11/09/00-11/31/01 Endless Tues/Thur morning ride ramblings, visit to TREK & LeMond factory, first ride up Diablo, Sonora Pass, French laundry lesson
01/01/02-07/15/02 Endless Tues/Thur morning ride ramblings, riding in the snow, Gary Klein visit, Millennium Crows, Spooky Old Tree
07/18/02-07/31/02 Incredible trip to the 2002 Tour de France
08/01/02-12/31/02 Endless Tues/Thur morning ride ramblings, 2nd 2002 trip to France, winning Lance-signed frameset, 5th-Annual TurkeyTrot ride, riding in the rain
01/01/03-03/31/03 Yet more ramblings about the regular Tues/Thur ride, Mr. J visits Washington DC
04/01/03-08/28/03 You take the guy with the gun, I'll handle the guy with the Gatorade!
09/03/03-12/31/03 My dinner with Zap, 75000 mile TREK OCLV, meeting Graham Watson
                            TOUR DE FRANCE 2003 TRIP, 2004
04/01/03-08/28/03 Endless Tues/Thur morning ride ramblings, Fast older guys, Sequoia Double-Metric, Grizzly Peak Century
09/03/03-12/31/03 Endless Tues/Thur morning ride ramblings
01/01/04-07/31/04 Endless Tues/Thur morning ride ramblings
07/31/04-12/31/04 Endless Tues/Thur morning ride ramblings
01/01/05-07/01/05 Endless Tues/Thur morning ride ramblings
07/01/05-12/31/05 Endless Tues/Thur morning ride ramblings plus Tour de France ride-a-long in Team Car
11/22/06-07/16/06
07/28/06-12/28/06 Endless Tues/Thur morning ride ramblings, Sonora Pass, caught in a snowstorm
01/01/07-06/30/07 Endless Tues/Thur morning ride ramblings
07/02/07-12/31/07 Endless Tues/Thur morning ride ramblings
01/01/08-05/30/08 Endless Tues/Thur morning ride ramblings
06/01/06-12/31/08 Endless Tues/Thur morning ride ramblings
01/01/09-12/31/09 Endless Tues/Thur morning ride ramblings
THE DAY MOUNT HAMILTON ALMOST BLEW AWAY (with us on it)

TUESDAY/THURSDAY KINGS MOUNTAIN RIDE

Every Tuesday & Thursday morning, rain or shine, 7:45am at Olive Hill & Canada Road in Woodside. 26 miles, back by 9:25-9:40pm (a bit later when it rains). Hills, sprints & great roads. If you can make it up Kings in 30 minutes or less, try it!


The Tuesday/Thursday ride is now on YouTube! Broken up into three separate segments, about 10 minutes each. Filmed by Millo on 1/30/07
The regular cast of characters on the Tuesday/Thursday rides includes
Kevin the first regular on our ride, and the most regular regular. Has too much time to ride!
Karl (aka "Fast Karl"), super-nice-guy road racer who can really charge on the flats
Chris, one of the younger guys who thinks he can climb and sprint. He can.
(Karl now with is own page here, Karl's Korner)(but not updated in ages...)
Eric, who likes to torture me up Kings by riding just a bit ahead or behind me, waiting for me to blow up.
John, relative newcomer, another 50ish youngster who can climb way too fast.
Millo, who complains that he's old & slow but somehow always there in the sprints.
George, always out on Tuesdays, nice guy, too fast on the climbs

I was playing with a new camera, getting ready for my trip to France (leaving Saturday), and yet somehow managed to miss the mother duck and many ducklings along the side of Manuella. Karl mentioned it long after the photo op was gone; sometimes you can't see the forest for the trees. Oh, yeah, that sprinting thing. The only contested sprint was the run into Sky L'Onda, and to make things interesting, I decided to just go for it from the top of the descent, carrying all the speed I could into the bottom, knowing that I was dragging the other guys behind me and they'd have a huge advantage as they came around. But sometimes you need a challenge, and I just didn't feel like doing what was required to win the sprint... rather, I wanted to really have to work for it. And I did! But hard as I worked, Karl got me at the line, no question. I shoulda coulda woulda, but the truth is, it was a lot of fun, and I think I'll be doing some more of that. If I can get strong enough to beat guys doing that, then I'll be ready for whatever it is that's totally irrelevant and silly to a guy who doesn't race.

07/11/06- THREE SECONDS. LESS TIME THAN A SNEEZE MIGHT TAKE. THREE LOUSY SECONDS. So where did I lose them? That's what I'm going to be torturing myself with today. Karl, Jeff, Milo & Todd rode with me this morning; actually, Todd & Karl rode on ahead, having a casual conversation while I was gasping for air. 26:02 to the top of Kings. What makes 26:02 seem so much longer than 25:59? I was really hoping to pull off a 25-something time this morning, knowing it was going to be close all the way, but when I rounded the final hairpin and rode straight into a 50 mph headwind coming from the coast... oh, did I slip an extra digit in there? Maybe 5 mph headwind. But it was a headwind, and it lasted the entire .38 mile from just past that hairpin to the top.

At least I hadn't cleaned my bike! Not too often that's a good thing, and my bike is pretty much a mess right now, with just a few days left before I (and my bike) leave for France. But had I cleaned it yesterday, it would have been pretty dirty after just this-morning's ride, due to a fair amount of fog & light drizzle near Sky L'onda. Not enough to keep us from sprinting though, although I question whether my moving across the road might have relegated me to last-place. Adding credence to that likelihood is the fact that I beat Todd, and about the only way that's going to happen is if I run him into the barriers. Which I wouldn't do intentionally!

07/09/06- CHURCH, WORLD-CUP SOCCER, TOUR DE FRANCE, WHO HAS TIME TO RIDE? That's how things were shaping up today. I'd had thoughts of getting up early and doing a pre-church ride, but given that I haven't had more than 6 hours sleep/night the past week, I kinda intentionally didn't set the alarm clock, and kinda intentionally went back to sleep when I woke up around 7am or so. I finally dragged by butt out of bed around 9am and watched the recorded coverage of this-morning's TdF stage, and then headed off to church where there were several reminders in the sermon of the world cup soccer finale going on (France/Italy). By the time we got home it was 12:45 so I figured I'd missed the game pretty much entirely but no, still a few minutes left in regular time, then it went on for another hour in overtime and penalty kicks!

So about 1:45 and I'm thinking I'd better get my butt out there, and maybe Todd, who was going to do an early-morning ride, might want to go out a second time. Well, yes, he's ready to ride, but he hadn't strayed from his TV all morning, watching the TdF coverage and then the World Cup...

So obviously, there's nothing left to do but THE UGLY RIDE. Yes, something nasty, not fun, something you do because you have to punish yourself for being a slacker. Something to recalibrate your sensibilities. And there's nothing better for that than heading north on Canada (into a stiff headwing, yuck!), up 92 to Skyline (which you could do faster than the cars, which were bumper-to-bumper, probably all the way to Half Moon Bay), and then the very worst part. That long grind south on Skyline, with several perfectly-straight stretches that seem to go on forever, and the sun beating down on you the whole time.

We headed all the way to Sky L'Onda, down west-side 84 to west-side Old LaHonda, then back up to Skyline and down 84 to Woodside. Kind of an extended variation of our regular Tuesday/Thursday ride, but with the sense of fun generated largely from the shared experience of doing something that wasn't fun in any sense a normal person would understand.

07/06/06- CHECK THOSE TIRES BEFORE YOU RIDE! Actually, you should be checking tires after you ride. This morning, heading down Jefferson towards the start of the ride, I somehow managed a small skid on my rear wheel (unusual, since I rarely apply much force to my rear brake). So when I met up with Todd, Preben and... darn, was that it? Anyway, I checked my rear tire at the start and found two small spots where it had worn through to the casing. Hate it when that happens. So we cut the ride a bit short, skipping the west-side Old LaHonda section, where it's likely the gravel sections might have finished off the tire. Got up Kings in just under 27 minutes, well behind Todd, but just a bit ahead of Preben.

07/04/06- 4th OF JULY RIDE. No big crowd this time, as the early-morning weather looked a bit dismal for the ride out to the coast (most cyclists preferring to head out in the afternoon soon it seems). George, Kevin P (not the "regular" Kevin who's in France right now), Preben and Milo joined me for a ride that was supposed to be a moderate pace up Old LaHonda and down to San Gregorio. Kevin P isn't into moderate though, so he and Preben took off while George kept me company for as long as I could stay with him. Milo didn't continue on with us, as he was suffering from a cold (a mere cold would keep someone from a long ride???!!!), and I don't recall when Preben left us, but eventually it was just George & Kevin at the San Gregorio store... which, at 9:05am, was not open! No matter, we were doing fine, didn't need any extra fueling for the trip up Tunitas.

Oh, right, forgot something (which happens when I'm two days late updating the diary!). I was training for my trip to France 10 days down the road, carrying a backpack with my camera gear. So it's no wonder I couldn't keep up with others on the climbs, carrying 12 extra pounds on my back! Oh darn, weighted it on the scale later, and it's only 6 pounds. Sigh. But it felt like 12! George & Kevin went ahead and played on Tunitas, while I managed to get to the top on the same day. Beautiful day by then too! Lots and lots and lots of people riding up Kings as we headed back down into Woodside.

07/03/06- UPDATE ON TOMORROW-MORNING'S RIDE. Could be just me, or a number of others showing up, I really have no idea. What I do know is that it's going to be longer than normal, so make plans to be back as late as 1pm. The pace will also be a bit more casual than normal, as I'll be using this ride as a test for my upcoming trip to France, carrying a backpack with the same camera gear I'll be climbing Alpe d'Huez and the Galibier with. It's going to be a bit on the cool side, so you might want to wear leg warmers and bring a light jacket. There will likely be several photo stops, particularly if we do the Pescadero/San Gregorio option... it would be nice to get a good shot of the Flamingo house, as well as Machine Gun Man!

07/02/06- FAST PACE ON A SHORT RIDE today; the Alto Velo A ride was a pretty unusual ride today. Up Old LaHonda, north on Skyline to Sky L'Onda, down west 84 to west-side Old LaHonda, back up that to Skyline, south once again on Skyline to Sky L'Onda, now down east-side 84 into Woodside and a brief regrouping at Tripp Road & Kings, where we stopped just long enough to make for a dead-start up Kings, then south on Skyline to 92, down 92 east to Canada and back. Who comes up with routes like this??? It sounds longer than it actually is though; 45 miles total, and about 4800ft of climbing.

I did cheat a bit climbing Old LaHonda. Normally I meet up with the ride at the base and head up with them, which is always a competitive pace. This morning I got there a few minutes early and spotted "Fast Eddy" and his friend Raylene heading up, so I rode with them. Not slowly, but not the torrid pace of some in the A ride either! But I later paid the price for that transgression when, on the return on Canada Road, Greg Drake (former or present Pro rider?) went to the front and rode everyone off his wheel. Well, a couple of us (me included) came unglued well before the rest!

Tuesday's 4th-of-July ride will be an extended version, heading out to the coast for either the San Gregorio/Pescadero loop or San Gregorio/Tunitas Creek. Either way we'll meet at the same place (7:45am Olive Hill & Canada Road) and most-likely head over the hill via 84. Yes, that's right, a Tuesday/Thursday ride that doesn't include climbing King's Mountain! Plan on being back in the neighborhood of 11am-1pm, depending which loop is chosen. Most likely the pace won't be quite as fast as normal, with both Kevin & Karl elsewhere.
 

06/20/06- ONE MORE MONKEY OFF THE BACK. I was a bit concerned how this morning's ride would go, since I hadn't really ridden (other than a single mile on Sunday) since last Thursday, and we usually have the "fast" group showing up on Tuesdays. This morning it was Eric (who usually shows up on those rare days I'm not there, which takes pretty careful planning, since I miss no more than 5 of the 102 rides/year), Jeff, George, Kevin, Preben... but no Karl, Milo, we knew, was on vacation this week, but where was Karl? I figured that George & Karl would be hammering up the hill, preparing for Saturday's Pescadero Road Race.

But I felt better than normal this morning, probably because it was a bit warmer than normal. Finally, the chance to climb in near-60-degree temps, which has an amazingly-positive effect on my lungs. I can actually breathe! I still sound like a freight train, but I don't ran out of steam so easily. I took off at the start, with Eric just a bit behind, and behind him, I'm not sure, but I really wasn't looking. I assumed the rest of the party was right behind, although a glance at the park entrance revealed only Eric. So I just kept going. I made it to the first hairpin past the park in under 9 minutes, so I knew I was doing pretty well. The next timing point, the hairpin where you cross the creek, was just under 13:30. This was going to be (for me) a fast time. And at the final hairpin, under the powerlines where, if you don't die, the end is just 4 minutes away... 21:56. No chance to let up, not even to look back. Finished in 25:54, which is nothing to the guys you regularly get 24 minute times, or the Cat-1s who can do 20 minutes, but for today, for me, it was another indication that I may have managed to accomplish my goal... riding stronger at 50 than 35.

06/18/06- IF YOUR LEG'S HURTING THAT MUCH, WE'RE TAKING YOU TO THE DOCTOR AND GETTING IT CUT OFF! Yeah, how's that for encouragement from Dad, when his son has ridden less than half a mile from the house, on our way up to the far side of Old LaHonda, but having to turn back because he's complaining about his leg (which he'd hurt five days prior while hiking in Stulsaft Park). So we did in fact turn around, I did in fact haul him to the urgent care clinic at Kaiser, and he did in fact have a slightly-bowed and chipped fibula (the non-weight-bearing bone in the lower leg). So no ride for Dad on Father's Day, not this year.

06/15/06- IT DOESN'T GET A WHOLE LOT BETTER THAN THIS. Warm enough to not need leg warmers, no fog or rain up on Skyline, and I get to ride up King's Mtn for the zillionth time with a nice group of people who seem to find little in life more enjoyable than the chance to ride me into the ground. Karl, Jeff, Milo but no Kevin today (he later called to say he wasn't feeling well). Karl was determined to lead me to an under-26-minute time up Kings this morning, but my legs & lungs said otherwise. Actually, had I known it was going to be so close (26:15), I probably would have dispensed with a failed picture-taking effort and really gone for it! But the effort was enough to shut down my first Skyline sprint a bit early, letting Karl ride past with perhaps 20 meters to go.

I apparently just missed my brother Steve and his son (Ed), who'd ridden up Old LaHonda and then down west-side Old LaHonda, where they happened upon a baby rattlesnake. Dang, too bad we didn't see it. Towards the edge of the road, where the rock outcroppings and the great view of the coast are found. Maybe better that we didn't, since I would have insisted on finding something to move it off the road, and baby rattlers tend to be more dangerous (or so I am told) because they don't just strike at you, but tend to hang on for a while. I'll keep an eye out for this little guy though.

06/13/06- AND I THOUGHT WE WERE DONE WITH THE RAIN. Large group today, with Karl, Kevin, Jeff (whom we haven't seen for maybe a year?), George, Preben plus Don and Josh from our Redwood City store. A bit cool but not nastily so; I rode the first part fast but then held up and waited for Don & Josh, who made pretty reasonable time up Kings. Not nearly as fast as George & Karl though. Very tough to keep those guys in sight for very long. We were joined at the top by Milo, and then had a moderately-paced run across the top of Skyline, with the road growing ever-more-wet as we approached Sky L'Onda. No real sprint on the wet pavement, although at the end of the ride Karl took off and kinda road away with the "sprint" on Albion. Thursday, I might try to get a good time on the climb.

06/11/06- WE'LL MAKE A CYCLIST OF HIM YET! Didn't have time for a big ride on Sunday, so went out with my 13-year-old on The Loop. Normally nothing too noteworthy, except that I had him drafting my wheel at about 25mph on Alpine. He actually seemed mildly disappointed we couldn't head up Old LaHonda, so I took a bit of a risk and took him up Godetia, that nasty little cutoff road between Jefferson and Canada. No stopping, no walking!

06/09/06- PRETTY PROUD OF THESE GUYS. No, I'm not talking about the Tuesday/Thursday-morning crew that rides me into the ground. They don't need further encouragement! Rather I'm talking about my daughter Becky, and Kyle, both Chain Reaction employees, who graduated today from Woodside High School. Hard to believe my daughter is 18 and out of High School. Equally hard to believe that Kyle managed a better-than-4.1 GPA and was one of the top 9 in his class (he always seemed so... normal). I'm looking forward to seeing what the future holds for both of them. Should be a lot more interesting than the usual Tuesday/Thursday-morning drivel posted here!

06/08/06- THE LEGS ARE BACK but in the relatively-cool (50 degrees this morning) air, the lungs just weren't working the way I'd like. Karl, Kevin & Chris were serving up the morning meal of humble pie, with Milo, Steve and Josh waiting at the top. I finished the climb on the same day, but not much faster than Tuesday. The fog magically burned away just ahead of us, giving us one more in a long series of beautiful days. A bit cool, yes, but if that's the worst we can complain about (and right now it is), this is a great area to ride indeed!

06/06/06- I'VE LOST CONTROL. As if I ever had it in the first place! Pretty decent-sized group this morning, including Preben, making one of his rare appearances, and Paul (if I have his name right), a customer who was showing up for the first time on our Tuesday/Thursday cruise. Also Chris, Kevin, George, Karl, and Steve at the top. My legs felt... well, they still hurt a little bit after Saturday & Sunday's 100-milers, but worse than hurting, they just didn't seem to have any zip to 'em. So instead of charging hard up the first part of the hill, I engaged "survival mode" and just watched as they rode on ahead. All of them. It wasn't as if I couldn't make it up the hill, or that it was terribly difficult. It was just impossible to go fast. Eventually I got to the top, and looked upon a large group of well-rested riders, who saw fit to continue to push things on Skyline, leaving me in the proverbial dust. Or maybe their turbulence. I wasn't in a position to even see any of the sprints, much less take part in one, although as the ride went on, I did seem to find a bit more of my legs, bit by tiny little bit. By the time we got to the end of the valley on west side Old LaHonda, I there was actually a small amount of power in my legs.

All was still not completely right with the world though, as descending 84 I went quite wide in a corner, not wanting to take the usual line because something didn't feel quite right, possibly a flat. So I stopped, checked out the bike and realized it was all in my head. It seems that both physically and mentally, those back-to-back centuries (in two different parts of the country) did take their toll. But the good news is that I'm feeling better all the time, and perhaps on Thursday I'll be back to normal. But for now, I'm still wondering just why I'd want to climb Sonora Pass at the end of the month.

06/03/06-06/04/06- CENTURY IN WISCONSIN ON SATURDAY, PALO ALTO ON SUNDAY. CAN IT BE DONE? It seemed both crazy and yet possible... I was heading back to Wisconsin for some product meetings (Trek, LeMond & Fisher), and at the end, on Saturday, was the opportunity to ride the Trek 100, one of the larger benefit rides (childhood cancers). Then fly back that night and do the Sequoia the next day. Pretty silly to even consider, but the Trek 100 was supposed to be pretty flat (it is Wisconsin, after all), and how could I miss out on my favorite local century?

