Date: August 27,2016
Registration opened at 12:01 AM January 1, 2016
http://hh100.org/
 
This will be my first HnH and far and away my longest ride yet so I figured I'd register and commit early to give myself plenty of training time.  My 'plan' at the moment is to get up really early and drive out there the morning of the ride.  It's a long way that early but I figure I'll probably still get more sleep.
 
How is the parking situation?  Many of you going?
 
 
 
2015 Catrike Expedition

Don't ride, bike .. there's a group that rides up there from Plano each year ..  
 
 
 
The HHH is really a good place for your first long-est ride as its completely supported and you can comfortably bail out and take a shorter route back at nearly any time though its better to just grind on and take lots of rests at each of the stops.
 
As far as training for it goes ..  RIDE ..   ride a lot, start joining the club rides (Theres plenty of options around the metroplex)    get a plan together which has realistic millage goals.    If you are just starting out both GDB and PBA have beginners rides .. (as do some of the bike shops)   but you'll need more than that.  plan on about 10 hours a week of on-bike time to work up to this kind of millage ..  The good news is you will be in much better shape even if you don't make the whole 100 the first time around at the HHH  
 

One thing to consider about driving up there and sleeping in the parking lot is sweating all night before a century. I did that one year and started the race dehydrated.....didn't finish that year. At 83 miles I cramped all over--hamstrings, calves, quads, back--all at once.

You may already know, if you reserve a motel room in advance, they only take two night reservations in town during the event.  Some only use one night and leave after the ride.  Kathy and I did the motel one year.  It was somewhat noisy, but they had early breakfast and lots of cold bottled water to take.  They also had afternoon snacks.  We stayed Saturday night and had a relaxed drive back home Sunday.  The other time we drove up early Saturday and found lots of parking spaces a couple of blocks from the start.  That time we came in on a side road and darted into the parade after the starting gun.  The drive didn't seem to affect our performance adversely, although it was one of the best years, weatherwise.  But the drive back home afterwards was not so nice.

The recumbents and tandems have the option of going to the front of the HHH and starting about 6:50AM.  This gets you out of the main chaos and on the road prior to the main packs.  There have been at least 200 recumbent bikes & trikes in the last three HHH.  This would allow a group of trikers to ride together, but do not ride side by side as the main racing bike groups will be quickly closing in after the 7:00AM official start and they will need room to pass (you will see what I mean).  I would plan to arrive at least an hour prior to your start time (an hour & 1/2 if you've never been there before) if you plan on parking, unloading, picking up your packet and getting to the recumbent section at the front of the group.  Hope that helps.

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I get up at 2:45 leave the house (Richardson) at 3:00 am. - Stop in Denton at the IHOP for breakfast and get there about 6:00 or so.
I usually park on the JS birdwell Agricultural Center on the other side of the river. It seems to fill up last.  
You have to cross a long footbridge to get to the registration area.
 
Note: The colleges seem to open the same time and IHOP could be full of drunk kids. And maybe 2 or 3 cop cars in the parking lot. This year I think I will take a sandwich.

Quote from jcsadowski on Mar 25^th, 2016, 7:48pm:

 
That is exactly the type of information I was hoping for!  
Thank you all very much!!