SD Randonneurs Rainbow 200K

I signed up to become a member or Randonneurs USA a couple of years ago, but really got burned out on the whole long-distance thing right after I signed up–before I had even completed even a single brevet!

It seemed like trying to ride 200 milers for the California Triple Crown, together with the training that went along with it, always seemed to tweak my knee or some other part of my body. Then the baby came, and long-distance training time became scarce, even if I had wanted to continue with it all.  As a result, in all of 2012, I only rode over 100 miles on a single occasion, preferring instead shorter and harder rides on the road, and MTB rides under 5-6 hours.

So when my friends Mike and Esteban announced they were going to do the San Diego Randonneurs 200K on January 19, I was reluctant. Besides the distance and my lack of training, for the last couple of years, SD Randonneur brevets have always seemed to coincide with cold and rain. Sure, I’ve got fenders, but who wants to ride in the rain for 10 hours when in SoCal you can usually just wait a day and everything will be roses again?

So when a January heat wave brought predictions of sunny skies and temperatures in the high 70s, I was running out of excuses fast.

Well, I’m glad I did it.  It was a beautiful day on the bike, and despite not having done any long-distance rides recently, I didn’t drag much at all, and felt good right up until the end. It helped to have Esteban del Rio as my riding buddy as the miles just seem to tick away a lot faster when the conversation is good.

(photo by del Rio)

(Here is Esteban describing how much further we have to go)

(The home stretch along the coast! Photo by del Rio)

It’s often the case that doing “too much, too soon” can result in injuries, so I can’t really advise this approach to riding brevets. On the other hand, I’ve been consistently doing some pretty tough MTB rides, so I think my muscles, joints, and tendons are pretty strong. The hide on my butt, now that’s another story.

In terms of food, one of the advantages of having a rando bag up front is that you’ve got space to hold real food.  My ride was fueled by bananas, dates, baked potatoes, and a few larabars.  Good stuff that does’t leave you feeling icky and strung out the way 9 hours of robot food can.

I don’t think I’ll be pushing the mileage much higher than 200K this year. Even at that distance, an old hamstring injury was starting to bother me. But the SD randonneurs have put together a great series of 200K and 300K events throughout the year, and many of them look awfully tempting.

 

Touring California’s Lost Coast, Fifth and Final Part

The final two days of our eight day lost-coast tour were beautiful and pleasant, though nowhere near as epic feeling as the previous days.

By day seven, my knees were getting pretty darn grouchy. I’m not sure if this was because my saddle had slipped a bit (something I only figured out upon my return home), or simply due to lots of mileage and climbing. I tend to think it was a mix of both. In any event, combined with Esteban’s angry Achilles tendon, we were not bursting with bike mileage energy the way we had been on previous days.

The morning ride into Point Reyes Station was only 38 miles and 1754 feet of climbing. While I had thoughts of exploring Point Reyes National Seashore, I found myself content to spend the afternoon chilling in town and hoping my knee would heal up a bit for the climb over Mt. Tam in the morning.

(Signs that you are in Marin)

After a ridiculously good lunch at the Pine Cone Diner (does every restaurant in Marin serve only local organic food?) and some gluten free pastries at Bovine Bakery, we made a pilgrimage to Black Mountain Cycles, where we found a customer’s Cunningham in the stand. Hands down one of the coolest bike shops out there. If you are in the area, go and give Mike some of your money.

We ended up staying at the RV park in Olema, which I really can’t recommend unless you are determined to be close to Pt. Reyes. In the future, I’ll continue on to Samuel P. Taylor park up the road. It worked out Ok in the end though, as we had a couple of other friends touring the area who stumbled upon us, and we were able to do the final day’s ride over Mt. Tam as a foursome.

We began our final day early with a 7am rollout from camp. Our plan was to ride over Mt. Tam, get lunch in Mill Valley, make it to the airport to pick up my car, and drive all the way back to San Diego before midnight when I turn into a pumpkin.