So Saturday I met up with Brian K, a former Chain Reaction employee who has moved back to Wisconsin, and had a very nice ride at a very different century. Different? Well, for starters, there were rest stops every 8 miles or so. And the food? They say that this is one of the few centuries where you are likely to gain, not lose weight, and with rest stops featuring such things as fried chicken wings and bread pudding. Pretty killer cornbread too. And at the end, something I definitely haven't seen at a California century... beer! But remember, this is Wisconsin we're talking about. Terrain was a bit hillier than I'd expected, but it was a beautiful day, mid-70s, low humidity and light breeze.

The plane trip home was on-time and uneventful, almost pleasant even (If you fly United and you're on an A319 or A320 plane, make sure to request row 6, probably the best economy-class seats you'll ever find). Arrived at 10:45pm, came home and got the bike ready (in Wisconsin, LeMond supplied me with a bike so I didn't have to bring mine) and managed to get almost 6 hours of sleep... about average for the past few days.

But how would my legs feel for the Sequoia Century the next day? Pretty much as I expected- mush. Legs & arms both felt a bit lacking in energy; the climb up Redwood Gulch was merely the first in a series where the idea of stopping and walking for a short bit didn't seem entirely unreasonable (although it most assuredly wasn't going to happen!). The plan was to do the 200k version of the ride, so we (forgot to mention that I was riding with Todd from the shop) did the extra Rodeo Road loop south of Santa Cruz and I gotta tell you, I wasn't entirely optimistic about being able to finish. I'd already had one episode of my body rebelling and "sweating out", with another one to follow on the East Zayante climb. By the time I got to our "secret" soda stop at Bear Creek & Skyline, there was so little left in my legs & arms that I was having a difficult time visualizing finishing the ride. But an ice-cold Mountain Dew had a wonderful effect (along with sitting in a chair in the shade for a bit), and within a few miles, I felt almost human. Todd had ridden on ahead but I soon came upon Elaine, who provided a perfect, even pace that kept me going.

In the end Todd & I skipped the Portola Valley loop that would have made the ride 125 miles, and finished with 108. For me, a very tough 108 miles, but it was enough to be able to claim the weird bragging rights that come with doing a pair of centuries on adjacent days, 2000 miles apart.
 
05/30/06- IT'S FUN! Right, that's what I have to tell myself some mornings. It's fun to get out and ride with the guys, getting up earlier than I otherwise would so I can... what? Have fun, of course! And who would I be having fun with today? That would be Kevin, Karl & George, and, of course, the hill. King's Mtn. Something I've climbed literally over a thousand times before, nearly 100 times a year, and it's still there. You'd think it might have moved by now! But no, it's still there, like a bad dream. And sometimes, that's what it seems like, and you wonder why. Why you keep climbing it, twice a week. It's not just because it's there. But darned, it is convenient. Just a few miles from home. And it's pretty darned safe, with virtually no traffic. And, perhaps best of all, it allows you to get in a hard effort in minimal time. Figure half an hour of climbing; a bit less if you're really pushing. And, back in the day, you were rewarded with a nice cruise along Skyline, followed by the beauty of west-side Old LaHonda.

That... was then. This is now. Rarely does our group just cruise along; on any given Tuesday or Thursday morning, you can assume that George, Karl or Kevin (and recently Chris) is going to push the pace up Kings. And I get to decide where I want to be. Do I want to push hard and try to keep the leaders in sight for as long as possible, or cruise along at a more relaxed pace with whomever has decided not to kill themselves on this particular day? Maybe 7 times out of 10, I'll push. Partly because even if I ride with somebody taking it easy, I'll still be at a disadvantage in lung power, doing the heavy-breathing thing while they're able to yak away... at least until the temps get a bit warmer.

So this morning Karl took off, Kevin & George guarded the rear, and I tried to keep Karl in sight as long as possible. 26:39 when it was all over; at this point in the year, I can generally do mid-26 times at will. And afterward, I'll be thinking, couldn't I have pushed a bit harder? Gone a bit faster across the middle section, and shaved off another 40 seconds? Yeah, that's what I think afterward, and maybe if I had someone yelling at me with a bullhorn I'd be thinking that while climbing the hill, instead of worrying that I'm about to blow up.

Kevin & George came up a few minutes later, and we met up with Milo (who'd left earlier and was waiting at the top of the hill for us). And now for that fun cruise along Skyline? That was then, this is now. Yes, it's fun, but it's a very different type of fun these days. Because now the fun is in challenging yourself; seeing what's left after the main climb and continuing to push yourself. Three sprints, the first being the long uphill past Swett Road, made a bit more challenging today by allowing Kevin to literally hang onto my jersey on the way up. In the end it was a non-sprint, but it took its toll on my legs, which are still reeling from it. George took the sprint at the Skegg's parking lot, while I recovered enough to take the big one into Sky L'Onda. From there it's sitting on Karl's wheel while he hauls us all down 84 towards west-side Old LaHonda. Dang he does that well! Then up the twisty, deteriorating-yet-friendly and always-beautiful Old LaHonda. Generally civil until the far end of the valley, and then it's often a free-for-all to the top.

But is it really fun? Pushing yourself to the limit, riding past others who clearly have a different idea of what it means to enjoy being out on a bike, sprinting to imaginary and yet well-understood lines... is it really fun? Yes, it's really fun. It's something you can look forward to, something reliable and enjoyable that's disconnected from just about everything else in your life. And maybe even more important, it encourages a feeling of immortality. A feeling that, despite being 50, you can do something today as well as, if not better, than you could 10, maybe 15 years ago. That alone makes it worthwhile.

05/28/06- DIFFERENT KEVIN TODAY, as I rode with my 13-year-old instead of the big boys. Not a lactic-acid-special, to be sure, but any chance I have to get him out on a bike is one I have to take advantage of. Did the Old LaHonda, eat-at-Alice's (Sky L'onda) and then descend 84 back into Woodside ride again. Nice ride because it's not hopelessly long, includes a good climb, and has a reward (Alice's).

05/25/06- SLOW KEVIN SHOWED UP TODAY and I was kinda glad. After a couple of pretty fast rides up King's Mtn, I was beginning to feel a bit pressured, and it was nice to be able to relax a bit on the hill. Karl and new-guy (actually rode with us once before) Brian rode on up ahead, and at the top, we were joined by Milo and Steve. The easy ride up the hill made for easier sprints than normal, which was fine with me. Probably the most-challenging part of the ride was the descent on 84, where Karl was definitely pushing the pace. He's got two entirely different descending speeds... wet & dry. When wet, he's the most-cautious person in our group. But when it's dry, he's an entirely different animal!

Kevin did confess today that he's cutting back on his diet coke habit; at some point he admitted to drinking more diet cokes in a day than seems believable, but given the number of times he has to take a "natural break" (as they call it on the Tour de France coverage), you begin to believe it. On the other hand, as we headed back to the finish of the ride, we passed a young woman (well, these days anyone under 40 seems young to us!) rather proudly wearing a "Diet Pepsi" t-shirt. I told Kevin it was one more sign that his diet coke days ought to be nearing an end.

05/24/06- WRONG DAY, WRONG TIME! I decided to revisit yesterday's events one more time, just to make sure I hadn't made an error in reading the HAC4 chart. At first, all appeared as I expected... it was actually a 27-something ride up the hill, not the 25-minute scorcher that George had said. But then I noticed I was reading the wrong file; it had defaulted to the oldest one stored in the HAC4, not the latest. So I can say with reasonable certainty that my actual time up King's yesterday was 26:18. That I can live with. Fastest time so far this year, and puts a 25-something time within reach. Probably not tomorrow though.

OK, it's time to talk about something really silly. Something I haven't talked myself out of... yet. Next week I fly back to Trek for a mini product show and, on Saturday, will be riding in the TREK 100 in Wisconsin, a benefit ride to fight childhood cancer. I fly back Saturday night, arriving at 10:48pm if things go according to plan... and then, the next morning, ride the 200k Sequoia Century. Back-to-back organized centuries are one thing... doing them 2,000 miles apart is quite another. Don't think they make any special patches for that one!

05/23/06- A TIMELY TALE. It was a nicer morning than every-other-Tuesday-morning usually is, because the garbage collectors, on recycling day, didn't arrive at their usual 5:45am time, banging on everything they can find in an attempt to let the world know what that your $34/month aren't going to, ahem, waste. Instead, they showed up at 7:04am, just one minute ahead of the alarm clock. I can deal with that!

Harder to deal with is the deadly quad of George, Chris, Karl & Kevin for the ride up the hill. I'm modifying my pace a bit lately, choosing to ride a bit slower at the start, hoping not to die quite so many (or such painful) deaths in the middle section. Chris rode on and out of sight, while Karl kept a respectable distance in front of me, without making it look too easy. I eventually lost track of him as well, but then George cruised past, gaining about half a minute on me by the top. But that's where things get a bit confusing, as George, who didn't have an "official" timer running (just his watch), thought he got about 24:30, leaving me with an unbelievable time around 25 minutes. Unbelievable, indeed. Nearly unverifiable as well, since I'd neglected to start my Garmin GPS unit, but did have my backup HAC4 running... which required that I download and analyze later on, extracting the actual climb from the rest of the data manually. And that time? A far-more-believable 27 minutes. I'm still looking for where I might have made a mistake... how I goofed and the time was actually 26 minutes, maybe. 25 minutes though, not a chance. Maybe later this season. But for three or four hours, there was this chance, this possibility that George really did ride 24:30, and since he was within visual range at the end, I was in fact about 30 seconds behind. But not this time.

At the top we were joined by Milo and Steve, so we had a pretty healthy-size group going. Made pretty good time, and I might have had fun in the third sprint except that something just didn't quite feel right on the descent, so I stopped to make sure I didn't have a low tire (I didn't) before continuing. Sometimes that's just what you have to do... stop, collect your bearings, relax a bit and then get back to it. Highly recommended if you start feeling a bit sketchy on a descent. Don't force it if it ain't there.

05/18/06- NOTHING IF NOT CONSISTENT. Rather lonely at the start of the ride, with just myself and Karl. Steve came driving past and said hello, goodbye, have a fun ride. Fun ride with Karl charging up the hill? Fortunately I didn't totally blow a gasket and made it up in 26:38, just 9 seconds slower than Tuesday. Looks like I'm finally in the "repeatable mid-26" range again, which is pretty normal for this time of year. At the top of the hill we found Kevin hanging around, briefly... he apparently needed to get to work and couldn't ride the rest of the way with us. But we did pick up Milo and Josh, enough for a good run on Skyline. Josh hasn't quite figured it out yet, but when I ride hard up the hill, I'm going to have problems in the first couple of sprints, and today was not an exception. In fact, it was actually Josh taking both! The second one was a lot of fun, with Josh and Milo going at it pretty hard, and I'm just sitting between them, just a foot or two back, enjoying the view as their draft is sucking me along. Should have brought a camera and taken pictures!

05/16/06- OOPS, HE DID IT AGAIN! That would be the most-unlikely-to-ever-win-a-spring, Kevin (the original), who managed to pull off the Skegg's Skyline sprint this morning. But it's not as if I didn't die trying. The ride started out nicely enough, at a reasonable pace up the hill, made a bit less reasonable for me by the memory of my 27:01 time last Thursday. So today I had the Garmin set up to show my time and I managed to get up in 26:29, a respectable time that just barely kept Kevin in sight. Karl and George battled it out for top honors though; not sure who made it to the top first. Gosh, all that work and I was the last person up the hill, or am I forgetting someone? At the top we were joined by Milo and Steve, who had left a bit earlier (perhaps I should think of doing the same, especially since the more-moderate pace would leave more for the sprints to follow!).

The first sprint I managed to snag, despite being more than a bit dead from the climb up King's, but the second sprint... well, Kevin took off a bit early, and I was waiting for a wheel to come by... and waiting... and waiting... and finally realize that nobody's going to come around me, I'm going to have to chase him down on my own. Yuck! My legs were protesting like never before; I died a thousand deaths trying to get to Kevin. And I did. About five feet past the point we sprint to. All that work for nothing. Not really; it helps to force yourself like that and still keep going. The final Skyline sprint I hardly even bothered with; I think George took it. The other guys thought they'd managed to box me in, but the truth was that there were at least two ways I could have gotten through, had I the legs. I did, however, manage to take the last sprint on Albion. Two out of four. Not enough to maintain control over the wolves, who are most definitely now smelling blood. And if this is what I do for fun...

05/14/05- EVERYONE NEEDS A TODD! It's Mother's Day and you're trying to get a ride in before church, and you want something at least mildly challenging. A quick ride over 84 to LaHonda, then back up West Alpine. But two flats later, time is running out. That's when you're glad you've got Todd with you. That 7 mile run on Skyline between Page Mill and 84 zipped by in 17 minutes instead of the usual 25. Made it back home with at least 22 seconds to spare!

05/13/06- WATCH & LISTEN TO THE GIRO d'ITALIA FREE! If you've got DSL or Broadband cable, and haven't sprung for the $20 OLN on-line package, you might check out these links-

---RAI video feed-  http://www.media.rai.it/mpmedia/0,,Sport^4292,0.html
---Eurosport audio feed- http://www.eurosport.com/eurosport/mc_vid20993.shtml

So you watch the RAI video while listening to Eurosport audio. Eurosport typically doesn't start their audio until the very last part of the race, but that's OK; can you ever get enough "grouppo compacto?"

05/11/06- FAILURE SEEMS FAR EASIER TO DEFINE THAN SUCCESS.

The graph above is from my Garmin Edge 305 GPS, showing the climb up King's Mtn this morning, starting at Tripp Road and ending at the stop sign at the top. On the one hand, I can look at it and say hey, I'm finally burning off some of that winter fat, and getting close to a respectable (26:xx) time up the hill. But on the other hand, 27:01... how many places could I have saved just two lousy seconds and been in the "26" range?

I had my chance, as I was pretty much on my own. Kevin was doing an easy (slow) ride, Milo and Steve had gone on ahead, Chris was riding with Kevin... I'm forgetting someone, but the point is, I was setting my own pace, with no distractions. I didn't actually know what that pace was, as I haven't figured out everything yet on the Edge 305, and I was guessing it was going to be something close to 28 or so. It was only after getting home and downloading the info into the computer that I found it was 27:01. The irony is that I would have been happy with 27:25, but I'm unhappy with 27:01. 27:25 would be a success, while 27:01 represents a failure.

Sprints? The first was neutralized, the second & third ones on Skyline I managed to snag, but that last one on Albion? Chris took that one good. I might have been a bit distracted by the squirrel that ran in front of me, or nailing that bump in the center of the road pretty hard, or simply gave him too much room on the inside. It won't happen next time! You can't let the other guys think they can beat you, or you're finished. Time to shut down their hopes, their dreams of getting to the line ahead of me. Right. Who am I kidding? It's great that Chris is getting stronger, and there's sure no way I can hang onto his wheel on the climbs. I'm not worthy! :>)
 

04/30/06- ANOTHER RIDE WITH THE "OTHER" KEVIN UP OLD LaHONDA today. The original plan had been to ride the Wildflower Century in Chico, but since I'll be heading to Sacramento on Monday & Tuesday for the PedalPower bicycling lobby event, I decided to stay closer to home and do a ride with my son. After all, next Sunday we're scheduled to revisit the Delta Century 35-mile ride again, possibly with both my 13-year-old son Kevin as well as his 18-year-old daughter Becky. I'd like to say Kevin had an easy time riding up the hill, but truth be told it was a bit of a struggle, as he hasn't put in much time on the bike lately. Of course, for the Delta ride, there won't be any big hills (nothing more than an overpass or two), but there will definitely be some butt-time on the saddle!

04/27/06- FOGGY AT THE COAST, WARMER INLAND. FINALLY NORMAL APRIL WEATHER! It was just yesterday morning that I finally woke up to the sound of a whole lot of birds outside the bedroom window... haven't heard that noise in ages. Yes, even the birds had given up on Spring. Until now. This morning the sun was out, the roads were dry, and my bike felt fast. Maybe not fast enough for the ride up the hill; we had Milo, Kevin, Karl, new Kevin, and Chris. Enough to assure that I was in the bottom-third heading up the hill. I'd like to pretend I was saving myself for the sprints, but no, 27:42 was all she wrote. Maybe it was just so nice I wanted to enjoy it, rather than kill myself? Nope, did that anyway! Chris made it to the top first, but didn't have a bike computer and so was estimating a virtual time that would have him leading the Tour de France. We brought him (gently) back to reality, pointing out that Kevin & Karl weren't that far behind, and they'd be more likely to serve as mere domestiques in the 'Tour.

The roads did feel fast though, fast enough that a combination of brute force and fierce intimidation allowed me to win the sprints along the way. Heck, I was even able to keep up with Milo heading down 84, something very rare indeed.

For anyone riding with us next week, I'll be missing Tuesday's ride, as I'll be in Sacramento at a cycling lobbying event (meeting with the various legislators, trying to get a small piece of the massive infrastructure bond set aside for cycling projects).

04/25/06- THE FOUR CYCLISTS OF THE APOCALYPSE? That would be Kevin, Karl, Milo & George, joining me on the usual Tuesday/Thursday ride up Kings. It was one of those "yak-yak" days, when Kevin, Karl & George were discussing their race last Saturday (Wente Brut), in which, if I remember correctly, George took 2nd. Or maybe it was Karl. I know it wasn't Kevin, since he's not a sprinter, but he did manage to pull off a solo effort towards the end of the race, for an entire lap, getting caught maybe 300 meters before the finish. And me? What tales of racing glories do I have to tell? Zip. Zilch. Nada. Didn't even do the Sea Otter this year, figuring it would be too muddy. Wimped out.

So I'm huffing & puffing like a steam engine, while they're riding off the front, yakking away casually. Ah, that's it! They're using up all the oxygen in the space ahead of me. That explains everything! But all that aside, it was a good, strong ride this morning, including at least one sprint in which, without the bets of tactics, there's no way I would have pulled off. Karl's catching on to me though; he knows that I'll keep the speed down on the lead-in to the Sky L'onda sprint, so nobody has the opportunity to swing around a fast-moving rider and catch someone by surprise (me). The final sprint on Albion/Olive Hill tends towards pure power though, and, for the moment, I can still pull it off. Won't be able to for long though, as Karl gets stronger and stronger. Not too worried about Kevin; it generally takes him a day or two for his "sprint" to wind up. Milo? He's frequently there at the end, with a tenacity that's stronger than his horsepower. George is the strong, silent type. I'm never sure what he's up to, but sometimes he just suddenly appears. But in the end it's George & Kevin & Karl who are out there actually racing on the weekends, so whatever I manage in a sprint can be seen best as training for them, not a victory for me. Maybe if there's a road race somewhere, on a Sunday, without a huge climb in it... (ironic since in my racing days, I would have been tempted to skip anything relatively-flat, favoring instead nasty climbs you could sink your teeth into).

04/24/06- SAD NEWS TO REPORT as we find out that a rider that Burt, one of our employees, saw down on the pavement on Palomares (during the Primavera Century) was later found to have died from his injuries. Nobody's certain what happened; could have been hitting another rider's wheel, could have been a heart attack, but either way a grim reminder of our mortal nature. The irony is that there's a part of me (actually a very good-sized part of me) that believes that riding keeps me alive; that while I'm on a bike, I can pretend that all is right with the world, and that my body will never fail me. And truth be told, there are far more dangerous things than riding a bike. But, as they said in Hill Street Blues, "Let's be careful out there."

