I live on a hill, which is how this whole thing started. I'd climb the hill headed home and find myself enraged at the unfairness of hard things. A little black cloud would follow me up the hill, along with an unhealthy inner monologue. I started to wonder if there was a way to fix this problem.
And so, one day in 2019, I thought to myself, I'm going over to the hill to ride it - on purpose and not as part of some other ride. I rode to the corner and down the hill, then back up it. I found myself giggling at the ridiculousness of hating this very nice hill (SE 52nd Avenue from Harney to Flavel). The bike lanes are wide. Occasionally, a peacock would walk across. The sightlines are terrific. It's not even that steep!
After I climbed it that first time, I went back down and did it again, then rode the flew blocks home feeling like I'd just found a free gym right at my corner. I started going over once a week, on Tuesdays for some reason, to do a few repeats on the hill that I soon came to think of as "MY hill".
After a few months of this, it occurred to me that other people might enjoy this silly game of hill repeats on a nice easy 100' gain hill. So I started a club and called it the "Hill Repeators". My friend Madi (yes, that Madi!) and her son were the first to join. We rode repeats a few times for a few weeks together until their schedule changed and it was back to just me.
I renamed the club "hill killerz" (all lower case since our hill isn't huge) and started posting on the Pedalpalooza calendar. Attendance was spotty but it helped motivate me to show up since there was always a chance someone might come.
Soon the Covid pandemic was upon us and leading group rides, even teensy ones like hill killerz, didn't feel safe to me. I continued to do repeats on my own and then I had an idea. What if I invite folks to do repeats on hillz of their own choosing? A dozen or so friends participated and that was that.
2021 came around and I had another idea. How about if I go find hillz for people? I posted the challenge - tell me where you live and I'll come in person to find each participant their perfect repeat hill. I looked for a hill close to where they live, a perfectly sized hill (ie not huge!), and a hill free of stop signs, giant potholes or other dangerous factors. Once I assigned a hill, the challenge was to ride it 5 times in a row, once a week for 5 weeks out of an 8 week period (building in 3 entire weeks of flake friendliness!).
I anticipated a dozen or so would sign up. Instead 150 (!!!!) people signed up. What an amazing motivation to get out of my neighborhood and scour other neighborhoods for hillz. The furthest hill killerz were located in Forest Grove and Canby and the rest were all in Portland except for one: a stranger to me who had signed up via Instagram. This person lived on Aldercrest in Milwaukie, a road I'd never ridden on before. Aldercrest is now a favorite destination - a nice, quiet, rolling hill type of road that follows Kellogg Creek for about 7 pretty miles.
By 2022, I was ready to lead group rides again and our current format began of Tuesday lunch killz all summer and monthly social rides where we chase kitties instead of lions! Often folks express intimidation at joining a hill killerz ride, but the vibe is easy, fun and do what you can. I always tell new lunch hill killerz attendees they are invited to try for 5 repeats and if they do any less than that, they did not fail, they are not defeated, they'll still get a sticker and they won just by showing up!
I've made more than a few friends thanks to hill killerz and I never get mad climbing my hill anymore.
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