The initial climb up Bo-Fax was terrific, though signs on the road tended to be less than encouraging:

We arrived at Ridgecrest Road before it was open to traffic, and the light made for some spectacular Jesus effects.

By the time we hit the dirt of Old Stage Coach and Railroad Grade, we might have been able to see the end in sight, except that it was covered by clouds.

It was interesting to think about this as the birthplace of mountain biking and how this might have affected some of the early designs. You can certainly see how things like a drop bar Cunningham make an awful lot of sense on the Mt. Tam fireroads.  It was a bit funny to see so many people riding dual suspension bikes, but maybe I am ignorant of some of the rougher dirt options on Mt. Tam?

Lunch at Punjabi Burrito in Mill Valley is not to be missed. You know you are back in civilization when you can order an Indian fusion burrito with quinoa!

After a final push, the end was literally in sight:

One of the most hair raising experiences of the entire tour was ironically the ride across the Golden Gate Bridge, where high winds and a seemingly endless stream of oncoming tourists on rental bikes made a head-on collision seem almost inevitable.

While we thought about spending the afternoon in San Francisco visiting Box Dog Bikes and a few other shops, in the end we voted to make the long slog of a drive home so that we could spend the following day with kids and wives. We ended the final day with 44 miles and 3626 in climbing, plus a solid eight hours of driving!

All in all, it was a terrific trip. It’s hard to capture the deep satisfaction I take from a trip like this in words. I do know that a lot of my chronic aches such as lower back pain tend to go away on a trip like this as the stress just seems to melt away in the here and now bliss of it all. Now that I’m back, I can’t stop scheming about the next one.

 

Touring California’s Lost Coast, Part IV

After two big climby days on the lost coast, I had planned a relatively low mileage day for day five of the tour.  My knees were starting to creak a bit and my friend Esteban managed to tweak his Achilles heel, probably on one of the steep hike-a-bike sections. We started the day with a terrific breakfast at an organic hippie cafe in Fort Bragg.

After topping up whiskey stocks at CVS, we headed into Jackson State Forest.  We were a little tentative about this detour since we were cooked from the previous two days, but the climbs were relatively gentle and it was well worth the trip.

After realizing that we were going to finish the day extra early, we decided to press on to Manchester as we heard that the KOA had good laundry facilities. I had never stayed at a KOA before, but this particular one was actually better than a lot of the budget-cut-strapped state parks I have stayed at. The luxury of clean clothes made it well worth the extra mileage that day, which we finished up with 58 miles and 4137 feet of climbing.

We rose early the next morning and headed through the fog into Point Arena looking for some breakfast, but just about everything was closed. This is one of the problems of having an early internal alarm clock. Luckily, the organic coop supermarket had some pretty good breakfast burritos, which I ate sans tortilla.

We ended up spending about two hours inside waiting for the fog to die down, and trying to figure out where to stop for the night. Our decision to press ahead the day before had put a wrinkle into my carefully designed itinerary. It’s good not to be too fetishistic about an itin. On the other hand, we met a couple of guys from the midwest touring north to south. They had been so determined to be spontaneous that they didn’t even do enough research to realize that north to south kind of sucks due to prevailing winds and the fact that the best views are on the right-hand side. Anyway, after a lot of figuring, we settled upon the idea of camping at a primitive campground near Jenner.

We stopped for supplies at what looked to me like a run-of-the-mill roadside general store, but the place ended up having some ridiculously gourmet stuff. I would have been happy for a candy bar, but this place had snacks like olives and cheese. It was clear we were out of the great north and getting closer to San Francisco. Potato salad with wild salmon on top went down a lot better than some of the other meals on the trip.

We also ran into two young guys touring from Portland to San Diego on Fixies. They had been doing about 100 miles per day and one of them mentioned that his knee was starting to hurt. Go figure!

One of the best detours of the entire trip was our decision to leave the coast–where the traffic was really starting to annoy me–and head inland up a dirt road called Kruse Ranch.

This lead to some terrific country roads high above the ocean.