04/23/06- THE PHANTOM RIDER AT THE PRIMAVERA CENTURY. Read all about it here... not quite the way a century normally goes for me, but what the heck, losing a rider is an experience everyone should go through at least once! Not.

04/20/06- I WASN'T REALLY SURE HE'D SHOW UP, but sure enough, at the start of the ride this morning, there's Josh, on his brand-new Trek Madone 5.2SL. Josh had never been up to Skyline before, so showing up for a ride with the big guns was kinda gutsy. Either that or it says something about Josh's estimation of our capabilities! And I suppose before we get further carried away, I should point out that Josh is one of our employees in Redwood City.

So at the start we had Josh, Eric (who rode with us some time ago, and drives up from the Lexington Reservoir area), Kevin, Mark, Milo... I must be forgetting somebody. Kevin and Mark predictably went racing up the hill, and I hung with them for a while, before deciding that wasn't too civil for new-guy Josh, who wouldn't know anything about pacing himself up the climb. Milo wasn't in it for the long haul this morning, showing up on a fixed gear and turning around at the clearing on Kings. Josh did pretty good... actually, excellent for a first-timer, at about 32 minutes up Kings.

Heading south on Skyline, I complained that none of the sprinters were with us today, which Kevin suggested Mark should take offense at, and I waited for a pump in my spokes or maybe an elbow, but alas, they were all talk today. We didn't even get to contest the final, fastest sprint just before Sky L'onda, as Mark had a rear tire blowout that required Kevin to head back home (near Swett Road) to get his car and rescue him. That left just Josh, Eric and I on the west-side 84 & Old LaHonda section, which was fine with me! I did miss not having Karl to push the pace heading down 84 though!

Hopefully we'll see more of Josh in the future, but I suspect it won't be too long before he's the one pushing the pace. Hate it when that happens!

04/18/06- TIME TO GET OUT THE NICE BIKE AGAIN AND GO FOR A RIDE! How long has it been since I've been able to ride my Madone, instead of the rain bike? Far, far too long. And it's not as if my rain bike (a "ruggedized & weatherproofed" 5900) is any slouch. But the Madone... just a couple turns of the crank and you feel the difference. A bike that wants to go, and go fast. And right now, coming off our extended winter, I need all the help I can get.

Kevin, Karl, George, Chris all at the start, with clear skies and temps just a bit on the cool side... something we'd normally be complaining about, but we're just so happy to have the sun out, and no rain. George, Karl and Chris took off and raced up Kings, while Kevin wasn't feeling quite so hot and only managed to pass me about halfway up, finishing perhaps 30 seconds ahead. Normally I would have liked to have been up there where the action was, but that's going to take a few more weeks, and maybe a bit warmer weather. At the top we were joined by Milo, who'd left a few minutes ahead of us.

Karl is getting smarter, recognizing that if he tires me out on Skyline, before we get to the sprints, I'll either not be there at all (having been blown off the back) or too winded to put in a strong effort. That should have been the case today, but wasn't... I hung on and barely held him off. The final sprint before Sky L'Onda was the most interesting, as I was in the lead on the descent just prior to it, but held down my speed so there wasn't as much advantage to drafting. Then when Milo came around, I let him go for a bit before grabbing his wheel, which delayed Karl (who was sitting on my wheel) just enough to take it. Of course, it's all kinda silly, since Karl, Kevin, George & Chris all ditched me on the west-side Old LaHonda section. Realistically, if they didn't want me around for a sprint, they could get rid of me without much trouble. They're just too nice to make a practice of doing so.
 

04/17/06 (Addendum) OPEN THE POD BAY DOOR, HAL. That's what I was thinking when I was 14 minutes out from home, desperately trying to make it back in time for the extended-family Easter Brunch at a restaurant. I knew my timing was going to be a bit tight, trying to squeeze in a good ride in just an hour and a half... and the first half hour of the ride, I felt like a total slug. Didn't help that the scale showed a weight I hadn't seen in about two years, mostly because I would have had two centuries under my belt by now. That plus a bit of a headwind, but I'm still thinking I can do it. Not just the normal loop, but with an extension up West Alpine. The plan was to get the first mapped ride from my new GPS (Garmin '305) up on the website.

It's both fun and scary at the same time, as you're flying down Alpine towards Sand Hill, knowing that you've got to get back home by 1:15 at the very latest (the plan was to drive to the restaurant at 1:20, and my wife said I had to be back by 1pm, but I figured as long as I had at least one foot in the shower by 1:15...), and trying to figure out, from where you are at the time, exactly how long it will take to get back. Do you go flat-out and risk flaming out, or a measured effort? No choice, go for speed. 12:30pm and I'm at Alpine road, a bit above Arastradero. Can I make it back home by 1:15? That's 45 minutes... it takes about 14 minutes from Roberts in Woodside... so can I possibly get from here to there by 1pm? 30 minutes. Long light at the messy Sand Hill/Alpine junction. It's 12:41 by the time I'm making the left turn onto Sand Hill. 19 minutes to go up Sand Hill, north on Whiskey Hill and down into Woodside. Funny thing is, even though I've lived in this area all of my life, ridden these roads hundreds if not thousands of times, I just don't know. It seems so far, and the time seems so short. 12:52 though, and I'm finished with Sand Hill and onto Whiskey Hill. How long is Whiskey Hill? Thankfully, not as long as I'd remembered... I got to Roberts at 12:56.

So this is the moment of truth. You're about 14 minutes out; it's 12:56pm, and your wife was expecting you at 1pm (so you'd have enough time to shower and dress for the restaurant). Do you just put down the hammer and race home, ignoring the cell phone that will inevitably ring at 1pm with an exasperated voice at the other end of the line asking "Why aren't you home yet?" Or do you pull over, call just prior to that 1pm deadline, and tell her you're on the way? I chose the latter option, calling in with a minute to spare, and telling her to have someone open up the garage door so I could sail right in (and thus the "Open the pod bay door, Hal" bit, from the movie 2001). By 1:13 I had a foot in the shower, and by 1:20 I was nearly as ready to go as anyone else in the house. Don't think my pulse went into recovery mode until we were well on our way in the car though!

04/16/07- BARELY SQUEEZED IN A RIDE TODAY, AS I NEARLY WIMPED OUT. Well, truth be told I did wimp out; the original plan was to get out early in the morning, before church. And I did wake up in time... in time to see pretty nasty rain, plus the added excuse of being able to watch the end of the Amstel Gold road race on the 'net.

Fortunately, I guessed correctly that the rain would let up later on, and sure enough, I was able to leave in only the slightest drizzle just before noon and get in a high-speed run out on the "Loop." Only I chose to do the Loop with an added bonus, by heading up West Alpine and over the infamous "Walking Joaquim. West Alpine was downright noisy as the small creek was looking more like an angry little river! I've put up a quick web page showing this loop, for the benefit of anyone who hasn't had the pleasure yet.

As for the rain... the 10-day outlook doesn't look quite so bad at the moment, with only 2 or 3 days of rain showing. Could be we're finally leaving the wet stuff behind, which suits me just fine.

04/14/06- FINAL CLOSURE? (not bike-related) My daughter's long journey choosing a college may very well take her to UC Santa Cruz, where she can be a slug (their official mascot, believe it or not) just like her dad. It's a strange and curious thing, looking at colleges and going to the website for your old school and seeing what has... and hasn't changed. I found myself looking at the alumni page and feeling a bit guilty about not being a member, but then remembered why I stopped so many years ago... the endless calls for more money from young students who seemed to think that I was a successful business mogul who was going to donate money for a new building. Er, no, not someone who owns a bicycle shop.

But it also rekindled something else- those weird dreams I had for quite a few years after graduation... dreams that have come back a few times recently... dreams that I never finished some needed requirement, and thus didn't actually graduate. This was a very real concern of mine when I was approaching graduation, since I'd come down with Mononucleosis in the 2nd quarter of my senior year, and ended up taking 25 units my final quarter to make up. Even after graduation I was never really sure, until my diploma finally arrived many months later. But the dreams didn't stop. They represented unfinished business, and it's not as if there's ever been a time in my life when I could say there wasn't some!

I found it interesting, researching the UCSC website (www.ucsc.edu), just how different college is from high school, at least in one respect. Where it talks about academic advisors and such, it tells parents that they're not allowed access to information about how the student is doing, no able to talk with their academic advisor, unless the student has given permission and is present. Guess it's that growing-up thing, but I don't recall it happening so quickly, without any intermediate steps between full (and welcome) parental involvement and an almost-absurd degree of separation. Yes, every once in a while something hits me like this and I realize that I am a parent, but my kids are growing up and things aren't quite the same as they used to be.

So what did I do tonight to try and get a sense of closure to it all? I finally ordered my complete transcripts. Something I've never had all in one place, nor do I recall even looking at those from my final quarter (because, arriving well after graduation, they almost seem posthumous and thus irrelevant at the time). Should be interesting, since UCSC, at the time, didn't give grades, but rather detailed written evaluations. Maybe those rare-but-occasional dreams will finally end. But more likely they won't. Quite possibly they'll continue until my daughter graduates. That would, indeed, seem to be the relevant piece of unfinished business left in the puzzle.

04/13/06- NO RAIN! Not even that many clouds, but the roads still looked pretty wet outside the house, and there was still a small threat of a rogue shower or two, so one more time I went down to the garage and dragged the rain bike upstairs (my Trek Madone lives in the main part of the house, but there are limits to how many bikes are allowed to sit in hallways, dining rooms, foyers...). Pretty warm too, at about 50 degrees leaving the house. The ride up over Jefferson made me feel good about taking the rain bike, as water was still cascading down the pavement from the rain-soaked hills. I didn't, however, have to bring along the heavy rain jacket.

Kevin and Karl this morning, along with another Kevin, a long-time customer I'd recently sold a Madone to. I've got to stop doing that; the pattern repeats itself frequently. Sell someone a nice new bike, and then watch them ride away from me on the hill. He couldn't quite keep up with Kevin & Karl (give him time, and maybe) but did manage to stay out front, just out of range, after passing me about halfway up the hill. I do have an excuse though; he had to turn back at the top (to get to work on time), so I can rationalize that he could put on the afterburners because he didn't have to ride the rest of the way with us.

Kevin (the regular Kevin), Karl and I headed south on Skyline, and for the first time in a bit, the sprints were contested again. It's not really fair on days like this, when I'm not climbing terribly well, since logically that means I've got a bit more available in the sprints than Karl (I could include Kevin too, but he's more of a "roller" than a sprinter... it takes him a couple minutes to get up to speed, but once he does, he might ride you right off his wheel). After the second sprint Karl waited up for Kevin but I kept on going, mostly because the roads were getting a bit messy and I didn't feel like contesting that final high-speed sprint into Sky L'onda on wet pavement. But even with the often-wet roads, it was still one heck of a nice morning to be out on a bike. It felt almost... almost like how it feels riding in April in California. Oh, right, it is. Well, we're at least getting hopeful that we might come out from this extended winter we've been having.

04/11/06- THAT'S WHAT FRIENDS ARE FOR. The Tuesday/Thursday-morning ride isn't just about getting in shape (or trying to keep from getting too-badly out of shape). It's also that shared-experience thing; seeing the guys (rarely does a woman show up on our ride, apparently being too sensible) and talking about last-weekend's race, discussing what's worse, the stuff coming up from the wet pavement or down from your nose... ok, maybe I can see why the women aren't riding with us. Whatever the case, twice each week I'm out with... well, people I can call my friends. It's kinda funny; you grow up with sitcoms where your role models hang out in bowling alleys (OK, really old sitcoms) or bars or whatever, and wonder if it's normal that you don't have friends you do that with. People who do this or that every Friday night. But what is it, exactly, that I'm missing out on? Instead of drinking beer, we have Cytomax. Instead of getting into arguments & fights, we ride each other into the ground in sprints and on climbs. But those discussions about our work, kids, wives, ex-wives, relationships, the touchy-feely kind of nonsense that guys have to have a few drinks before they start into? That's what west-side Old LaHonda's for. If the road had ears...

OK, on to this-morning's ride. It started too early, as the garbage men were making one heck of a racket at 6am. Usually they're not so bad, but this morning? I eventually did get back to sleep, and then dragged myself out of bad at 7:05 and prepared the rain bike for another soggy morning. If not for the fact that people will be waiting for me at the start of the ride, I wonder if I'd continue to be as insistent about riding every Tuesday & Thursday morning, no matter what? But the question is academic; over the years, we've accumulated a few die-hards who are willing to brave the elements on the worst of days. This morning it was Kevin, Milo, George and Karl. Actually, Karl was running a bit late and didn't catch up to us until the regroup at the top of Kings. The pace started pretty easy, so easy that I found myself quickly putting some distance between myself and the others, without intending to do so. This is rarely a good thing, especially with Kevin & George back there, who can turn up the heat very quickly. But what the heck, I figured I'd ride it out as long as I could, and found that, while my heart rate was running a bit high (170-172 instead of 165 or so), I didn't feel too bad. Still, it was always with a certain amount of fear and trepidation that I forced myself to look back from time-to-time to see where they were. At the halfway point I had about 40 seconds on them, and the gap was coming down quickly. George finally caught up with (and passed me) a bit after the clearing, but I did manage to keep Kevin at bay.

From that point on things were a bit more casual, as we talked about the recent races Karl & George & Kevin had done, and I felt just a bit more than slightly envious. These are all guys about my age, and they're living a dream that used to be mine, so many years ago. No sprints today, partly due to the wet conditions, and partly just a bit more relaxed atmosphere than normal. George did push the pace on the "return" section of west-side Old LaHonda, and for some reason I felt comfortable going down 84 a bit faster than normal for a wet descent (possibly because I'd finally installed new brake shoes?). So much for the technical details. But the reality is that we're just a bunch of guys out for a good time. 50-year-old guys can still do that. Hopefully 10 years from now I'll see that 60-year-old guys can too!

04/06/06- DO AS I SAY, NOT AS I DO. I've dispensed some pretty decent advice over the years; sometimes it would be helpful if I followed it myself. That was the case this morning, when, as I got ready to inflate my tires, I noted a big bald spot on the rear tire, where the rubber had worn completely through to the casing. As I've told my customers many times, don't check your equipment before a ride, check it after your ride! That way, if you find something, you've got time to fix it before the next ride. This morning, I was up against the clock in terms of leaving the house and getting to the start of our ride on-time... so, with changing a tire involved, I was going to run about 8 minutes late. No way would they wait; they'd assume something must have happened, like maybe I died. In over 20 years of doing this ride, I've been late maybe 3 times, and each of those only by a couple of minutes. Fortunately, I was able to get word to them, since my daughter leaves for school about the same time I leave for my ride, and she drives right past the start, so she was able to tell them I would be there shortly.

Millo and Kevin joined me at the (late) start on the first beautiful morning in... well, a very long time! A few clouds but no threat of rain. A bit cool, dropping as low as 41 degrees, but not unpleasant, not as long as we could ride without fear of a low-traction shimmering liquid road surface. Milo rode up Kings at a moderate pace, while Kevin... well, Kevin's back, and he's nasty. No way can I hang with him, not past the first 3rd of the climb anyway. I managed to keep within maybe 30 seconds of him on the main climb, which I was both happy & frustrated with. But truthfully, if Kevin had really been feeling good, he would have been out of sight in no time. At the top we were joined by Ueyn, and from there on made pretty decent time. Got a pretty good shot of Milo on the second (Skeggs) sprint.

04/04/06- THE TALE OF THE BIG ORANGE BLOB. Once again the TV is on, showing the latest weather radar, as I'm getting ready to ride. And once again she (the wife) asks "You're not going out in that, are you? Look at that big orange blob. It's heading straight for us!" While it would seem rude, crass and generally not the appropriate thing to say, I said it anyway. "No duh." Why does she bother to ask? Perhaps because we've only been married such a short time (26 years)? Perhaps she's thinking a bolt of lightning struck me and suddenly made me sensible? I don't get it. On Tuesday & Thursday mornings, I ride my bike. That's what I do.

And so I set out, in a heavy downpour, actually thankful that it was coming down in buckets. Seriously, what's the difference between it being wet enough to be annoying, and really dumping? The difference is that it's impressive riding when it's really dumping. It gives you a reason for having put on all that clothing. Your bike doesn't just get messed up, it almost gets washed clean. Bring it on!!! Plus, well, I'll admit it... there's bragging rights to riding when it seems like any sensible person would stay home.

Today's bragging rights went to me and... Milo. Saw two other guys out on the road, nobody else. Kevin had left a message that he couldn't make it, Karl is relatively sensible, and the others just thought there might be someplace better to be. They were wrong, of course. Heading up Kings Mtn when it's really dumping is an experience everyone should have, at least once. If I had to describe it in just one word, it would be loud. The creek seemed more like a small river, and even the rain itself was noisy. Nothing fast about the ride, just a reasonably-brisk social pace. I did consider, briefly, dropping down 84 back into Woodside and skipping the OLH-West section, but... why? 44 degrees, raining, yeah, those specs don't sound so good, but it was nearly windless, and there was the curiosity about what might be left of the roads. And, of course, I couldn't wimp out, not with Milo there! Can't have witnesses to such things (and besides, would have to figure out how to rationalize it here).

04/02/06- WILL IT RAIN, OR WON'T IT? Dumb question; of course it will rain, that's what it does these days! Still, there was some hope that perhaps it would hold off long enough in the morning that I'd get my son Kevin back up to Skyline again. And so it was, on Saturday night, that Kevin's attitude was one of "Gee Dad, I sure hope it doesn't rain tomorrow, so I can suffer terribly on a bike ride with you!" Not quite in those words, of course.

But as it turned out, it didn't rain. Not only that, but we even talked my daughter Becky (who works a couple days a week at the shop) into riding with us as well. Not much chance we could get her all the way up Old LaHonda, but anytime I can get one of them, let alone two, out on a ride... that's something I can't pass up.

We made it about a quarter way up before Kevin had a flat, and while Dad is very well prepared to take care of something anybody else might suffer on the road, he'd neglected to bring along the 650c tubes that fit Kevin's bike, nor was the patch kit in the seat bag. But then Tom Ritchey comes riding up the hill and I ask if he's got a patch kit... well, he sorta does, or at least a soggy glueless patch. I thanked him and sent him on his way, only to find that soggy glueless patches don't stick. But it's not time to give up yet; there ought to be a way to make a 700c tube work in a 650c tire, and to my pleasant surprise, I find it's not that big a deal, so we're back off and running. We eventually make it almost halfway up the hill before it's clear that Becky's lack of riding, along with a recent mild bout of walking pneumonia (we'll call it mild here because Grandma might be reading this) is giving her enough trouble that we turn around at that point and head back for home. But all in all not a bad ride, especially since the skies cooperated so nicely!

03/30/06- SOMEDAY, EVERY CORNER ON 84 WILL BE NAMED AFTER ONE OF US. Given the context of that remark, I hope not, but we'll get to that later!

