and comfort us that we choose the good spot. We take the train to the nearest town YuYao and start the ride from there.

The Course: Train arrives at 8.40am and leaves at 3.50pm, basically we have six hours and we want to do at least 110km, maybe too tight for a place that we visit for the first time. We use this convenient feature on Strava to search for rides within a specific area. We find a 110km loop, more than enough, we don’t pass by Simingshan itself. Servaas knows more or less the route, no Garmin though so we will navigate by with baidu map, not handy.

The Weather: The sky is grey but at least no rain is forecasted for the whole day. Temperature is around 17 degrees. Servaas and I ride plan to ride with short sleeves jersey and short bibs while Stephane adopts the long version. Climbing is fresh, perfect outfit to sweat, but when the road goes down, we freeze so much that we even expect the next climb to get warm again.

The Trip: Meeting at 5.45am at Jingan to ride to HongQiao Railway Station, too tight, we pass the platform gate when it is about to close. Matteo is unlucky and miss the train; only choice for him is to take the next one. He still manages to make a 100km ride by himself, awesome. Looking at the flybys afterwards, we actually do cross each other at the same point and at the same time without seeing each other, maybe from just couples of seconds, lost in turns…

So, arriving YuYao at 8.40am, we set up the bikes, put the bike bags at the railway station locker, basically the convenience store next door. We have some more noodles and by 9.15am we are ready to go.

0-50km, awesome view: It is pretty easy to reach the mountains, 13km straight south, crossing YuYao. Early morning, so there is almost nobody in the streets. We reach the first climb to Lianghui Reservoir; very short but that gives you a pre-taste of what is next. Long stretch along the reservoir, some ups and downs, another reservoir then we arrive at the first big climb, no the steepest but the longest and for sure the nicest scenery. The concrete is just perfect and there are not so many cars, though it is one of the main roads. The routes zigzags and slowly goes up, legs get warm, it is not too hard. Let’s be realistic, it is the first climb and they are a lot more, very soon, every single slope should seem like a whole mountain again.

We reach the top, we have done almost 50km, we stop for 10min along the road to enjoy the view, drink and eat. Since the last big trip, I forgot to buy new gels and we ate already the cookies I took in train. Bad plan not to come well-prepared; anyway, I don’t realize it yet.

50-100km, keeping steady, more climbs: Some ups and downs later, I start to feel that I really should have eaten at the first break. We stop again at a very local store in the middle of nowhere to get some biscuits. After regaining some energy and some funny chats with the locals, we continue our way. The road goes down towards Jiaokou Reservoir. Servaas and I in short sleeves are literally frozen, never mind, the landscape really makes our day, an alternation of mountain curves, local villages, vegetation, bamboos and roads with no cars.

Servaas is in shape and pushes on every single flat part. During climbing, no drafting off course, so the group splits and he still pushes, Stephane is just right behind, I feel weak and I am always the last one of the trio. Anyway, I still prefer to go up than to go down, I feel it in my legs, I am slower but I am steady and I can hold it.

After making the long round of Jiaokou Reservoir, it is time to go up again for the last very long one. It takes time but we manage to pull ourselves to the top.

100-140km, crawling: At some point, looking at the time running, we have done 100km so far and we have two options, 30km to the city or 40km with more climbs? ok let’s go for more climbs. Maybe that was a mistake, well, we came to Simingshan for climbing right? Coz after few kilometers, we expect it will go down towards the city anytime, but it seems endless, the road just zigzags around villages passing from one mount to another, going down, going up, going down…We start to worry not to get the train one time. We love climbs but not when we are in a hurry.

Finally, we see the end and we enjoy a long 12km downhill to the south of YuYao. But we still have the whole city to cross! First part, we have energy to draft each other and we can hold it, not for very long though. As soon as the traffic gets denser, our speed falls down drastically, as well as motivation. Tiredness, hunger, no drafting, we no longer have any energy, suddenly a flat 2 km from the station. We miss our train but we can change tickets one hour later, especially giving the opportunity for the best McDonald reward ever.