And one screaming descent back to the ocean.

We were excited to finally make it to Jenner and discover that there was a tandoori place not far from the campground we planned to stay out. Only problem was that the campground itself ended up being closed for the season due to state budget cuts.

We considered doing a bit of stealth camping among the overgrown weeds of the derelict and abandoned feeling campground, but since it was located right next to the ranger’s house, we decided to press on. I was really bummed to ride by that tandoori place on our way out of Jenner! This also meant that our plan to begin the next day with a dirt road climb up to Occidental were spoiled, but everything turned out OK in the end.

After rocketing a dozen miles down the coast boosted by heavy tailwinds, and passing a completely full campground, we arrived at Bodega Dunes State Park, only to be told that all hiker biker sides were full, as was the county park campground on the other side of the bay. After some pleading, the ranger finally gave us a spot though, for which we were pretty grateful.

An excellent Mexican restaurant down the road made up for the tandoori. We finished the day with 72 miles and 4600 feet of climbing, well more than we had been planning, but it was a terrific day all the same.

 

Touring California’s Lost Coast, Part II

We woke up fairly early in Redcrest with the knowledge that we had a big day ahead of us as we dove into California’s Lost Coast.  Our sleep had been interrupted in the middle of the night by a strange and eerie barking creature.  A neighboring camper who got out of his tent described it as a fox like animal, and after some discussion we decided it was likely a chupacabra.  After choking down breakfast,  stale grilled cheese and french fries saved from the one burger joint in town from the night before, we headed off into Humboldt Redwoods State Park.

After ten miles of pleasant meandering among the redwoods, we had a pretty steady seven mile climb up panther gap ridge. In hindsight, this was actually one of the easier climbs on the lost coast as the grade didn’t exceed 10%, meaning you could pretty much just stick it in the granny and motor up. The payoff was a terrific descent into Honeydew, one of the key resupply points on the Lost Coast.

(despite appearances in this photo, the road into Honeydew is paved)

After subsisting for most of the morning on grilled cheese and bars, I was pretty pleased to make it to Honeydew. The store caters to a mix of personalities, with supplies ranging from pork and beans to hippie energy bars, including some gluten free ones made from rice flour in the refrigerator. If you make your way through here, make sure to budget a little time to stop, hang out, and people watch.

Speaking of locals, when we told the women running the register that we were on our way to Shelter Cove, she said she had never been there, despite living in the area for some time. Pretty amazing when you think that Shelter Cove is really the only town of any size on the entire lost coast!

(my friend Esteban’s grub)

We felt pretty energized leaving Honeydew, not entirely cognizant of how hard the remaining riding was going to be before we made it to our destination in Shelter Cove. The six-mile climb up Wilder Ridge was tougher than Panther Gap because the grades reached 13% in places. It also featured one very tough customer of a resident:

Cerberus, Guardian of Wilder Ridge Road kept us at bay for a good 15 minutes before the owner finally showed up from her run to rescue us. I like to think the honey pretzel treat I was offering just as she showed up might have granted us passage, but I’m not so sure.

At the top of Wilder Ridge, we made a turn onto dirt and begin the long up and down slog of King’s Peak Road. It’s actually a lovely stretch, but things were really heating up. I’m not sure what the temperature was, but after temps in the low 60s for the first two days, I was sweating bullets.

(This pic about sums up how we felt by the time we made it to Shelter Cove Road)

(destination finally in sight!)

The road to Shelter Cove descends 2000 feet in about four miles at grades of 10-13% for most of the way. Lots of fun going down, but keep in mind that there’s only one way in and out of Shelter Cove.

About half way down, you’ll find a great grocery store. Make sure to stop here as it’s a 1000 foot climb back up from town and the store in town is much smaller and more expensive. After the oppressive heat of King’s Peak road, I downed two large coconut waters in about 5 minutes.

The RV park in Shelter Cove is pretty much the one cheap place to stay, and it served its purpose, but was a bit on the mangy side.