For once, it wasn't raining, so I got to ride the Madone SSL with the way-cool wheels and just generally that nice, how-could-a-bike-do-anything-better feel. A bike I haven't had much opportunity to ride lately! Pretty big group this morning, with Karl, Millo, Kevin, George & Todd at the start. Todd's presence meant I wasn't going to be winning any sprints, but that's OK, I need something to remind me of what's possible. The ride up the hill was pretty harsh, with Kevin finally recovering from whatever virus had flattened him the past couple of weeks. Millo left a couple minutes before us, which is probably not a good idea since having a rabbit up front only makes people ride that much harder. Karl & George quickly rode out of sight... we later found out they did something around 24:30, not bad for March! We'd caught up to and passed Millo around the Park entrance, which was also about the point that Kevin passed me. I don't even recall where Todd was, but it was either shortly ahead or behind me. I dragged my tail in for a time of 27:11 which was actually quite a bit faster than I thought I was going (and leaves me wondering, had I known, could I have gotten 26-something?).

At the top we came across Ueyn and Katie (Ueyn being one of our former regulars, who says he'll be coming out more in the future, and Katie being a fellow Stanford cyclist), who'd left a bit earlier, concerned, like Millo, that they might not be able to keep up on the climb up Kings. We're a pretty sizable group now, cruising along Skyline at a pretty good pace. Todd, predictably, took the first sprint, and the second one as well. The run into Sky L'onda was pretty wet so I stayed out of the final sprint; there's something about wet roads and skinny tires that kills my desire to get silly on a bike. Just before Sky L'onda we picked up one more rider- local legend Lindsay Crawford, who accompanied us as far as Old LaHonda, on his way out to the coast.

After the pleasant run up west-side Old LaHonda we headed down 84, which is normally an uneventful and safe descent. Water on the pavement changes that. Millo is one of our more-aggressive descenders, and this morning I watched as he passed by me at a faster speed than I'd dare to ride, and shortly afterward go sliding across the lane in that infamous backward-banked hairpin with the chopped-up pavement. Fortunately he wasn't hurt; just torn up clothing and a helmet that got a bit chewed up sliding across the road. Better that than his head!

03/28/06- SO WERE YOU THE ONLY PERSON RIDING THIS MORNING? You would think, after all these years, that my wife would know the answer to that question. Just because it's raining, just because it's fairly cold, she thinks I'd be the only person on the Tuesday/Thursday morning ride? Rarely would that be the case! This morning found Kevin, George and Millo all out there in the muck. Actually, the rain slowed to a drizzle just as we set out, allowing us to pack up the jackets for a more-comfortable cruise up the hill. More comfortable for some anyway; my lungs just don't like the combination of cooler temps and damp air. I was doing that fish-out-of-water-gasping-for-air thing, with my heart rate way up but no power. Toughest 30-minute climb I remember ever doing, but I got to the top and we had a very nice ride from then on.

But I gotta watch out for that George guy! I took the first sprint, but for Skegg's, he copied my move, perfectly. I had no idea what he was up to, figuring that maybe he was holding off and not going to contest it, when all of a sudden he comes flying around at a speed way too high for me to grab his wheel. What he'd done was to come up from behind, cut across my wheel to gain speed and then zipped past. I was impressed. I'd like to say that on a good day I might have recovered and got him, but that might be wishful thinking.

Thursday... maybe... they're saying we'll have a dry day. I'll believe it when I see it!
 

03/27/06- YES, IT'S TRUE, WE WON. I thought it would be fun to send something in to VeloNew's weekly photo contest, which a customer had clued me into. But what to send? No contest; who could refuse to vote for the photo I took at the '03 Tour de France of the old man and young boy, "Passing the Torch." You can see it on the VeloNews website, as well as an article on our own site about how it all came down, and the extensive post-processing involved to make it work. I haven't submitted a photo this week, but my brother Steve has, so maybe we'll get another win and make it a family thing.

03/25/06- PROOF-OF-CONCEPT RIDE, although it could be seen as a variant of The Ugly Ride. There were a lot of things to try and get done today (Sunday), so I thought maybe I could squeeze in a decent ride in the morning and still make it to church at 11am. One of those days where you figure, if you plan, you can do it all! But doing it all meant coming up with a morning ride that was more substantial in quality than quantity, so I did the Woodside/Portola Valley/Page Mill/Skyline/84 loop. About 37 miles, with that nasty ascent up Page Mill... which I've never been able to understand why, exactly, it seems so bad, particularly the lower section, where it seems like you just can't get a rhythm. But this morning it just seemed like the thing to do. Nothing super-fast, taking about 46 minutes from bottom to top (I'll have to look up how long it's taken in the past). Left the house at 8 and was back by 10:15. Nice weather too, although it looks like not too many more days of that... Monday afternoon the rain starts in again. Aren't the clouds going to run out of water?

03/23/06- JUST ANOTHER DAY IN PARADISE? Don't I wish I could say that. Today was a great morning to be out on a bike, with the bright ball of fire in the sky (for the first time in weeks, so it seemed), very little of that special reflective road surface additive (some call it water), and moderate temps in the 50s. The slower version of Kevin showed up, still working out the bugs from whatever has been ailing him for a bit, which meant that it was me, in a very unusual reversal of roles, doing the work pulling on Skyline and down 84. Just Kevin for the first part of the ride, but we later picked up Steve at Sky L'onda. He'd left earlier, not wanting us to pass him up on the hill, but not realizing that it wouldn't have been an issue today since Kevin was still recovering.

Realistically, mornings like this are the way things are supposed to be in late March. I'm definitely up for the return of normality, but right now the weather folk say more rain headed our way for Friday and Saturday. That still, of course, leaves Sunday as a nice day to ride.

03/21/06- WE RIDE IN THE RAIN SO YOU DON'T HAVE TO. Didn't know that's how it works? This morning, Kevin, Karl, George, Todd and I were sacrificing our bikes and our sanity by riding in the muck, just ahead of the finally-clearing weather. Muck and cold too... down to 39 degrees. 39 and damp just isn't all that much fun. Oh, and eating whatever's flying up from the road at you (even though all of us have bikes with fenders for weather like this, you still get a mouthful of... something.). Oh, and I also get flats in the rain. Me, the guy who never gets flats, usually one every 3000 miles or so, but got one last Thursday (in the rain) and again this morning (in the rain). Is there a connection?

But it's much better to be riding in the rain than not riding at all. And if we can be doing a public service, riding in the rain so you don't have to... so much the better! But I am oh-so-thankful that Thursday's weather report looks very nice.

03/20/06- SO, HAVING TURNED 50, IT BEGS THE QUESTION- How long can you milk a mid-life crisis? Or, when does mid-life end? Or is that something you even want to think about... after all, what would you call whatever comes after mid-life? I ask this having just received a nice email from someone who had read our web page devoted to climbing Haleakala and had done it himself, having just turned 50. Who are we? Seems like there's an awful lot of us. Can't wait to get my AARP card. As if. What would it take to get me to actually use a card that says I'm over 50? Shouldn't there be truth in advertising laws that don't allow such things until you're at least 55? Even 60? I don't care, it's not going to change at least one thing- I will not act my age. Or at least I won't bother trying to figure out how someone my age is supposed to act. I just know I'm not going to act that way. Whatever it is. (My hair, on the other hand, has a different idea...)

03/19/06- JUST A SMALL CIRCLE OF FRIENDS TODAY. Finally, a day of really nice weather, the type we're supposed to see in March. After a while all this rain gets a bit tiresome; near-epic rides can be interesting, but eventually you wonder when you'll see the sun and dry roads again. Today was that day. A bit different day not just due to the weather, but also my first post-50 ride. My plan had been to be in better shape at 50 than I was at 35, and I'm probably close, but the last month has been difficult. But today? Things just seemed to line up the way they ought to. I arranged to meet Kevin and his friend Leslie (could be Lesley) at the top of Old LaHonda, so I timed things just right... sort of. Actually left a bit later than planned, which meant I had to high-tail it up there. The use of afterburners through Woodside put a serious crimp on my speed up Old LaHonda though; I'd hoped for something around 20 minutes, and ended up with 22.

From Old LaHonda we headed west to LaHonda and then over Haskins to Pescadero, where the bakery, once again, did not disappoint. A cherry turnover and a cheese thing did the trick (I don't eat before riding in the morning, so I don't feel too guilty about loading up at the bakery), after which the three of us headed out Stage Road towards San Gregorio. Kevin's getting over a nasty cold so he was off the back a bit, a reverse of the usual positioning (where it would be Kevin flying off the front). Leslie was riding up the hills just fine though.

At San Gregorio we came across a friendly group from Stanford, including Tuesday/Thursday former-regular Ueyn, plus a bunch of people I'll have trouble remembering, but I believe there was an Ashley, Katie, John... ok, Ueyn's going to send me an email and help out with the rest! We took it pretty easy on the climb back up to Highway 1 and the first part of Tunitas... even when the grade steepened, things were still quite civil. Until. Until someone thought they heard a car behind, so John (a new Cat-2 guy from Texas, where the hills run to maybe 7 minutes long) flies off the front for a bit, making room for others to fall in behind. Well, not exactly. He just kept going, with me glued to his wheel. The rest of the group (now fairly large, after adding Kevin & Leslie to the Stanford folk) decided to keep at their previous pace, while I'm still trying to hang with John. Fortunately John didn't push himself on that steep middle section of Tunitas, since if he had, I would have flown off the back in very short order. As it was I was surprised nobody else was up there with me! But I survived, and when we hit the upper stretches where things leveled off, I decided it was time to smooth out the choppy pavement a bit by adding some power & speed for those last couple of miles. It wasn't as if I was going to try and shake John off my wheel (which wouldn't have been possible), but I was at least going to try and hold my own and not sit on his! And so it was to the top, where we waited about 10 minutes for the more-civilized folk to join us.

It was supposed to be a 50 mile ride for my 50th birthday (which was actually two days earlier), and turned out to be about 58. No problem with that; just means I've got 8 years credit, right? I wish! Later on my wife had put on a birthday party for me with a small number of close friends... actually, a pretty large number of people. Didn't know I knew that many. Lots of embarrassing photos from my past (not too many on bikes), lots of food & drinks, and lot of "You're 50, over the hill, you might as well give up and pack it in" birthday cards. In my mind I had two parties; the first one in the morning, on the bike, with Kevin & Leslie and later adding the Stanford group to the mix. Not a bad day at all!

03/16/06- FRESH MEAT! Well, only for today... had a visitor out from Florida (Roy) who decided to see what it would be like to climb something taller than an overpass, and, of course, we were happy to oblige! Just Millo & Roy this morning; I later found out that Kevin was pretty nastily laid flat by a bug. Would have been a really nice ride if not for a flat I got on Skyline; normally I simply don't get flat tires, but rain & wet roads bring out the worst. Rain. They're finally admitting the truth; we've had more than a full season's worth of rain already. It's time for it to stop. But maybe it's my fault. Maybe if I stopped riding in the rain, it would stop raining. Guess we'll never find out!

03/14/06- ARE YOU REALLY GOING OUT IN THIS? You gotta live for lines like that, when you get up for your ride, and your wife's had the news on and they're showing the off-shore radar with big orange blobs (heavy rain) coming on-shore. As if that's going to keep me from riding? Just means it takes a bit longer to get everything set up; lots more gear to get on, including waterproof pants (to be avoided at all costs due to how hot they are, but looked forward to because it implies a truly-epic ride is at hand!). As I'm getting ready to head out the door I notice she's at her computer, so I ask what the latest radar looks like. I assume that's what she's looking at. Never assume. She was playing solitaire. Yeah, really worried about me, I can tell!

Kevin and Millo braving the elements with me but, truthfully, the elements disappointed. Sure, it was wet & mucky, but it never really rained on us, so the first order of business was to remove extra clothing and figure out where to stash it! We rode up Kings at a civilized pace, although Kevin was a bit less civil than I (he has trouble riding at any speed other than what his body commands at the time). Saw three curious but not-in-the-least-bit worried deer on the way up. And added another test run of the Garmin GPS computer. Pretty cool little gadget.

03/12/06- WOW! WHAT A DIFFERENCE A DAY MAKES! Sometimes I've talked about having to do an "ugly" ride, to shake myself out of whatever malaise I was suffering. An "ugly" ride is one where you take a route that isn't particularly fun to do, but by doing so it somehow purges your system and makes you feel better. Today wasn't an "ugly" ride, but it was just as good... the "last second, didn't think I'd actually get out on a bike" ride.

The weather had been questionable all day; kind of cold, kind of wet, kind of windy. Not a great abundance of any of those things, but enough to make it easy to rationalize doing something else. I found lots of other things to do, of course. But around 3pm, as time was running out to get out on a ride... I finally decided it was just something I had to do. So at 3:30 I'm out through Woodside and riding up King's Mtn, with always-threatening skies, and temps that got colder and colder as I climbed. Started out at about 48 degrees, and by the time I got to the top it was 37. I'd hoped to see a fair amount of snow, but only saw dirty leftovers, starting at about 1700ft. I'd actually driven up there the night before with my son, thinking there'd be quite a bit, but not much then either. But that's OK; it still had the potential to border on a near-epic ride with the 37-degree temp and light rain and wind. And it all felt good. No, it felt great!

Not many other riders out there; just three, in fact. Saw one guy coming up through Huddart Park at the entrance on Kings, then caught up with the guy in the photo above near the top of Kings, and, as I was descending 84, looked back and saw someone else (he turned the other way at the bottom).

Also got to test the new Garmin GPS bike computer. Interesting gadget! The standard '305 (and '205, for that matter) derives speed and distance entirely from the GPS functions; no wheel magnet, no transmitter. I had both my HAC-4 and the Garmin on the bike, to compare the readings, and they were amazingly close. By the end of the ride I was showing 23.91 miles on the Garmin, and 23.75 miles on the HAC-4. Considering that the Garmin isn't measuring wheel speed & travel but rather just distances between nearly-arbitrary points in space, that's pretty impressive. Indicated speeds were pretty much spot-on as well. Amazing what they can do with signals from satellites!

03/11/06- WHAT, ME, BEHIND? Yet another very late entry for last-Thursday's ride. The weather cooperated... sort of. No rain, but not exactly the temps you'd expect in March. Seems like we're getting a late winter blast, but fortunately it held off until after the Tour of California! Big group showed up, almost scary. Rick B (new), Mark P (occasional), Karen B (new, friend of Karl's, super-racer), Karl, Milo, Kevin & Chris. The only thing I was looking forward to less than being dropped by a big group of strong riders was yet another dentist appointment right after the ride!

I dragged myself to the top in something just under 29 minutes, but the effort felt closer to 26. I continued straight on up Skyline rather than wait for a couple minutes for the last person; I figured they'd catch up to me pretty quickly anyway, and truth be told, sprinting on Skyline just didn't seem all that attractive to me at the time. Strange, but true! And the temp? 37 degrees and damp. I've got enough extra insulation right now that it didn't feel quite as cold as it should have, but still a bit of blue toe in the shower afterward.

Two weeks. March 27th, and I will finally have a permanent psuedo-tooth... after something like 7 trips to the dentist. Now I understand why, when I was racing, they told us to make sure we took good care of our teeth. The world just doesn't quite seem right when there's a tooth issue. Even when there's no pain, just an annoying feeling that things aren't as they should be.

03/07/06- A SHOCKING ADMISSION! Yes, I'm here to tell you that this-morning's ride wasn't all that enjoyable for me. You'd think the combination of fairly-cold weather (42 degrees) and rain would have the potential for that epic-quality that creates a memorable, even fun ride. But not this morning. Last night it seemed like the skies were clearing up, so it was with more than a little disappointment that I woke up to wet pavement & drizzle. Kevin & Millo showed up, fortunately not early, since it took me about a minute longer than normal to get to the start. Yeah, I time everything. But this morning, things were just a bit out of sync. Maybe I was just a bit sore from Sunday's ride, or maybe it's the continuing sage of the root-canal from hell (visit #5 to the dentist next Monday morning, yipee!). Whatever it was, my heart rate was running higher than it should have, but not in the way it does if you're on the edge of coming down with something, since as soon as you slowed down, the heart rate came down.

So the reality is that yes, after the ride, I was glad to have done it. But during the ride? I could only think of the "That which doesn't kill me, makes me stronger" bit. But, this one time, not in a good way. Yes, it was good to be on a bike... just not at that particular time. Yes, it can be fun to ride in the muck... just not this particular morning. Yes, it can be challenging to try and chase down Kevin... but not when your heart is doing 172 but your legs aren't. Thursday will be different.

03/06/06- A BIT LATE BUT (GUEST AUTHOR FOR TUES/THURS RIDE) Tue, Feb 28 2006 , Snow on Skyline
(Mike was in Washington DC for the Bike Summit, so Millo graciously filled in the gaps. Thanks Millo!)

Weather.com displayed copious green rain globules and dark clouds loomed ominously but at 7:30 the sun was out so what the hey and off to the 7:45 am start. Kevin and I were the entire peleton. We congratulated ourselves on the excellent sunny weather and headed up Kings at a leisurely pace (Kevin cooked from three back-to-back 130 mile plus days leading out the Tour of California down to Santa Barbara). Half way up Kings the sunlight faded.

Two thirds of the way up mother nature unloaded. What the weather guys call a "steady soaking rain". And chilly. I'm head down pulling along Skyline after Skeggs and Kevin shouts "SNOW!". Sure enough we see little piles on both sides of the road. No wonder it felt chilly. Descended to Sky Londa in continued steady soaking rain with great respect for the slippery road surface and looked each other in the eye as we passed the Woodside limit sign and, with tails firmly tucked between our legs, decided to forgo West OLH and instead bailed down 84 and home as fast as our cold wet legs would carry us. Everything sodden and cold and world did not improve until 3 minutes into a hot shower. Time heals all wounds so by then it felt like an excellent ride.....   Millo Fenzi
 

03/05/06- EVERYONE NEEDS A KEVIN. Someone who will show up for a ride when the weather's questionable. Someone whose wheel you know well enough to sit on it without worry, and who isn't bothered by the fact that you're not going to be taking very long pulls yourself. And someone who jumps from the group way ahead of the sprint, giving you a strong lead-out. That's what Kevin did for me today, on the Alto Velo "A" ride. Normally the ride would head out to the coast and up Tunitas, but because the weather looked threatening, they made a run north on Canada, up Polhemus, and then back.

Not quite enough miles (or climbing) for me, as it had been a week since I'd been on the bike (having been in Washington DC for the Bike Summit lobbying event), so after that we rode up 84 to Sky L'Onda (which is actually one of the more mis-understood gems in the area, rarely ridden because people worry too much about the traffic and miss out on a true high-speed climb up to Skyline) and then north on Skyline. Quite a workout for me, and just what the Doctor ordered. Get the system back into believing that it can do things on a bike!

