I can't imagine how it would be like. On my 71 mile route, 30 miles are narrow 2 lane roads in the mountains. The most scenic but also the most dangerous. There's always at least a dozen cars and trucks in the 1 mile stretch of the road 24/7.
High speed accidents are common in that 30 mile stretch. When I cut that route to 40 miles, avoiding the 30 mile danger zone entirely, the ride became less stressful though Ironically, traffic is a lot heavier on the 40 mile stretch but with 4 to 6 lanes of the road, and slower-moving traffic, I feel a lot safer there. Ground level air pollution is the only major problem there. I wear mask to avoid breathing in some of the soot. Makes climbing harder with the breathing restriction. If only the air had been much less polluted, I prefer no mask at all. Though I do breathing restricted workouts on weekdays, I still prefer no breathing restriction on outdoor rides during the weekends.
Did my 40 miles weekend stretch yesterday. I seemed to have gone faster on climbs by at least 10% since I started doing strength training with free weights for few weeks now. Yet I was doing these strength exercises to get my muscular and bone strength back. It got me really concerned a few weeks ago when I did some short runs, my whole legs and joints got sore. It seemed like cycling actually made my whole body weak in any other tasks but cycling! Though my endurance was never better my whole life, my muscles and bones have deteriorated in strength. I've started running as well.
My bones and muscles have adapted since to running and strength training. No more soreness, no more pain. I'm taking this as progressively as possible. It also caused me further concerns that other studies have confirmed cycling-alone exercise will cause weakening of the muscles and bones. At least mixing running with cycling will help offset or even reverse these issues.