Outside of the RV park, the town itself–which is mostly a landing strip, vacation homes, a few restaurants, and a bunch of sport fisherman–was quite scenic:

All in all, I am glad we visited Shelter Cove–it was one of those places on the map that really piqued my curiosity. At the same time, if I were to do the trip again, I might bring enough food to stay at the Wailaki campground up on Chemise Mtn Road and avoid the trip down and up Shelter Cove Road. As we would discover the next day, Usal Road is hard enough in and of itself without a 2000 foot/4 mile climb at the start.

I finished the day with a little whiskey and some local red snapper and rice. All in all, we rode 50 miles and climbed 7301 feet. Normally I’d be embarrassed to admit that a 50 mile ride kicked my butt, but as has been said, if you are used to 100 mile days in the saddle, plan for 30 on the lost coast.

 

Touring California’s Lost Coast, Part I

California’s coastline can be one of the most idyllic locations for a bike tour imaginable. If done from north to south, you benefit from stunning cliff-side views and tailwinds most of the way. The segment I did last summer from San Francisco to Santa Barbara certainly fell into this category.

For this summer’s trip, however, I wanted to do something a bit more adventurous involving as many dirt and back roads as possible. So I charted a route down the northern half of California, dipping into the rugged and isolated “lost coast.”

Things started with a flight up to Crescent City, CA on the border with Oregon. The planes they use for flights into Crescent City are too small to hold bicycles, so we had to ship them to a hotel via UPS. Luckily, I discovered this fact before arriving at the airport for departure with bike in hand!

Even after five years in West Africa, this was the tiniest airport I have seen, with ticketing, baggage claim, and security all located in a room smaller than the guest bedroom in my house.

I had been a bit paranoid about my bike being damaged in transit since its size meant I had to remove both wheels in order to make it fit in a UPS regulation box. Luckily, the bikes arrived unscathed, and after a bit of fiddling, our bikes were set up and ready to roll in the morning.

As you can see from the bikes, the idea was to go relatively light for an 8 day tour as compared to some setups, but not entirely spartan either. We had changes of clothing and plenty of bike repair and camping gear, but didn’t bring stoves and cooking gear, so most eating was done at restaurants. The resulting lower bike weight was much appreciated during some of the bigger and longer climbs on the route.

(The sign in Crescent City says 347 miles to San Francisco, though we actually rode 467 miles with all of the detours and backroads that we took.)

Day one from Crescent City to Trinidad was supposed to be one of the easier days on the trip. A nice warm-up. I was trying to learn a lesson from last summer in not going too hard the first couple of days only to wonk out my dodgy knee early in the tour.  In reality, it ended up being pretty tough, mostly due to 11 miles of singletrack that we did that involved no small amount of hike-a-bike.

At the same time, these detours were the highlight, the main point of the trip really.  I wanted to plan a coastal route that did not feel like I was driving towards a goal or destination, but really exploring each and every day.

From the outset, I found northern California to be so beautiful as to be almost overwhelming. It felt a little like going to the Louvre in Paris where the art is so intense that you can only absorb it for half a day or so before needing some time to re-charge before coming back for more.

We finished day one with 66 miles and over 5600 feet in climbing. Except for the night of our arrival in Crescent City, we camped every other night of the trip.

Day two took us into Humboldt County, where the main industries seem to be lumber, dairy, and “herbal legend” (the name of one of the medical marijuana dispensaries we passed). Some of the small towns we passed through, like Rio Dell, seemed quite economically depressed. Yet one of the biggest and busiest shops in town appeared to be the hydroponics store. Must be all those hydroponic tomatoes they grow.

Grass Fed!

Luckily, we found a few dirt and abandoned forest roads to ride, though the amount of bear poop on them was a little disconcerting:

After a long but beautiful day, we made it to the avenue of the giants.