03/02/06- WE CAME, WE MET, WE CONQUERED. This has been the most-successful of my three visits to Washington DC for the DC Bike Summit. I met with staff from the offices of Representative Mary Bono (conservative republican from Palm Springs), Senators Dianne Feinstein & Barbara Boxer, and Representative Tom Lantos. It was the meeting with Tom Lantos' Aide, Ron Grimes, that was the most-interesting and apparently fruitful. You may (but won't) recall that it was with Ron Grimes four years ago that I made a terrible faux paux in his office, making a joke about feeling as out of place in DC as in France (which wasn't a good thing since Tom Lantos is a rather Hawkish Democrat who wasn't too happy with the position France was taking on our Iraq plans), and, well, it just seemed like I blew it. Later I found out that wasn't the case, and in today's meeting, he seemed more receptive than even before and sent the following email shortly after-

We appreciate you helping on important bicycle issues.  TOM became a member of the Bike Caucus today and agreed to sign a Blumenaur letter to the Appropriations Committee to provide $6.2 million for Conserve by Bike.  Thanks     Ron Grimes

Not a bad result at all. We'd been trying to get him to join the Bike Caucus for the last 3 years, and today he did! We also had a photo opportunity with the Senator himself, but I insisted on a photo of Ron as well, since he's the guy behind the scenes, doing a lot of the work in the office analyzing policy issues and making recommendations. It may sound really corny (may?), but I've got a lot more faith in how things work in DC than before. Perhaps more than I should! I'm also very impressed by the incredible work being done by bicycle advocates here. Of the 370 people attending the DC Bike Summit, there are fewer than 30 dealers, and probably no more than 50 people from the industry total. The rest are people passionate about bicycles. Unpaid people volunteering their time to make the world a better place. They're doing the really hard work; sometimes I feel more like window dressing. But that's OK; it's quite apparent that even small businesses command quite a bit of respect when talking with the various lawmakers, so I am more than willing to do what I can to add legitimacy and support the cause.

Next year, I have a lofty goal. 100 dealers. That's how many I want to see here. And I'm going to create a lot of noise to see it happen.

03/01/06- WHERE AM I??? Good question! The brain's still pretty fuzzy, as I get used to the killer-combo of a 3-hour time change, plus little sleep, the day preceding our (the bicycle industry's) big lobbying effort in Washington DC tomorrow (Thursday). Yes, I've taken photos, and yes, they should be up on the website by now, but there just hasn't been time. Constant meetings learning about all manner of ways in which the world can be a better place for bikes. There are hundreds of advocates, unpaid, who truly believe the humble bicycle to be the answer to all manner of society's ills, including obesity, air pollution, congested roads, foreign policy blunders and much, much more. And, for the most part, I agree! More tomorrow night.

02/26/06- IT WAS ONLY 46 MILES, BUT THEY WERE QUALITY MILES. Or at least that's my excuse for feeling a bit sore in the legs, despite a reasonably-short ride with Alto Velo's Sunday "A" ride this morning. There are lots of reasons to like this ride; it's a good group of people, they don't run every stop sign & light, they wait at the top of major climbs for a predetermined amount of time, and they ride well. One more reason- it doesn't start at the crack of dawn. When they climb Old LaHonda, they reach the base of the hill around 9:15. I can live with that!

It didn't start so well though, as I got there a bit early so I rode south to intercept them. Heading through Portola Valley I found them, flying full-speed at the time (they have a sprint for the Portola Valley City Limit sign), and I wasn't able to get across the road very quickly due to a few cars. Nor do they stop or even slow down after making the left turn onto Old LaHonda- they just go! What they heck, I start out pretty fast anyway.

The original plan was to do the Pescadero/Stage Road/San Gregorio loop, but as the weather began to look threatening, intelligent people decided it might make more sense to head back via West Alpine, one of the area's classic climbs. Well, turns out the even-more-intelligent people cut it really short and headed back via west Old LaHonda, as it started to drizzle a bit on Alpine and, by the time we got to the top, the wind was blowing nastily and it had just begun to actually rain. But since I'd already made the cut for being a dumber person once, I completed the process by riding north on Skyline, while everyone else went directly down via Page Mill. Shades of Mount Hamilton on New Year's Day, as the wind would literally blow me across the lane a bit, more efficiently than on Mount Hamilton since the roads were wet.

But, as they say, that which doesn't kill me makes me stronger. At least it builds character (but is "character" always good? Can you build "bad character?").  I later learned that Kevin was out there today on a different ride, heading back on Skyline pretty close to the same time I was... but, apparently to impress a friend with the idea that he's a reasonable person, chose to bail out at a friend's house due to the relatively-unsafe riding conditions, and get a ride back home. (Disclaimer- I probably would have been accurate to say "unsafe" instead of "relatively-unsafe" riding conditions, but sometimes my mother reads this... sigh... you'd think she'd give up on me after almost 50 years!).

02/23/06- ME, KARL & SOME GUY ON A FIXED GEAR who wanted to ride up as far as the park entrance. That would be Milo; what he had in mind, showing up on a track bike, is beyond me. Something I might have done 30+ years ago, and maybe that's exactly the point. Curiously, I've been so far immune to the whole fixed-gear thing; maybe my vaccination (having ridden the track back in the day) doesn't require a booster shot yet for continued immunity?

Karl was taking it easy today, while I was out chasing a few rabbits. First, some guy climbing with a backpack, which is never fair game. Obviously, the added weight of the backpack is improving his traction, making it easier to climb the hill! But after passing him, I came across a much-tougher target- John W. He's usually further ahead, having to get back from his morning ride a bit earlier than the rest of us (due to that work thing that sometimes gets in the way). He thinks I was being civil, riding with him up the hill, but the truth is, I don't think I could have shaken him.

Sprints? Nothing on the first one, don't think the second was contested either, but on the sprint into Sky L'Onda, Karl cheated and threw a dog my way. While I was pausing momentarily, assessing what the dog might do, Karl took off! I gradually pulled back up to him, but have a feeling he actually took the sprint (to the imaginary line, which makes for a bit of sportsmanship in determining who actually wins, in the event someone doesn't run away with it).

02/22/06- INCREDIBLE! That's the least I can say about watching the second stage of the Tour of California yesterday (Tuesday), from atop Sierra Road. Watching some of the world's finest cyclists compete in your back yard just isn't something you get to do every day. And the setting... so much like a slightly-downscaled version of the Tour de France. Obviously I have photos up... www.ChainReaction.com/sierra_road.htm. The day started with an abbreviated Tuesday-morning ride up to the park entrance and then back. I'd planned to ride all the way up the hill before turning around, but the guys were running a bit late, with George getting a flat, and Kevin having to make a run into Woodside to pick up some pedals from Karl.

If you haven't discovered the raw video feed on cbs5.com, check it out! They've got the complete helicopter feed of the climb, everything you didn't get to see on ESPN's coverage (plus a lot of chatter between the various helicopters covering the event- there were six of them!).

02/20/06- HAPPINESS IS... well, it doesn't hurt when you turn on TV (espn2) at night and hear Bob Roll and Paul Sherwin announcing the Tour of California! Yesterday (Sunday) I went to SF to watch the Prologue and have to admit I was impressed, impressed by how well organized everything was, impressed by the quality of the field, impressed with weather that had threatened to go south on us but instead was quite pleasant for a February day in SF... and impressed with the quality of the racing. I didn't think they'd pull it off; seemed like a lot of loose ends up until the last minute. But they did, and, for the first time, I have hope that professional cycling could possibly make it in the US in a big way.

Later that day Jeff and I headed south to San Jose and rode up Sierra Road, looking for good spots to watch the stage. I had forgotten just how nasty & mean Sierra Road was; last time I rode it may very well have been in a race, 30+ years ago. It appears to have gotten steeper since then!

Tomorrow it's back to Sierra Road, and hopefully get some great photos. Got a few so-so shots in San Francisco, but hopefully the lighting will be a bit better on the big hill. Yeah, that's right, blame the equipment or some such!

02/16/06- HIGH FIVES ALL AROUND! That was last night, around 9pm, when my temperature dropped to 99.2. Strange thing to get excited about? After running a tooth-problem-related fever since Sunday, it was extremely welcome news. I was officially better. No more chills, aside from watching the news reports about how cold it was going to be this morning. So I got all the cold weather gear together and went to bed just slightly nervous about getting back on the bike after everything that had gone on, and wondering how the cold weather would affect my tooth.

THIS MORNING'S RIDE was about a lot of things. First, it was just great to be swinging my leg back over a bicycle. Sure, I'd gone on a short ride on Sunday, so it was only four days off the bike, but for me, that's not so easy. Especially when it meant missing one of the Tuesday/Thursday rides, of which I've missed only a handful over the past 20 years.

The second thing I noticed? It wasn't nearly as cold as I expected. Didn't really feel cold at all; I overdressed pretty badly. Probably didn't need the winter all-weather jacket at all, and definite overkill on the balaclava. The lobster gloves were probably a good choice, but the jakcet and balaclava disappeared at Huddart Park.

Third thing I noticed? They're like wolves, stalking their prey, seizing opportunities. They knew I wasn't going to be up to speed; I fell off the pace set by Karl & Kevin pretty quickly, and only put a moderate distance between myself and Steve L & Milo. When I fumbled a bit stowing my jacket when we stopped at Huddart to get rid of excess clothing, they took off.

Revenge? Or just an opportunity not to be turned down? Either way, this was not a ride I could control any part of. But the worst was yet to come. No surprise that I can't, on a good day, match the climbing of either Karl or Kevin when they're having a good day. But today I was just happy to be on a bike. Not. Could I just let the sprints go by? Let them gap me a bit on the run up towards Skeggs, so I'm so far back that I'm not even part of the group anymore. Thus no sprint for me. But doing that in such a calculated fashion (because it really did go through my mind) meant that I couldn't, in fact, do that. I hung onto that last wheel for as long as I could, and then, as I lost it, didn't give up 'cuz  maybe they'd slow down just a bit. Which they did (thanks Karl!). 10 meters back, heart rate at 165 before the sprint even starts (not good). Before full commitment, I checked the speed on my computer... basically paced well behind Karl and matched his speed at 17mph. Too slow; I can do this. If it had been 19, no way, but if he was starting out at 17, I can make up the gap and hold 19 or so to the top. Maybe. Fortunately, that's exactly what happened. But that was the last of me; I could only watch Karl take the next sprint (not from me) and stayed too far back on the descent to contest the last sprint into Sky L'onda. Karl 2, Mike 1. But later we picked up Chris (started the ride late and rode the reverse on Old LaHonda to meet us), which meant the "optional" suicide sprint (to the Olive Hill stop sign on Albion) was on.

Chris knows I'm a bit tentative on that sprint, since I don't enjoy sprinting to (which means flying past) stop signs. One of these days I'm going to paint a white line maybe 10 meters shy of the stop sign, so there's something to sprint to. A win to a "virtual" line just doesn't cut it with Chris; he'll keep going all the way to that stop sign. Knowing what he'd likely do, and having nailed only one sprint this morning, I had no choice. When we started up the rise we were both standing hard on the pedals (unusual for me; I usually stay seated as long as possible) and pretty much matched Chris for speed... and then was surprised to hear him say something like "I've got this one" in a very sure fashion. It didn't exactly inspire me, but it certainly gave me no option of letting him win. I kept on going to the line and got it, technically finishing the day at 50% (Karl 2, Mike 2). But I really have to go paint that line. One of these days.

And it was only three days ago I felt like I would never be back on a bike again.

02/15/06- WELL, IT IS CHAIN REACTION, YOU KNOW. Or maybe you don't. I certainly don't know what to expect, one day to the next. Yesterday we were loaning a Trek 5.9SL Team bike to Lance for a commercial photo shoot (and got it back with his signature on the top tube!), and today Chris Horner, former Saturn racer extraordinaire, now successful European Pro racer, drops in for a pump and water bottle. Yes, Chris Horner is out there with a Chain Reaction water bottle somewhere. Very nice guy.

Chris is out here for the Tour of California bike race, which starts this Sunday. Details about the best stage to watch it are, of course, on our website!

02/14/06- THE VIRTUAL TUESDAY/THURSDAY RIDE. Last night wasn't much fun; most of the absolute pain from the tooth thing was gone, but either a side-effect or something entirely different nailed me pretty hard; so hard that by the time my temp got to 103 I was barely coherent enough to watch "24" (the TV program). Fortunately, by 10pm it had dropped down to 101.5 or so and I was feeling much better, but still pretty wasted. The idea of riding the next morning just didn't seem too practical.

Nevertheless, I woke up around the normal time, and very painfully went through a virtual ride in my mind. I knew that at 7:53 or so the guys would be hitting the base of the hill, and around 8:15 I'm imagining the middle part where it gets pretty nasty. Bizarre. I'm actually playing out the entire ride, in real time, in my head. At about 8:45 they're heading down into Sky L'onda (Karl took the final sprint), with Karl leading things out down 84 to west-side Old LaHonda. Beautiful views on west-side Old LaHonda today, with no hint of the changing weather to come. All in all, a beautiful day to be out on a bike. Too bad I was experiencing it at home! Kevin called me up at the shop, asking how I was doing, and saying it was, of course, a beautiful morning to ride. He, Karl, George and Steve came along for the ride, presumably with Karl getting the sprints, but Kevin said he was so far off the back he wouldn't know.

02/13/06- VISIT TO THE DENTIST. Fortunately, I have a really great dentist. Pel, a long-time customer of ours, friend of "older" Kevin (not my son) (not that my son hates dentists or anything) (but wait, at 13, I don't think anyone looks forward to a visit to the dentist, do they?), and generally a bit too fast on the bike. But great with his hands, and I gotta admit, there's a lot of craft involved in dentistry. But if they could just get rid of the sound of that darned drill!!! So the root canal process has begun, basically drilling holes into the base of the tooth, extracting out whatever formerly-living-stuff used to be in there, and preparing things for whatever is done next week to finish it off. Meantime I'm doing my best to try and get off aspiring & advil, and hoping I'm OK on the hill tomorrow morning. Pel says that whatever he did was going to make me go faster, but I think I'm better off if he does something to the other guys so they go slower!

02/12/06 11:30pm ADDENDUM- I was feeling so bad when I wrote the previous entry (tooth problem that will require a root canal) that I forgot something pretty cool  on my ride with my son earlier today. We're heading back towards Canada Road on Olive Hill... you know the part, you've got a long, downhill run to Canada where, if you do it right, you can coast pretty much all the way to the end. So we'd just been passed by a couple that we'd seen a bit earlier up at the Huddart Park entrance; I didn't give it any thought, because I'm not out there being competitive when I'm riding with my son. But he may have had other ideas.

He went bombing down the hill, and, from a bit behind, I watched him pass the other two at decent speed and then pull right in front of them, as if he had a clue about what he was doing! He just made it seem like this natural thing, while I'm thinking hey kid, no, don't do that, just stay to the side... oh no... oh my, he pulled it off without looking like a total Fred! Still, I don't think anyone much older than 13 would get away with a maneuver like that. (That's Kevin in the photo, in "target acquisition mode.")

02/12/06- THIS IS NOT FUN! And it has absolutely nothing to do with cycling. Well, actually that's not entirely true. For the past day and a half, and suddenly accelerating towards the exceedingly nasty, I've been experiencing quite the tooth pain. It's that front tooth that was heavily damaged (2/3rds broken away) by a kid that backed a car out into me from a driveway. The tooth that the dentist figured didn't have a chance of lasting very long, but I had more faith than he did. Well, it's been five years, and it feels as if it's decided that it's not long for this world, and wants to take me with it.

Actually, about the best it felt all day was when I got out on a short 13 mile ride with my son. Took him 1/3rd of the way up King's, via the back way through Huddard Park (off Greer). Didn't seem so bad on the bike, which was in marked contrast to how it felt before... and especially after.

So tomorrow morning I'm up early, not for a bike ride, but to get the first-possible shot at the dentist. No, I don't mean shooting the dentist that worked on the tooth the first time! (Actually I'm kinda amazed I can think of anything funny through this pain). Pain like this and you want to see the dentist. Pain like this and you wonder what people did before modern dental techniques. Pain like this and the fastest-ever ride up King's seems like a walk in the park. If it takes contrast to make you appreciate things, I'm going through an exceptionally-appreciative experience right now. I just can't figure out what those things are yet! Maybe by tomorrow.

02/09/06- THE PIED PIPER RIDES AGAIN. Yet another ridiculously-nice February day in California. How long this will last, I don't know, but dry roads and mild temperatures are great for riding (and not bad for selling bicycles either). Karl, Kevin (the slow version today) & Milo showed up, although by the time we got to the top of the hill we'd added Chris, who got to the start a bit late and raced up the hill to catch us, and Steve L, who cheated and road up a bit earlier. We modified the route a bit, dropping into Kevin's place off Swett Road for a quick bike repair (OK, I'll admit it, it was my bike that needed a cassette tightened) and then down Native Son's road. Normally no traffic on Native Son (aside from the time we nearly became hood ornaments on Neil Young's car) but they must have been doing some construction on the ranch at the bottom because there were some big vehicles this morning! If you're old enough to remember Steven King's first movie "Duel", that was what it was like heading back up to Skyline... a narrow road, a few cyclists able to crank up the grade at around 11-16mph, and a bit dump truck rumbling behind, unable to go any faster due to the twisty road, but seeming to literally be pushing us up the hill.

02/07/06- SO HOW DO YOU DO THE SAME RIDE, TWICE A WEEK, FOR 20+ YEARS, AND NOT GET BORED? Well, looking at the stuff I wrote below, it looks like it's all about playing games with myself. Perhaps I've become a total nut case, but y'know, if that's what it takes to enjoy being on a bicycle, things could be worse!

WHO AM I, REALLY? An obvious philosophical question, but what does it have to do with this-morning's ride? We'll get to that in a minute. First off, it was a very nice morning, with temps reaching up into the mid-50s through the latter part of the ride. Karl, George, Kevin & Milo, with Kevin & George stomping up the hill (somewhere in the mid-25 minute range; I lost track of them before even getting to the clearing) with me in the middle. I felt fine at the beginning and end, but pretty dreadful in the middle; thus it was surprising that I ended up with a time of 26:58, not so bad for February. Of course, putting any sort of serious hurt on my body on the main climb may be something I have to pay for later, and therein lies the conundrum. Do I consciously hold anything back, saving myself for the sprints? Well, no. But it does affect how I approach the sprints, since if I'm totally gassed, I can't play around much, and have to grab the best wheel as a lead-in.

So this morning I'm moderately gassed as we approach the first sprint (starting at Swett Road), and had let Karl get a bit of a gap on me. That's a bad thing, especially since Karl wasn't killing himself on the main climb. Fortunately Karl wasn't killing himself on the sprints either, allowing me to wind up and gradually overtake him. Since he wasn't into super-human heroics and tactical stuff today, I pulled away from his wheel a bit early on the second sprint (Skeggs) and did the side-by-side thing. Karl then pulled me all the way across the top of Skyline (he's incredibly strong on the flats & rollers; it's all I can do sometimes to hold his wheel), so it was only fair that I stayed at the front for the final sprint into Sky L'Onda.

He paid me back on West Old LaHonda, where I was trying to get some photos of the coast at the same time he decided to pick up the pace and tow Kevin & George to the top. I got a few photos showing them as little dots way up ahead on the road.

But the who am I, really thing- guys like Karl & Kevin and George can steadily pull away from me, just about anytime they feel like it, on a longer climb. It's not as if I'm not giving it everything I've got; I'm not one of those guys that takes it easy through the ride, just so he can outsprint everyone who's been climbing hard. But I'll do everything I can to try and win a sprint. I'm some sort of hybrid, maybe... not really that guy who takes it easy wherever possible so he can win the sprints, but maybe not so far removed from that guy as I'd like to be. Thinking back 30 years, when I raced, I can't say that I remember anyone quite the way I am now. I don't give up on the climbs, even when it's hopeless, but I don't think that I'm trying to compensate by sprinting. It just happens to be something I've gotten better at. But why?

