The Potomac Pedalers Bicycle Club holds their annual Century Ride every year on the third Sunday in September, and Clarke County ARES has provided communications support for the event for the past five years. Clarke County Emergency Coordinator (EC) Mark Gribble N3MG organized the amateur radio support and acted as Net Control Station (NCS) for the past four years, having taken over from Tom Martin KF4TNX. ARES mustered 12 local amateur radio operators, the majority of whom stayed for the full day. Please join Mark in giving a very big thank you and congratulations to all the volunteers for an excellent job of teamwork, skill and persistence: Ed Krom WD4KHP, Tom Martin KF4TNX, Mike Orndorff, Teresa Orndorff KJ4DOR, Jay Ives KI4TXP, Tom Chase N3LGF, Margie Krom KC4QYK, Larry Miller KB6VAA, Dave Johnson WA4DJ, Alan Moeck WA2RPX and Tom Brownlee AF2D.

The Century ride combines 100, 66, 50, and 25-mile rides, with the start/finish point at Clarke County High School in Berryville, VA.  First riders are out of the gate at 7:00 AM and the last riders trickle in eleven hours later. The ride traverses through Clarke, Jefferson and Warren counties, encompassing a grid of approximately 8 by 24 miles. The terrain is rolling, including much low-lying river-bottom land (read: RF hole). Cellular telephone reception has often proven to be non-existent or poor in several of the course’s locations, so good radio reception proves invaluable.

The team arrived early at the high school to set up a temporary shelter with 2-meter radio and power equipment, computers, and supplies.  Ed Krom WD4KHP provided two crates of pre-programmed UHF commercial HTs for use by the several non-amateur radio support vehicles and personnel.  A UHF commercial frequency base station was also used at NCS, with a mast and ground plane antenna.  These proved to be very useful and capable for communicating with the non-ham operators, and in certain instances with amateur radio operators when away from their vehicles.  The primary frequency was a two-meter simplex frequency, with backup frequency being the Shenandoah Valley Amateur Radio Club’s W4RKC repeater.

This year there were five amateur radio SAG (support and gear) vehicles, six non-ham SAG vehicles, and amateur radio operators at three rest stops.  SAG vehicles traversed the course at the direction of the Potomac Pedalers’ SAG coordinator, facilitated by NCS radio communications.  SAGs provide transportation to riders in need of transport due to injury, fatigue, or an inoperative bicycle.  An incident log is kept during the day to record time, location, nature of incident, and response offered.  The incident log provides good guidance for following year’s staffing and procedures.

The PPTC Century provides new lessons every year to ARES volunteers with regard to equipment, RF propagation, and the unexpected. As Mark observes, “Murphy’s law never fails to happen when we least expect it, so the more training we can do, the better prepared we will be.”