I had planned to overnight at a small campground in RedCrest, a town consisting of perhaps 10 houses and buildings. It seemed like a good jumping off point for our trip the next morning into Humboldt Redwoods State Park and the lost coast.  Unfortunately, the general store that appeared on Google maps had closed down a few years back, and the only restaurant in town was about to close. While we made it in a few minutes before closing time, gluten free options were non-existent. The hamburger I ate tasted OK, but it gave me the bloated and crampy stomach feeling I get from eating gluten. Had I known, I would have stocked up in hippie nirvana earlier that morning:

Luckily, the camp had a hot tub, and I hadn’t forgotten to pack my flask full of whiskey, so all was not lost.

We ended the day with almost 78 miles and 3200 feet of climbing. We knew that days three and four of the tour–when we would explore the lost coast proper–were going to be the hardest of the entire tour by far. The manager of the camp in Redcrest warned us not to deviate from established roads in the lost coast lest we be killed and disappeared by the region’s many marijuana growers. We weren’t sure how real such a threat was, but since we had no intentions of straying from the main paved and dirt roads, it seemed the biggest thing we would have to fear would be the seemingly endless hills of the lost coast.

 

“Cactus Make Tires Go Poppy”

I had a BMX friend growing up who was a non-native English speaker. Though his English was actually quite good, he would occasionally say things that crack me up to this day, including “cactus make tires go poppy.”  As I carefully positioned my bike between a saguaro and a small barrel cactus for this picture, taking care to avoid a sidewall puncture from the wall of thorns, I thought of my old friend and had another chuckle.

The picture was taken on Phoenix’s South Mountain trail system, where I was able to squeak in a three-hour ride on a recent trip to visit family. Arizona has some stunningly good mountain biking. I hope to be able to get over there a bit more in the coming years to take advantage of it.

 

S240s Make Me Tired

Especially when it takes 52 miles and 6500 feet of climbing in 90 degree weather to get to the campsite. Luckily, I had some solidarity when I got back:

 

S24O

110 miles. 10,000 feet of climbing. One night camping by myself in the Laguna mountains. Not a bad way to spend just under 24 hours!

The only bummer was getting hassled by border patrol on the way back for failing to come to a full stop at one of their checkpoints. Last time I was treated like that at a checkpoint was in Africa and in the midst of civil war. But where would I be if they weren’t protecting me from those that hate our freedom?

 

God’s Temple

Or is it Man’s playground?

 

It’s Not About the Bike

Biking is a lot more fun when you’re not limited to strict notions of what a bike can or can’t do: “road bikes for road” and “mountain bikes for dirt.” For the past couple of years, members of SoCal Rivendell Riders and Friends have hosted a variety of on-and-off road rambles, ranging from dandyesque tweed ride excursions, to semi-epic mixed-surface marathons.

Recently, it was my turn to host, and I organized a course in East Country San Diego linking up three main sections of trail and fireroad with some very scenic stretches of pavement. At 55 miles and 5100 feet of climbing, this was adventure biking at its best.

Folks did the ride on everything from a Hampsten road bike with 28mm tires and short reach caliper brakes to my Blacksheep monstercross bike shod with Nanoraptor 29er tiers. Given that the route involved substantial stretches of both pavement and dirt, just about any bike and any tire was something of a “compromise,” but the kind of compromise that adds spice and challenge to the ride.

(Map by SD Yoshi)

(Conga line up one of the first singletrack climbs)

(Some sections involved hike-a-bike, especially if you were brave enough to ride the course on 28s and with road shoes! Photo by SD Yoshi)

(David hitting one of the early steep pitches)

(The long and winding road. Photo by SD Yoshi)

(Riding through deep sand gets challenging with 35s, and claimed one victim named “Rapha.”  Photo by Protorio)

(With my Nanoraptor 29er tires, I easily had the fattest tires on the ride. I was pleased as punch with them for most of the ride. They roll surprisingly fast on pavement, even if they are a bit of a dog on steep paved climbs. Photo by Senor Mikey)

(One of my favorite bikes of the ride: Esteban’s “Klunker.” Photo by Protorio)