02/05/06- WAS THERE A BIG GAME OR SOMETHING TODAY? Who cares, with weather like this? While it would have been nice to do a hard ride with the guys, it seems like I've almost got my 13-year-old to the point where he'd rather ride a bike than be indoors playing video games. Not yet, and it may never actually happen, but today he said he actually had a good time out on the bike. Like last week, we headed over Jefferson and out to the end of Bicycle Sunday and back, but then added a little kicker out to the bottom of Huddart Park (at the end of Greer Road in Woodside). That means getting to do the roller-coaster on Albion (part of the shortcut between Canada Road and King's Mtn), and he's just now getting to realize how much fun it is to zip downhill with enough speed to get you up the other side.

We saw quite a few familiar faces out there, including our Sales Manager and his wife (Dick & Janet) on their tandem, Ralph on his 5900, Steve L (who sometimes rides with us on our Tuesday/Thursday morning gig) and a bunch of others whose names I forget. Also got some nice photos of Canada Road, one of which might someday replace the badly-fading photo in the big window of our Redwood City store. And then there's the family in the photograph, with dad literally pulling the kid's bike via a rope tied around him. Interesting, cute, but of questionable safety.

02/04/06- HE'S RIGHT, OF COURSE. That would be the customer picking up his new bike Saturday morning, mentioning that the content on our website was great, but that it really needed some help in terms of having a consistent appearance, and that he knew a guy who, for a reasonable price, could fix things up and supply an organization to things that would be easy for me to keep up.

He was offering this advice with absolute sincerity, and it was obviously coming from the perspective of a highly-successful businessperson (a category I don't feel comfortable claiming for myself, although I'd have a difficult time figuring out exactly where I do fit in in the grand scheme of things... aside from being an avid cyclist that loves putting others onto bikes too). Not the sort of advice you can just toss aside, because it's absolutely true.

But just because it's true doesn't mean it works for me. For good and bad, I've kept our website 100% in-house, with no outside work, period. I've felt that it was important to have the website reflect the shop as much as possible, and I've seen enough websites that really didn't relate at all to the way somebody did business... well, I'm sure I'm over-reacting, but I'm going to keep this website entirely in-house (which basically means me). Nobody will ever accuse this website as being a "cookie-cutter" design, nearly identical to a sea of others based upon easy-to-maintain (which basically means easy-to-grow-stale) outsourcing companies. Nevertheless, there is a great deal of work to get done; a whole lot of articles here that there are no links to, for example. So when it rains for 40 days and 40 nights, maybe I'll get around to it. Or not. Because rain or shine, nothing beats being out there on a bike. Guess I'll just have to add some more hours to the day!

02/02/06- YOUR RAIN BIKE'S MADE A MESS OF THE ENTRY HALL (AND I'M NOT HAPPY)" That's what I heard from the mother of my children, warehouse queen at the shop, maker of the meals, keeper-upper of the house (because somebody has to do it and I don't), etc. Guilty on all counts. Guilty, guilty, guilty. Sigh.

But it was a good ride anyway. Just Karl this morning, on a dreary, wet-but-warm ride where he mercifully was trying to keep his heart rate down, which mercifully keeps his pace down just a bit, which unmercifully made me feel pretty bad about a pretty slow time up Kings despite the fact that I wasn't riding with any such restrictions. We came across a young woman (Erin) out training; originally we thought we caught up to her on Kings, but as she blew past us when we stopped briefly at the top, we had to rethink that a bit. She eventually settled down and rode with us towards Sky L'Onda, but couldn't ride the west Old LaHonda section with us wither because she was too sensible or her almost-believable excuse that she had to get to work.

We have decided it's best to the "slide" signs seriously; on the descent to west-side Old LaHonda, I think there were three separate slides, and a number of pretty big rocks in the middle of the road.

Really glad I brought the rain bike. It never rained in any meaningful fashion, but drizzled the entire time, making a mess of everything. Seems like 50 degrees and drizzle is a recipe for perma-fogged glasses too!

01/31/06- NEITHER RAIN, NOR HAIL, NOR... WELL, JUST ABOUT ANYTHING BUT A MUDSLIDE! My wife had the TV on just before I left the house, and there was a bulletin that Skyline Boulevard was closed near Sky L'Onda, due to a mudslide. The showed an aeriel photo which wasn't too clear, but looked like it was probably on the section we ride, just prior to the final Skyline sprint. How dare they!

Full-size squad this morning, with George, Kevin, Chris, Karl, Mark & Milo showing up. Roads were damp enough to have to be careful, but not so bad that it warranted a rain bike. I have no idea how fast Kevin & Karl & Chris & George climbed, because I wasn't there, having fallen off the pace pretty quickly. Was I intimidated by Karl announcing, as we started out, that he planned to inflict pain? Certainly a new tactic, which runs quite contrary to the usual moaning about not feeling very good when the reality is that you're ready to kill! But I'm not too concerned. This is winter, after all. By the time the nice weather hits, they'll be all worn out! Don't I wish.

As we head south on Skyline there's nothing to indicate the road might be closed, although there is quite a bit of traffic heading south, and nothing north. And all of the traffic heading south are emergency-type vehicles. Nevertheless I'm brain-dead, hanging onto Karl's wheel for whatever ride he's going to give me on the rollers, with the rest of 'em a bit behind. Flying down towards Sky L'Onda there's still no indication of anything amiss, until finally coming upon one of those "road work ahead" signs. Then nothing for another half-mile until there's another one. And then, half a mile after that, a bunch of flares start appearing. OK, bad sign. Around a couple more bends we finally come to a complete stop where a bunch of vehicles are lined up (difficult to figure out why they needed so many) and a CalTrans guy is rather rudely telling us no, we can't sneak through. Actually, it's worse than that. The guy is even telling us that I can't take photos!!!??? But a friendly CHP guys says no problem, I can come down a bit and get some photos (but still can't ride past).

Which means we have to ride back the way we came, up that rather-longish grind back to King's Mtn. Karl, Chris & I get out a bit ahead and waited for the others at Skegg's, where the strangest thing happened- everybody stopped and got rather social. Weird. For us, anyway. I guess everyone knew the rest of the way was basically downhill so, with no remaining pain quotient, it was OK to be civil.

01/29/06- SOMEDAY THERE WILL BE CAR LANES. But we'll get back to that in a minute. Sunday, instead of doing the Alto Velo "A" ride to Boulder Creek, it was time to do the "family thing" and get out on a bit less (physically) challenging ride with my son. The original plan had been to drive out a bit from the house and ride Sawyer Camp Trail, but putting road bikes into a car just didn't seem to make a whole lot of sense, so instead we rode from the house, up over Jefferson to Canada, and out to the end of Bicycle Sunday and back. As we got close to the turnaround point, Kevin says to me "Someday there will be car lanes" and explained that the future might be one where roads are devoted to bicycles and it's the cars that need their own special accommodation. Maybe you had to be there, maybe it needs to be your own kid, but I thought it was pretty cool.

01/26/06- SLIP SLIDIN' AWAY. I've often said I don't mind rain... as long as it's between 10 at night and 2 in the morning. I need to modify that a bit; when it's cold with no wind, the roads are not only wet, but sometimes quite a mess.

The ride started out like any other; waking up three minutes before the alarm goes off at 7:05am, get out of bed and wake the kids up for school, make a bottle of cytomax, try not to check the outdoor thermometer 'cuz who wants to know and will it really make any difference, get dressed, go outside with the bike, get the shoes & cold-weather booties on, inflate the tires, reset the HAC4's trip computer and ride up over Jefferson to the start. What, no mention of eating anything? That would be correct; for anything under 40 miles, maybe 50, Cytomax by itself works fine; maybe one or two times a year I'll feel like I'm almost bonking towards the end of the ride.

Kevin, Karl & Milo today. I decided I'd try to keep my heart rate down on the main climb today, so I let Kevin & Karl go off the front at the first creek crossing, but the funny thing is, it hurts almost as much to watch people ride away from you as it does to stay with them, so around the park entrance I chased them down... just once. And then idled back and waited for Milo, who was climbing at a much more humane pace. Nobody really contested the first two sprints on Skyline, but I'd gotten away a bit with Karl so, before the descent, I thought I had time to stop and put on my windbreaker (it was 39 degrees). Karl warned be to be quick because Kevin & Milo were going to be coming up soon, and he was right... by the time I got back to the road, all three were long-gone, and no way was I going to catch up to them on wet roads. I believe Karl took the sprint.

Thing are definitely back to normal, as Karl is doing strong pulls down 84 into west Old LaHonda. Old LaHonda was, unfortunately, a lot worse than wet... it was muddy, with that super-slippery clay-style mud that makes a mess of your bike and reduces traction to zero if you hit it wrong... which I did at least once, but stayed up. I decided not to let Karl & Kevin ride away from me on that section since I'd taken it easy on the Kings climb, and somehow I knew it was going to be Karl pushing things, so that's the wheel I stayed on. Kevin eventually fell off the pace, and I'm thinking it's going to be my turn soon, if Karl's really pushing (which, from my perspective, was certainly the case!). But I hung on, through that open section just before the trees where I usually falter, and then through the twisties, watching his wheel, watching the muck on the road, and wondering if I could last to the end. No sprint left in me, to be sure, so Karl rode away on that last little steep part.

That wasn't the end of the drama though. On the final descent down 84, my rear wheel slid out pretty nastily in a corner, with Milo behind me to wonder if I was staying up or going down. Fortunately I recovered quickly, but it's not a whole lot of fun, nor is it good for your confidence, when something like that happens. The rest of the way home I couldn't shake the feeling that something wasn't quite right, as if I was riding on a flat tire. Which, in fact, I was. About 40psi left in the front tire by the time I got home, from a piece of glass I must have picked up in the last couple of miles.

01/24/06- WHAT'S IT LIKE BEING TARGETED? I think I know now. Without Todd (who's back at Stanford doing the serious-student gig), it's up to me to control the sprints. But first you have to get up the hill!

Kevin, Karl, Millo & George showed up for the morning's festivities. Nice morning, a bit on the cold side, but this is January, y'know? I wasn't feeling too lively leaving the house (I rarely do in the winter), but gradually worked up to speed on the way to the start. Still, I wasn't particularly looking forward to a painful climb, so I figured I'd let someone else set the pace on the first part of the hill... only to find that my moderate efforts still managed to put some distance between myself and the others. Don't know why; it didn't seem like I was going that fast... pretty much the minimal speed I need to get over that first nasty little steep part in decent shape. The other guys don't get this. They think I'm attacking them, but I'm not. I'm attacking that nasty little steep part right at the beginning. Get past that, and the rest is easy. Yeah, right.

But even that moderate pace put a gap between myself and the Go4 (Gang of 4), and it didn't really seem like there was much point to slowing down, because it just didn't seem all that hard (which meant that very soon, they'd be flying past me). Kevin broke from the group and started closing the gap until I heard him yell, looked back and saw him having some sort of problem with his pedals. OK fine, there are three other guys back there, I'm sure he'll be fine. I'll wait at the park entrance.

But where were they? I figured they were just around the last corner, but it took them quite a while to come back into sight, as I idled for a bit at the entrance to the park. Idled a bit too long really, because I began to realize that I was having an OK morning and ought to take advantage of it. George and Karl finally came into sight, and when they got within range (whatever that means) I took off again. In retrospect, I would have been better off had I maintained a steady pace; as it was, I pushed a bit too hard too early and pretty much died in the steep middle section (before the clearing). My pulse was higher than it should have been, or at least that's what I thought at the time, because I really had no idea I was riding at a pretty fast clip. But not so fast anymore... Karl & George were catching up, and it seemed like an all-the-more ominous pursuit due to George's flashing front light. By the time I got to the final hairpin, George had dropped off the chase but Karl was charging, his rabbit in sight. He passed me about 30 seconds from the top, and maybe, just maybe I could have summoned a heroic effort and sprinted past him at the end, but that is quite literally the stuff of dreams, not reality. Only hours later did I figure out why; what I'd thought was maybe a 28 minute ride up the hill was actually 27, which is not my usual winter pace for the climb.

We waited 10 minutes at the top for Kevin, but he was nowhere to be seen. We figured that maybe he'd turned around and ridden back down to his car (but later found out that he reassembled his failing pedal as best he could and then rode to his house, changed pedals, and finished the ride well behind us). I neutralized the first sprint on Skyline (Swett Road) by getting far enough ahead that nobody was going to try and chase me down; after the climb, I didn't feel like I was in any shape to ward off a serious challenge from Karl. Surprisingly it was Millo on the next one (Skeggs) that tried to come around me, a definite surprise! The final Skyline sprint was the riskiest (from my perspective) of all, as I was leading out on the descent. That's a really bad place to be unless you're superman, so I quickly dropped my speed from 37 to 32mph as we approached the start of the sprint, which, in theory, should make it easier for me to snag any wheel that comes around me (which would happen, since they were all sitting right on my wheel, hoping to get a ride for as long and fast as possible). I shouldn't play with such things; much better to let someone else lead out and come around, but I figured why not make it a bit more challenging. A bit???!!! Millo was flying up the inside, George next to him, and gradually moving out into the lane, keeping me from going straight up the middle by forcing me even further outside. And Karl? He had been tracking my wheel, but as everything drifted left, simply ran out of room to make much of a run. I'd like to say it was fun, but it wasn't. I was having a tough time holding my bike steady but somehow got to the (imaginary yet well-known) line first.

Thankfully, the rest of the ride was quite civilized, with Karl doing his usual strongman thing hauling us down 84 towards West Old LaHonda. Even the 84 descent went better than it might have; we feared the worst after having been passed before the descent by an elderly woman driver, but dang, she actually knew how to drive down the hill.

01/22/06- GREAT BIKE, GREAT ROADS, GREAT COMPANY... GREAT RIDE! It can't get a whole lot better than this, except that maybe it could be just a wee bit warmer in the morning. Met up with Kevin, Frank, Long Bob, Lorraine, MaryAnn, Sanborn, Lesley... several others that joined in and left at various parts of the ride. We met at the base of Old LaHonda about 8:30, a reasonable hour, and headed over to the coast via Pescadero. Kevin took a group out to Bean Hollow for a longer loop, while I went straight into Pescadero and waited briefly for Lorraine, MaryAnn & Sanborn (all women; see, I'm not so dumb) for the ride back via Stage Road & 84 (had to get back by 1pm). Very nice group of people all around, although it's a bit different riding with Kevin than just about anybody else... you say you're not going to go all-out up Old LaHonda, for example, but if I let up, Kevin keeps going, so I end up continuing to push hard. Almost exactly 60 miles total (60.02 to be precise). I'm ready for more!

01/19/06- THANKFULLY NOT AS COLD AS THREATENED THIS MORNING; in fact, truth be told, we haven't had anything really cold for the last couple of years. Used to be normal that we'd get several days at or below freezing, and a couple in the upper-20s, but so far this year, I don't think we've seen anything colder than 34 or 35. This morning it was 37 at the bottom, warmed a bit on the way up, and then dropped back to 37 again up on Skyline.

Still no sign of Rob, or Karl either for that matter. Just myself, Milo and Kevin. The "slow" version of Kevin, as he's getting over that nasty cold everyone's had. That means no sign of sprinters either, darn.

01/17/06- YOU'D THINK I'D LEARN. I loaned my 5900 to Chris, who's been on our Tuesday/Thursday ride a couple times, so he could see what it's like (he's planning to buy one of our remaining 5900 frames from us, and just happens to fit my bike, so...). I shouldn't have done that. He blew us all off his wheel climbing Kings this morning in very short order. I had him in sight as far as the open section, but that was it. But hey, I hadn't been on a bike since last Thursday, and was getting over a mild version of "The Plague" that's been going around, so I can't complain. Besides, a good hard ride burns the cold right out of you. Or, if it doesn't, at least you can pretend that the stuff you're hacking is from the ride and not pneumonia (hope my mom isn't reading this...).

Milo & George were along for the ride as well, both being a bit more civilized than Chris. Very nice morning (again!), temps only down to 41 or so, mostly clear skies but when we did see clouds, they were the cool kind that you'd see in a painting (as opposed to the nasty kind that the alien spaceships always seem to come out of). But where was Karl? And Kevin? And Rob for that matter?

01/13/06- WHERE WAS THIS WEBSITE ON FRIDAY? Good question! Our webhost, XO communications (www.xo.com) was completely off-line, knocking off not just our website, but email as well. Not too happy about that! We've got a secondary server host we can bring on-line pretty quickly, and that may just happen soon. It won't change anything you see or how you connect to our site though; any change will be completely transparent (aside from the gray hair it's likely to give me).

01/12/06- NICE MORNING FOR A NICE RIDE and for once Kevin wasn't lying when he suggested he wouldn't be riding too fast. Karl, Kevin & Milo joined me, and I definitely felt a whole lot more in control of things than I had for a while. This was also one of those rides where I really wished I'd brought my camera, as the sun cutting through the trees & fog on Skyline made for some spectacular light shows. But that feeling of control is sometimes a lie; on west side Old LaHonda, sure, I was riding off the front a little bit with Karl, but there was this feeling that, at any time, Karl could just put down the hammer and drop me. Which, of course, he did! But with a smile, of course.

01/10/06- TOTAL DOMINATION! That wouldn't be me. Kevin's doing really well this year; actually, I'd have to say that the past two years have been very good for his cycling. No way can I keep up with the guy on a hard climb; my only chance is if either he's having a bad (really bad) day, or it's a very long ride that I start feeling better at towards the middle.

Today it was Kevin, Karl, Milo, Chris... oh darn, almost positive there's one more, who was it??? Milo had been off his bike for quite some time, but once he got to the top of Kings it didn't show, as he did quite well keeping up with things on the rollers. Without Todd I managed to take all the sprints, although the second one (Skeggs) was a bit of a risk... I was off the front by quite a bit but decided to let them catch back up to me on the descent, and then rode parallel instead of slip-streaming. It took a lot of work to nail that one! GEORGE. That's the other person who rode with us!

01/08/06- TOTAL RECALIBRATION ON MOUNT HAMILTON. Or total madness; riding Mount Hamilton twice in a year is unusual for me, riding it twice in a week is pretty crazy. But that's what we did, on a make-up ride for those who didn't ride to the top during last-week's windfest. Todd joined me again for the ride, this time at a bit more civilized hour (didn't have to get up until 7:30am... yay!). Carried all the camera equipment again (little Fuji F10 in my jersey pocket, along with a RebelXT with 70-200 F4 & 17-85 in a backpack), hoping it would increase the traction to the rear wheel so I could climb easier. Right. Why I didn't suggest that Todd carry the stuff up is a good question. As if. As if I would admit that I needed that much help. No, worse than that, it's because with him carrying all that stuff and I still couldn't keep up... at least with the backpack I had an excuse!

Absolutely beautiful day; I'll get some photos up soon.

But what did I mean about "recalibration?" Frankly, after climbing Haleakala, a 19-mile climb just doesn't seem like that big a deal. I don't say that trying to boast; it just is. You realize that you're capable of a lot more than you thought, and mentally you're a lot better able to handle what's thrown your way after something like Haleakala.

1/5/06- JUST A PARTIAL THIS MORNING, as I couldn't do the full ride since there was a Doctor's appointment for my son at 10am, but still got to ride up Kings with Karl & Kevin. I thought (briefly) about the idea of doing the hill especially hard & fast, since I could only go to the top and then have to turn around, meaning that I didn't have to save anything for the rest of the ride. As it turned out, I did ride hard... just not fast! About 27:45 or so, with Kevin a fair amount off the front. Still, even a partial ride is better than no ride!

THIS JUST IN- Got this in an email via an old friend-

Check out Mike J. and his friends' stories of their ride up Mount Hamilton on New Year's Day.  http://www.chainreaction.com/diary.htm .  They really do a great job telling the story of how tough the weather conditions were.

 

 Despite that, I think they should be nominated for a Darwin award.  (Sorry for the dig Mike.)   I saw you on your way to Grant's Ranch as I was descending down to Alum Rock Road.  I quit the climb and turned around just before the top of the saddle before the ranger station.  I also had a wardrobe malfunction and my friend Dino had to hold my jacket arms so I could put it on despite the wind's attempt to wrestle it away from me...... Chris

I don't question that they made a wiser choice than we did, but Todd just pointed out to me that, technically, I can't qualify for a Darwin because I already have kids.

1/3/06- REPORTS ON MT. HAM IN FROM TODD & KARL & STEVE R! Read all about our crazy ride from both Todd's perspective (brash young Stanford student... just kidding about brash) and Karl's (seasoned veteran). And this just in, we've also got a ride report from Steve R, who's got a great photo of a tree that had fallen across the road and had to be climbed over. And, of course, my version of the event.

1/3/05- ROADS JUST A BIT OF A MESS this morning! I met up with Todd on the way to the ride, with George & Kevin arriving shortly after. No sign of Karl... which doesn't seem like such a bad thing this morning, as I'm really not looking forward to blasting up Kings. As if it makes a difference. I was thinking that maybe we could have a conversational pace and talk about the crazy Mt. Hamilton ride two days earlier, but nooooooo. Kevin & Todd take off, with George right on their tail. Fortunately Kevin had to make a quick stop to water some trees at the park entrance (wonder how toxic partially-metabolized Diet Coke is for plants?) and this time I was smart... I didn't wait around, but kept on going. They caught up (and passed me) around the wide open section, but at least I arrived at the top on the same day. Todd took every sprint (which, if he's actually trying, isn't too surprising).

But the real story was the sliding hillside, just about everywhere. Made for dicey descending, because you never knew when you might come across mud on the road. Oh, and that little rock in the photo, on Old LaHonda.

On the return we met up with Karl, who'd actually been chasing us the entire ride, only he was chasing us from the front. That happens when he arrives a bit late and takes a shortcut to the base of King's, figuring we're up ahead and he'll run us down. Only this morning, we ran a bit late as George flatted right at the start (that's George in the photo on the right, demonstrating that ever-so-helpful "disembodied 3rd-hand" technique to scratch his nose, leaving his other two hands free to repair the tire).

1/1/06- IT'S THAT "GUY THING" FOR SURE. Mt Hamilton, our annual New Year's Day ride, virtually never missed (except for 2004, when the wind was so bad that it was raining horizontally). Something to look forward to, something to do on that very first day of the new year, so that, no matter what happens the rest of the year, you know you did at least something.

This year was different. This year, our sales manager in Redwood City, Dick, was getting married on New Year's Day. And not just that day... he was getting married at the top of Mount Hamilton. The plan was that he and his wife-to-be (Janet) would leave from Grant Ranch (about halfway up) and ride to the top on separate bikes, get married at the summit and then ride back down on a tandem.

But the weather didn't cooperate; we rode up from the bottom to Grant Ranch to mild rain and heavy wind, and the bride & groom had decided to have the ceremony at Grant Ranch and skip the ride to the top. Entirely reasonable, given the weather! Unfortunately, not everyone got the memo, and some who were riding just a bit behind my group (which was Richard & Ron) never saw us turn into the ranch, and thought they were chasing us up the hill. Not just up the hill, but into some really nasty weather! I thought that was a possibility at the time, but didn't give it a whole lot of thought; after all, those guys (Kevin & Karl & Jeff) were all reasonably-sensible and wouldn't do anything stupid.

Unless. Unless you toss in the "guy card." Howling winds, threat of nasty rain... but if you think someone's out there ahead of you, do you do the sensible thing and turn back? We'll come back to that one...

Meantime, after the wedding, my group (myself, Richard, Todd & Ron) decide that it's so cold and nasty out there that, instead of heading straight back down the hill, we'll ride in the opposite direction, to the top of the first ridge, "just to get warmer." Bad move. All three of us knew that riding in that direction was a bad choice, because it would make it that much more difficult not to go for the summit. Which, each of us knew, was a silly thing to do. But that first little decision, that first step, seems so innocent. Even though you know what it leads to.

The inevitable becomes reality when, at the top of that ridge, we meet up with a few riders coming back down, telling us about the wild conditions up there. Darn, one of them was Jeff. He'd done it. Gotten blown off the bike three times, he said, but he'd done it. Our fate was sealed. Richard had to get back quickly, and was able to haul my heavy camera bag back down the hill (so I didn't have to drag it up to the summit), and Todd, Ron & I headed up. To say that it was the wildest ride of our lives would be an understatement; in the final five or so miles, the wind was blowing so hard that, at times, you were literally being pushed up the hill (yes, so hard that you didn't have to pedal!) and at other times blown across the road. When one of the few cars came up behind me, I actually stopped and got off my bike, since I couldn't be sure a sudden gust wouldn't blow me into its path.

Trees had fallen all over the place, and if you tried to listen past the howling of the wind, you could hear things breaking and snapping. Unbelievable. We made it to the top, but didn't spend a whole lot of time there as we figured it was going to be a very long trip back down. In fact, at one point, heading downhill, we were brought to a complete stop, even pedaling quite hard. I had my feet on the ground, trying to push my way down and through the corner. It was almost laughable. Fortunately, by the time we got to the bridge (7 miles down from the summit), it had quieted down and things became relatively normal. Quite the ride, quite the day! An experience we'll likely carry with us forever. An experience which, at the time, seemed rather scary and punishment for a very wrong decision. But an experience which, looking back at it, was not one to be missed.

Definitely a guy thing.

12/31/05 ADDENDUM- MT HAMILTON APPEARS TO BE ON. Got word that Dick & Janet's wedding, at the top of Mt. Hamilton, is going to happen... barring a sudden change in the weather. See you there! Even better news is that my son is doing quite well after his stint in the hospital the other day. Dad's doing better too, after a bit of sleep.

12/31/05- MT HAMILTON TOMORROW? WHO KNOWS! The weather report changes and contradicts itself hourly; if things work out, there will be people leaving from the base of the hill at 8:30am. There will also, weather permitting, be a wedding taking place at the summit, sometime around noon! Details on the '05 Mount Hamilton page.

12/29-12/30/05- THE LONGEST DAY. (Medical emergency; nothing to do with cycling) Kind of mirrored one of those dreadfully-long "travel" days where you head to France, make a connection that keeps you moving for another 3-4 hours, and end up going on a ride when you get to your destination, without having slept the previous two days. Been there, done that one a few times, but those are better circumstances, or at least under more control, than the past couple days. It started on Thursday afternoon, when I got the call from my wife that my son, who was with my daughter running errands, had collapsed and was being taken to the hospital. So you know the drill. You do? I sure didn't... it was like watching a medical show on TV from the inside-out. You're in an emergency room watching your kid strapped to a table, going through seizures while doctors & nurses are trying to figure out what's going on, and using phrases like "We need to paralyze him until we get the seizures under control." At this point you're trying to figure out where you place your trust and faith; you're pretty much praying to God but having to trust the Doctors & Nurses. There are worse combinations to have.

The kid's not responsive, except when the stuff wears off (and the seizures begin again) and they try something else, and the cycle continues to repeat. Eventually they're happy that they've got him completely sedated (and I'm not sure what's supposed to be such a good thing about your kid being in a comatose state, with a breathing tube and ventilator to make his lungs work), and ship him off to a facility better equipped to handle kids than they are. Well hey, you do want him with the best-possible people at a time like this, and when they arrive to transport him (and "they" arrive en-masse; a Pediatrician, several EMTs, a driver and somebody else, I think), I'm beginning to realize I've got a very long night ahead of me. Thinking clearly for some reason, I head home, take a shower & change clothes before heading down to Santa Clara for the night. And, fortunately, once there things seemed to get better by the minute. The plan was to wake him up around midnight, but he was stirring around 10pm and, for the first time in almost 8 hours, rejoining the real world. He wasn't a happy camper; terribly uncomfortable with all the tubes & such attached to and through him, but he could understand us well enough to know that, if he could struggle to full consciousness, he'd get the breathing tubes removed. Amazing that he didn't seem very frightened by it all, not at all like I had felt only a couple hours previously.

So I spent the night with him, mostly up, talking, comforting, all the things that nobody teaches you, but somehow it's the right thing, and somehow it seems to make a difference. They never quite figure what's gone on, but he seems pretty much back to normal, and they let us take him home the next night. Everyone, the kid, the wife, the sister... everyone slept a whole lot better. Hopefully, in a few minutes, I can add myself to that list as well.

12/29/05- WHERE TO START? A FAMILY EMERGENCY OVERSHADOWED JUST ABOUT EVERYTHING, and clouds some of my recollection of Thursday's ride, our very last one for 2005, but here goes. Kevin, Karl, Todd, Marcos, Mark and first-timer Leslie... plus at least one other person that I'm neglecting here. Most shot off the front, a couple made a strategic break off the back on the King's climb. Significantly, I did not push the pace at the bottom of the hill, at least partly to see what would happen- and Karl stepped right in. The same Karl who gives me a bad time so often about pushing the pace at the beginning.

Nice day, no car hassles, good weather (slightly-damp pavement in some places, but no rain). Todd made a joke of the first sprint, and I'm trying to remember, think I may have been there for the second. The final sprint just prior to Sky L'Onda was taken by Todd, with Karl making a move ahead of me... he'd thought maybe he jammed me a bit into the shoulder, but truthfully, I could have come out on the other side, or simply shouldn't have been in that spot in the first place!

12/27/05- KARL'S KORNER DEBUTS! One of those things I'd meant to get around to a long long time ago. Karl had posted a ride report for a day I wasn't around (8/18/05), and it should have gone in-line here. I've always felt bad I didn't get it in, and so I'm finally doing something about it. Who knows, might even see something from Kevin sometime, although he flies an airplane a whole lot better than he types, so it might be a long wait.

12/27/05 ROLE MODELS. First off, the usual details. Check out the latest radar weather maps on www.noaa.org, see a big yellow blob moving my way, and decide yes, time to drag out the Iron Pig and put on the rain gear. Yuck. I hate rain pants. Kinda feels like they should be called "depilatory pants" the way they abrade the hairs on your leg (yeah, I know, if I shaved my legs I wouldn't have that problem...). Get out to find Karl, Kevin & Todd ready to brave the elements. Only guess what? The elements never came, and I was the only person on their rain bike. So yeah, that's my excuse for riding way behind everyone else on King's Mtn. It was the bike, right.

Other than totally ditching me on King's Mtn, it was a pretty civilized group, with Karl burning his usual strong pace heading down west-side 84 to Old LaHonda. Thankfully no ditch-fest on Old LaHonda, 'cuz no way could I have kept up with a hard run on that section. Even got to talk a bit, not totally gasping for air, noting that, between myself, Kevin & Karl, we pretty much supplied most of the required role models for a young guy... long-time married, reluctant to grow up & "other." Hey, better that than "Reluctantly married" right?

12/26/05- BRUNO'S DA MAN. So on Christmas afternoon I'm driving in the pouring rain north on Canada, and actually do see a guy out there (on one of our bikes, no less) enjoying the rain & wind. But I'm thinking OK, not that big a deal, I can ride in the rain just about anytime I want and this is Christmas after all, and having spent the day with the family seems like a good decision. That's what I thought then. But today I get to the shop and find out that Bruno, our Service Manager in Redwood City, went for a ride yesterday. A real ride. One with teeth. On his CycloCross bike, he rode up Page Mill, and then had fun doing what for most is impassable in dry weather, Old Alpine Road back down to Alpine. Dodging downed trees & deer in the process. Wow, I am impressed. But wait, there's more. After that he does a loop in Arastradero Park, before finally heading home. All in heavy rain. Like I said, Bruno's Da Man. At the moment, I'm not feeling worthy. Makes me almost wish for an epic-quality rain ride tomorrow morning, but even then, what's to compare to Old Alpine? I'm not only impressed, but certainly not worthy as well. Gee, really thought I'd get away with not riding Christmas day and feel totally happy about it. Sigh.

12/23/05- THE SCIENCE OF SANTA CLAUS. I mean, how can he really be everywhere at the same time? So back around 1990, somebody put together a piece detailing the science behind the man. And of course we put it on our website.

Regarding Christmas, my kids are very lucky this year. Because Christmas isn't on a Tuesday or Thursday, causing them to wonder if they're going to have to wait to open up their presents 'cuz Dad's out on a bike ride. The reality is that Christmas is the *only* holiday (or pretty much any other occasion) where I willingly, er, at least I claim that to be the case, don't ride.

12/22/05- TURNING THE CLOCK BACK TO 1998 ON THIS DAY, things were just a wee-bit different. This morning's ride, with new-guy Brian showing up in the very warm light rain, we could have been riding in t-shirts & shorts. 60 degrees on a December morning is just plain weird. Contrast that to 1998, when we saw a record-low (for the Tuesday/Thursday ride) of just 23 degrees. Not 23C, but 23F, as in 9 degrees below freezing.

It was dry that day in 1998, unlike this morning's light rain & drizzle. In fact, towards the end of the ride, we were seeing some blue sky (which was replaced a few hours later by some pretty healthy rain). So it was a morning for the Iron Pig, perhaps one of the last, as the Iron Pig may go into retirement due to global warming. No, just kidding, but my former main ride (before getting my SSL), the 5900, may soon become my rain bike. I'd like to believe that, on the 5900, I would have had an easier time keeping up with Brian on his TREK OCLV, but the truth is that Brian's simply in much better shape than I am. Still, he was kind enough to ride with me up the hill, enjoying the sounds of the rushing creeks (assuming he could hear them over my heavy breathing).

12/20/05- 15 YEARS, 1000+ RIDES WITH THE GUY, AND IT FINALLY HAPPENED. But first the mandatory play-by-play, naming the players, all that rot. Kevin, Rich (first time with us maybe?), Milo & Karl. I feel like I'm leaving somebody out... right. George. And Todd. As usual, the lying begins at the start of the ride, with various players moaning that they're gonna be slow today yada yada yada. As if. Eventually it's Todd & George off the front, with me in-between them and the rest. Kevin finally puts it into gear and gets up to me; I tell him I'm going to kick back and wait for the others. OK, I lie too. I thought about waiting, but it was so painful watching Kevin head on ahead that I let him get a pretty good gap (maybe a hundred yards) and then sprinted to close it. That hurts! Rode with him for a bit, then dropped back (I'll claim intentionally but the truth may have been otherwise), let him get another hundred yards and then sprinted to catch him again. That second time hurt even worse than the first!

We regrouped at the top, enjoying a much-warmer-than-usual December morning (about 52 up on Skyline, the same temp as below) and a brief shower on our way to Sky L'Onda. Todd took the first two sprints, probably the 3rd one as well, but I wasn't part of that due to the wet roads and a desire on my part to stay upright. Other than Todd's sprinting he was very well-behaved today, living up to his promise of an easy ride. At least he didn't claim he'd be riding easy because he didn't feel well, unlike some others in our group... (OK, maybe include me in that).

And then it happened. After descending back into Woodside, we're climbing that little rise before you get to the "singing pipes" (an area on the left side of the road where there's a bunch of above-group natural gas pipes that "sing" in the winter, when everyone's got their furnaces on, using a lot of gas), with things getting a bit bunched up. Milo's at the front, then Kevin, then me (and the people behind don't really matter because it's what's up front that might get you into trouble, right?). Me on Kevin's wheel. One of those things that happens so often you don't even think about it. Used to be a bit scary, when I was climbing at a similar speed to Kevin (not too likely these days) and if I was on his wheel on King's, and he stood up on the pedals, his speed would instantly drop maybe 1-2 mph and I'd suddenly be in peril of running into his rear wheel. Got to the point where I could anticipate exactly when he'd stand and back off a bit first. And somehow I never actually made contact. Came really close a number of times, but never hit.

Until now.

Milo slowed down rather suddenly (not surprising, as he was pulling a pretty good pace up that rise), and because I was paying attention to Kevin and not Milo, I missed it. Kevin reacted quickly, dropping his speed a bit and moving to one side, and me? I somehow didn't catch what was going on and, by the time I did, I'd severely overlapped Kevin's rear wheel and kinda fell into it when I must have moved in the wrong direction. Or maybe I just rode straight and Kevin moved; that's actually the most-likely scenario, since I stayed up, but we made pretty good contact for what seemed like a very long time (probably less than .1 seconds, but it seemed like a lot longer!). Nobody went down, although the only one in any real danger in that situation is typically the person behind (that would be me) since it's the front wheel which becomes unstable. Regardless Kevin was a bit surprised and appeared almost angry (maybe he was angry?) at my squid-like behavior. What can I say? Just one of those things, fortunately without anything bad happening. Just another day in the life, I guess.

12/18/05- YOU REALLY LIKE US! Or something like that, liberally paraphrased from Sally Field's acceptance speech at the Oscars. Normally our Redwood City location is closed on Sundays, but with Christmas approaching, we were open this past Sunday in a low-key kind of way; relatively minimal staffing (a hand-picked group of volunteers... but if you pick them, are they really volunteers?) and little advance warning to our customers. But it worked out great; we had a good time and took care of quite a few people who needed bikes & apparel for gifts (sometimes gifts for themselves, but what's wrong with that?).

Of course, it meant I couldn't ride this morning, so I missed the weather "event" involving the possibility of tornados due to a nasty storm cell that moved in. Maybe next time.

12/15/05- THEY PROMISED A SLOW RIDE UP THE HILL this morning, and almost delivered. Todd, Kevin, Karl & Mark showed up on a morning that somehow seemed colder than the 37 degrees that showed up on my computer. Too cold for my lungs though, so even at the relatively-easy pace, the other four were having quite the discussion while I was grabbing whatever air was available. Cars were a bit more trouble than normal; seems like the Christmas Spirit refers more to spirited driving than anything else. Even had quite the scene as we tried to make the left turn onto Tripp Road (from 84, on our return to Woodside). Normally it's not a big deal; we take the lane shortly before the turn, signal our intentions and, assuming there's no traffic in the other direction, head across. The problem this morning was that we had to do a quick abort because traffic did come the other way, and when he headed down the road a bit further to try and make the turn at the far part of the "Y", the cars behind just about plowed into us. Not sure what they expected us to do, but figure they were just in a bit too much of a hurry. Next time we'll make sure we've got a bit more breathing room.

12/13/05- FIGHT-OR-FLIGHT? Just about chose "fight" this morning, as I'm heading south on Canada to the start of the ride, and think maybe I'm having trouble focusing... oh-my-goodness. I'd put out the call to Todd, thinking he might have some time in-between finals to come out & play, but... eight people???!!! On a deep & dark December morning? I'm toast! There be sprinters here. And climbers. OK, roll call before I lose track.

• Cyrus, who we haven't seen in a good long time, and is a friend of Ueyn.
• Ueyn, long-time regular who's been trying to finish grad school (which has cut into his riding). Sprints & climbs.
• Rob, newer regular, a real threat to get into great shape and ride me into the ground. All-rounder.
• Milo, relatively new blood who's been showing up fairly often
• George, new friendly guy (not that the regulars aren't friendly)
• Mark, new guy (but long-time customer) friend of Kevin, too fast on the climbs.
• Todd, regular when school isn't in conflict with riding. Sprints & climbs, way too fast.
• Kevin, the most-regular regular (for what, 15 years+ now?). Climbs, but sprint? Thankfully not.

So how did it all play out? Nastily, at first! I did my usual from-the-front thing at the base of the hill, with Kevin quickly pulling alongside. Rob next, who then flew off the front... at a speed such that I assumed he'd flame out pretty quickly. Mark, Todd & George joined Kevin, who caught up with Rob about halfway up the hill (miraculously, I was still within range to see what was going on at this point). Rob held with them until falling off the pace a bit just past the "opening" (the straight spot where the road opens up, about 1.5 miles from the top), and at some point joined up with George. I'm looking at the timer on my computer, noticing that I've reduced the gap from 25 to 20 to about 15 seconds, but no further. But I'm not dying either, a good sign. By the time we get to the final hairpin (under the high-voltage lines) the lead trio is long gone, but Rob isn't. He's right there, tantalizingly-close, but still out of reach. My heart rate's been increasing gradually, but not out of control, and that last part of the climb? I own it. I am it. I closed the gap and Rob, George & I all hit the top at about the same time. And yeah, this is way too much drama for a 27-minute climb up King's Mtn!

The sprints- We regrouped at the top and headed South on Skyline, towards that dreaded first sprint with both Todd & Ueyn in attendance for the first time in a couple months. I never had a chance. Todd took off hard straight from the front, Ueyn darted to the right, and I'm just sitting there, almost laughing as Todd races away. But it was a sprint, so I did what I could, passing Ueyn as he flamed out and trying to at least keep Todd in sight. Impressive. Things were a bit different for the next sprint, where the downhill lead-in allows Kevin to get up a bit of speed, the rest of us sitting on his wheel until it's time to take off. Rob went first, I grab his wheel, and Todd? He's somewhere, I can hear him, but I can't really worry about that right now, since Rob has a bit of a lead and I've got to get around him. I could have strategically sat on his wheel until just the right moment, just as he begins to tire, but that A: wouldn't have been sporting and B: would have given Todd the advantage. Rob didn't give up, Todd was a bit tired from the previous sprint (or mis-positioned, not sure which) and I somehow snagged it. On the final sprint, I let Kevin & Mark get way too far off the front, and had to close a huge gap on the long downhill that precedes the sprint. I'm sure they (Kevin & Mark) thought they had it, and I was beginning to think that as well, but I didn't give up and began to make some serious ground up once the road tilted upward. I thought, ever-so-briefly, how cool it would be to fly up in-between the two of them and take the sprint, but there wasn't that much room, and I wasn't sure Kevin would hold his line. So instead I go to the left, which has the advantage of removing just about the last bit of available real estate for Todd, and hit the top in a near dead-heat with the other guys.

The run down Old LaHonda- Without Karl, it was up to Kevin to haul us westward towards the coast. Ueyn & Cyrus had previously headed back home via east-side 84 (down into Woodside), but that still left 7 of us, riding single-file at reasonably-high-speed and acting like responsible cyclists not just because we had some cars behind us, but also because one of them was a CHP.

West-side Old LaHonda- One of the prettiest roads in the world, or at least those parts of the US & France that I'm familiar with! Could be the size of the group had somehow created an energy-damping effect, but we rode at a pretty civilized pace. Perhaps the strangest observation that hit me was that I could hear 3 separate conversations going on at one time! So as much as you might read these entries and think that it's a take-no-prisoners kind of ride, the reality is that it's often a social yak-fest. A group of guys (once in a while a girl shows up, but most seem too sensible) of varying ages (generally 19 to 50-something, with a couple of us in our very, very late 30s... ok, 49) who find it pretty easy to ride together, joke together, and, sometimes, suffer together. Guys who might not be all that much in touch with their feelings, but can appreciate the clouds in the sky, or the view of the coast, sitting just under the fog, from Old LaHonda.
 
12/11/05- DOES A PILOT NEED TO KNOW GEOGRAPHY? That was the question we wrestled with on our ride today, as Kevin (who's a pilot for, as they'd say, a "major" airline) was insisting that India was in the Southern Hemisphere. But darned if I can remember how such a topic came up...

Kevin, "Long Bob" (he's got really long legs) & Julian (or is it Jullian?) showed up at the base of Old LaHonda at 8am for what was billed as a "nice" ride to the coast. Thank goodness Long Bob wasn't his usual self, or I doubt I would have survived. A quick run up Old LaHonda, out to San Gregorio, up the coast to Higgins/Purissima and a stop in Half Moon Bay at the world's greatest bakery. Well, maybe not, but it's the best one 'round these parts. But you'd probably like to have the name of the place, and so would I. OK, did a quick yahoo search, it's the Moonside Bakery. Great excuse for a ride to the coast!

After fueling up (a Pizza Foccacia & 16oz double-shot Mocha, not decaf, with whipped cream), it was time to head back over the hill. An interesting metaphor, over the hill is. Kevin's 50, I'm 49. Julian... not sure, could be 40. Long Bob is the young punk messing with the averages, probably mid-30s. So maybe it's just myself & Kevin who are over the hill? But we don't act like it, and as long as we have our wits about us, we can still pretend we're... well, not over the hill!

That's not to say that I often don't feel like I'm on the wrong side of the hill though! Long Bob did the smart thing, taking Lobitos Cut-Off instead of the much-gnarlier Los Lobitos Creek option, back to Tunitas Creek. I survived Los Lobitos better than I thought I would, but still found myself looking for the tunnel that's rumored to go from the coast to Woodside! I hung with Kevin & Julian for maybe the first third of the climb, then did the fly-up-the-hill-as-fast-as-you-can-and-flame-out trick. You know, where you get to a steep section but instead of switching to a lower gear, you go for a big one, stand up and haul your butt up the hill at a suicidal speed. Of course, you can hold that for precisely 13.482 seconds, and when you flame out, you get to consider that the pros climb the entire mountain at that speed!

We caught up with Long Bob about 3/4 of the way up the hill, and regrouped, and I'm thinkin' we might do a nice easy pace up that dreadfully-long but mercifully-not-so-steep upper part of the climb. Why would I think something stupid like that? Julian decided to put the hammer down (of course, he'll insist it was my fault, that I rode off the front a bit) and the two of us motored on ahead. Julian's got a power meter on his bike and made some remark that we were putting out 600 watts (very briefly); I mentioned that Lance produced over 700 watts continuously in the '03 TDF after the crash with Mayo & the handbag.

Overall a very, very nice ride on a very, very nice day. Even saw a good customer (Burt M) on the return, plus quite a few people climbing King's as I headed down. About 62 miles, 4900ft of climbing (so it doesn't pass the "tough ride" test of 1k feet of climbing per 10 miles) at a pretty hard pace. For me, anyway!

12/09/05- LOST A DAY... AGAIN! We did ride yesterday, but you wouldn't know it from the lack of a diary entry. Things were a bit thin at the shop, with just two people working the floor in our Redwood City store, so didn't get a chance to update things. But we did ride! Well, duh. Takes quite a bit to keep a few of us off our bikes; most-memorable time was a couple years ago, on New Year's Day, when I woke up to rain that was literally horizontal outside my window... didn't seem like a good day to climb Mt. Hamilton. But not yesterday. Yesterday morning was a bit wet, but not so wet that I couldn't rationalize taking out the new bike, and leave the Iron Pig at home. After all, had to find out how the carbon rims would work in the wet, right?

Just Kevin & Karl showed up, each pretending they were going to take it easy up the hill and, by the way, why not go up through the park (bypassing the lower section of King's)? They love doing that to me; the added steepness softens me up quite a bit. As if that's required; Kevin & Karl seemed to be having a very good time, yakking away, while I'm gasping for air like a fish out of water. But I did manage to keep up this time, even pulling ahead a bit at the archery range. Karl maintained his own pace, taking it easy, while I decided it was time to push myself on the last part... and push I did. Got my heart rate up from 160 at the corner to 177 at the top (pretty much my max these days), and didn't get rid of Kevin until the last few hundred meters or so.

Definitely should have put my flashing tail light on, as the fog was so thick it was actually dark up on top (Skyline). No sprints due to visibility issues; doesn't seem like a good time to be all over the road when cars can't see you. Despite the relatively easy-going nature of the ride, Karl still did his suicide time-trial run down 84 to west-side Old LaHonda, with Kevin & I hanging on. Trouble is, he does this without ever blowing up! If I were to create a "fantasy cycling team" built up around derelicts like myself, I'd definitely have a guy like Karl doing the lead-outs for me.

12/09/05 (Addendum)- DON'T KNOW HOW LONG THIS LINK WILL WORK, but if it's still working and you check it out, only one possible question can come to mind. What could possibly be worse? And I think I have the answer. A deep-fried cube of butter. Don't know if that's even possible, but if it is, I'm sure I have some friends in Wisconsin who have already done it. One of my guys at the shop wondered what it must be like, watching the fat slowly flow through your veins on its way to your heart...

12/6/05- IF THE CHICKENS & GOATS ACT LIKE THAT, WHAT ARE WE DOING OUT HERE? That's what I was thinking this morning, as we headed up Olive Hill past the place on the left where they've got a large fenced-in area with a whole lot of animals... animals that were all huddled together in one corner of the yard, trying to keep warm. It really wasn't that cold this morning though; I never saw anything lower than 35 degrees on my bike computer. But cold enough that we did encounter ice on the descent into Sky L'Onda!

Let's see if I can remember everyone who showed up- Kevin, George, Rob, Milo... seems like I'm leaving someone out, but we didn't come across Karl until the top of King's (he'd left the house a bit late so he bypassed the start of the ride and got to the hill just a bit before us). A reasonably-moderate pace... at first. Then Kevin, George & Rob took off, leaving me in the dust. Well, not exactly, it's not as if they were ever all that far ahead, but my winter lungs weren't up to the task of keeping up with them. The sprints on Skyline didn't really seem to happen, partly because I was pretty pooped for the first one so I rode off the front just far enough to discourage anyone from trying anything, and partly because we began to encounter a bit of ice on the road as we approached Sky L'Onda. But once we started the Old LaHonda section it warmed up a bit, all the way to 48 degrees. 48 degrees=warm? And this isn't even winter yet!

12/4/05- IT DOESN'T GET TOO MUCH BETTER THAN THIS. But, in typical fashion, this morning's ride didn't quite start out that way, as it was, simply, cold. Time for the toe warmers, leg warmers, thermal base layer, windproof gloves... you know the drill. Only I'm not too practiced at it yet, and soon as I got a block and a half from home realized I had forgotten to bring my windbreaker. Do I bother going back for it? Wisely, I did. Wisely, because it was 37 degrees in Woodside, dropping back down to 39 degrees on the other side of the hill. My original plan was to head out to Pescadero & back, after meeting up with Kevin at the base of Old LaHonda. Seemed like a good plan, as that's what a bunch of others were planning to do as well, a send-off ride for some friends who are heading off to New Zealand for six months.

But Kevin had other things in mind; he needed to be in Pacifica by noon to watch a nephew in a swim meet, which meant he couldn't head to Pescadero first, nor could he waste any time. So after waiting for a bit for people to arrive at the top of Old LaHonda (including veteran Pete and first-timer Tom, seen in the photo), I signed on to Kevin's high-speed run up the coast to Pacifica. 

I don't normally head north much, as if Half Moon Bay is some sort of physical boundary that I dare not cross. This may have as much to do with winds as anything else; typically, you get a headwind going north. But today? Seemed more like a strong offshore breeze, coming from the east. Plus the temps at the coast were almost toasty, at nearly 60 degrees. So after escorting Kevin to Pacifica I pointed the new bike up Sharp Park Road and high-tailed it home. Actually, I didn't go for all-out speed, deciding instead to use Sawyer Camp Trail, where you have a 15mph speed limit and compete for limited (paved) trail space with all manner of walkers, joggers and other cyclists. Still, it was only an hour and a half back from Pacifica, a fair amount faster than I'd thought. Not a bad 71-mile ride at all.

One other unusual item. This was the first ride on my new bike (the Trek Madone SSL with the wild fighter-plane-style paint job) where I really felt comfortable with it. I'd gotten so used to my 5900 over the years that the Madone just didn't feel quite right at first because it was... different. But this morning, wow. Got that feeling that it really wanted to go. Fast. Uphill and on the flats. On the steeper sections, for the first time in a long while I felt like I had a lot of power, and a frame that could use it. A bit of that twist-the-throttle-and-go thing. Hope it lasts!
 

12/1/05- IT WAS A DARK & STORMY NIGHT... no it wasn't! It was fairly dark, fairly wet, and fairly windy this morning at 7:10am when I fielded the phone call from Kevin, asking if I was really going to ride this morning, and telling me that he probably wasn't. But he showed up anyway, and we had a quite-pleasant ride up King's, first in pretty decent rain, later tapering off to showers. Temps were pretty mild- mid-50s or thereabouts. And the Iron Pig actually seemed just a bit faster, a bit nicer than it has been on past rain rides.

Thank goodness I remembered to wear a cycling cap under my helmet! It makes all the difference in the world on a rain ride; it keeps the salt out of your eyes, and allows you to protect your eyes against the rain by tilting your head down a bit and letting the brim block the rain drops which otherwise feel like small rocks hitting your eyeballs when you're going 30mph.

No other cyclists on the road this morning, despite it seeming not all that bad. I think the weather report must have scared people off, with the forecast of torrential rains & howling winds. Mildly disappointed that didn't happen, since it really doesn't make all that much difference, once you've ridden more than maybe 10 minutes in any kind of rain at all. Just means that you'll only be blown across half a lane on the way down 84, instead of all the way into oncoming traffic. Just kidding!

11/30/05- THIS ISN'T GOING TO BE EASY FOR ME; that's what I was going to tell my wife at the services for my 45-year-old cousin (that cancer thing), but I never did. Because I'm a guy, probably, and guys aren't supposed to let other people into their feelings. But I was right, it wasn't easy, not easy at all hearing about my 45-year-old cousin's life, all the things I should have known that I didn't, all the opportunities lost because the 2.5 hours that separated his life from mine (about 150 miles) became a a fence that was never scaled. And he's from the side of my family that I got so much from so early on- farmers in the Sacramento Valley. My Grandfather, who taught me the virtues of coffee that didn't pour, but rather, well, oozed out of the double-percolator. People who made a living by dealing with the forces of nature instead of the stock market. Relatives who might never have retired but literally died in the fields with their boots on, because that was their life, what they loved doing. Others, like Jon, who realized there was a different world out there, places to see, and that travel enhanced your appreciation for what you've got at home, what you accomplished with your hard work.

Cousin Jon was active in water politics (important if you're a farmer), 4H, the County Fair, Fly Fishing, Dogs, Photography, fixing just about anything mechanical or computer, volunteered at his kids school, earned a law degree despite being very ill, and had the respect and friendship of an entire town, and then some.

And here I'm concerned about my own kids, whose exposure to the "real world" is, in my book, minimal. They know X-Boxes and videogames and shopping malls and Starbucks. They see vast fields of grain, old wooden barns that have remained standing decades after common sense tells you they should have collapsed, skies with clouds that look like someone painted them into place, only prettier... and wonder what it is that Dad sees in such things.

At the service, they played a song called "Drive" by Alan Jackson. All about that car you learned how to drive in, and your kids learning to drive, etc. My kids learn to drive in parking lots when they get their learner's permit, not in the fields, in Grandpa's old pickup, like I did when I was 13. As much as I'm all about bikes, that car thing builds powerful memories. But nothing so strong as the memories that never quite happened, because I didn't scale that 2.5-hour fence between myself and my cousin Jon.

11/29/05- HALEAKALA WEB PAGE FINISHED! Actually, no web page is ever finished, in the sense that there won't ever be any further refinements etc. But for now I've got a functional page describing not only the climb (and, of course, with a whole lot of photos) but also maps that show the correct... and the very, very, very incorrect route up the mountain.

11/29/05- KEVIN? KARL? ROB? UEYN? TODD? Who am I forgetting that didn't show up for the first official Tuesday/Thursday "rain" ride of the season (which, to say "first of the season", means we must be defining "season" in some strange way... does it start at the end of the last decent riding day?). The first rain ride is usually a bit of a pain, because you've got to figure out where the relevant stuff to wear is, and you tend to forget the important little things that make a huge difference in comfort. Like forgetting to wear a cheapie cycling hat under your helmet, so the sweat from helmet pads doesn't stream down into your eyes, not to mention that it keeps the rain from impacting your eyeballs if you tilt your head down just a bit. Of course, the sweat issue wouldn't have been nearly as big a deal if I'd remembered to soak/clean the helmet after my Haleakala ride a week ago Monday!

But I wasn't alone out in the wet; Milo joined me for a nicely-paced cruise on the usual route. I thought briefly about skipping the Old LaHonda section, but never told Milo, and if nobody else tells him, he'll never be the wiser that I had a potentially-weak moment.

One thing surprised me on this first wet morning- the roads, while wet, seemed to have plenty of traction. Always a good thing!

11/27/05- EASY RIDE TODAY WITH MY SON, about 20 miles, his first time actually doing "The Loop." But the main project right now is getting up the web page for the Haleakala Ride last Monday! I've got photos up, but no descriptions yet. Fun to look at anyway.

11/23/05- TURKEY DAY RIDE BROUGHT TO YOU BY TODD! Difficult for me to do the traditional TurkeyDay Trot when I'll be on a plane heading back from Hawaii, so I handed over the responsibilities to Todd. 8am from Canada & Olive Hill, with a tentative route up over Old LaHonda, Pescadero, Stage Road and then back up Tunitas. Trust me, I'd rather be there than on a plane!

11/22/05- TRYING TO SNAG A STRAY WI-FI SIGNAL IN MAUI, sitting on the 4th floor lanai, holding my computer at a funny angle all so I can upload something about my silly ride up Haleakala yesterday? Yes, par for the course. Details are going to have to wait (difficult to work with the signal constantly cutting in & out), but basically, there's an easy way to ride up Haleakala, and a hard way. Guess which one I did? Not by choice, mind you!

Not so tough figuring out where to start the ride. The summit is 10,023 feet above sea level, so naturally enough, you gotta start at the ocean, right? That's where the picture's from, on a beach in Paia. From there you ride up Baldwin road and then cut over to Haleakala Highway/Crater Road. Impossible to take a wrong turn... for most people. But I ended up heading towards some place called Olinda, at the literal end (dead end) of a road, adding an extra 1800 feet of nasty climbing (much steeper than anything on Haleakala and no, the final piece up to the summit isn't as steep as people say, or maybe it is but after what I'd been through, it just didn't seem like it?).

It wasn't a whole lot of fun, climbing up to 3900ft and then having to descend back to around 2000, and then have to regain that altitude again. In fact, it was never very far from my mind! I kept thinking things like geez, I'm at 4,000ft right now, if I hadn't taken the wrong turn, I'd be over halfway up! I'll get lots of info and photos up, but suffice it to say that it's something you just have to do... once. Would I be tempted to do it again? No. Maybe. Tough to say.