What a difference a few days makes. Both our Tuesday and Thursday-morning rides this week sported their own style of misery, with Thursday being the worst by far (37 degrees and rain on Skyline). Fast-forward to today. No leg warmers, no base layer, no long-fingered gloves. Mid-60s to mid-70s the entire ride.

It was a solo ride today, since Kevin (my son, not the pilot) was off in Disneyland with his sister. It’s not so bad to get out there on your own once in a while, ride at whatever pace you feel like, and let bits & pieces of songs from the wayback days go through your head and you push through the wind or up a steep hill. I originally thought I’d be able to ride a leisurely pace up the climbs, but it quickly became apparent that’s just not in my DNA.

The route is sometimes called the “Coastal Classic”- Woodside, Old LaHonda, Pescadero, San Gregorio, Tunitas Creek. I figured I could get it in at 4 hours total, including a quick stop at the Pescadero Bakery, and pretty much nailed it in exactly that time, thanks in no small part to trying to stay on the wheel of a guy named Tomas, who had done our Tuesday/Thursday morning ride some time ago, and was setting a pace a fair amount higher than I would have done on my own.

This ride was not the original plan. The North American Handbuilt Bicycle Show was in Sacramento this weekend, and I was really hoping to head up to it and see the cool eye-candy on display. I was hoping to take my bike on the train and get off in Fairfield and ride the rest of the way into Sacramento, but heard from our staff yesterday that they were doing trackwork and the trains wouldn’t be running all the way through. Darn! Driving was out of the question; I’ve been trying (and actually succeeding) in cutting way back on the amount of driving over the past year, and there was no way I was going to miss riding on a day this nice.

After that bacon shake at Jack In The Box last week, a coke and polish sausage seems like health food! And it sure tastes a lot better. Of course, after the bacon shake I could sleep (or was it a coma?) but today we’ve got quite a distance to cover before arriving home.

(Next section added after the ride)- Details on our ride below. The original intention was to descend West Alpine and head back up 84, but the fog was so thick on Skyline (and all points west) that I decided to get the heck out of there and did a rare descent of Page Mill instead. Not that tough a ride at exactly 100k (had to ride around the block once home to get in the required mileage), but it did include Redwood Gulch, so it could hardly be called easy.

Kevin ended up with a string of personal best times for various segments, something which is to be expected as he continues to improve, but only if he rides on ahead of me! I can match and even beat him on a relatively-shallow grade, and can still outsprint him, and if the ride’s long enough, outlast him. But not for long, unless I really step up my game. The steeper stuff? That ship has sailed. Unless I wake up some morning with a new pair of lungs.     –Mike–

Jack-In-The-Box's Bacon Shake. Seriously. And it's as bad as it sounds.

The Superbowl- do you watch it for the game, or the commercials? Unfortunately I paid too much attention to one of the Jack-In-The-Box ads, the one promoting their site “Marrythebacon.com” And so, after the day’s ride, after the Superbowl, it was off to Jack-In-The-Box for something I felt funny even asking for, because, after all, you assume that it’s a joke, that there really isn’t such a thing as a bacon-flavored shake. But there is such a thing, and trust me, you don’t want one. My first impression was that it tasted like cigarette-flavored ice cream. Oh Snap! It’s true that “riding to eat” doesn’t work; you’ll inevitably eat more than you should. But eating something like a Bacon Shake without riding would be worse!

Kevin and I did have a great ride today. Strava details below; in a nutshell, a 100k ride starting in Woodside, up Old LaHonda, south on Skyline, descent on West Alpine, over Haskins to Pescadero, Stage Road and then up Tunitas and down Kings.

5 minutes up Old LaHonda I cut Kevin loose; I really thought he was going to get a personal record but he missed it by about 15 seconds. He’s still just over 20 minutes for the climb, but he’s now riding consistently fast for the entire ride. And he’s famous; on our way through Woodside we passed a group of 4 cyclists, one of whom said “You’re the father & son team! I read you blog all the time!” So one more person who knows that Kevin’s speeding up while I’m slowing down.

As long as the grade isn’t too steep, I’m OK. Kevin’s sweet spot seems to be around 7-8%, which pretty much mirrors my weakness on climbs these days. Steeper, and I can gut it out. 3-5% and I’m sucking that fast wheel in front of me like my life depends upon it. And if it’s not too long I can even manage the 7-8% stuff, like the bumps on Stage Road. But on Tunitas, once we get to the Bridge of Death, it’s all over (and so today, climbing Tunitas, that’s where bid Kevin adieu and met him at the top, a couple minutes after he arrived).

I should know better than to ride with guys literally half (or less?) my age. But for good or bad, I feel like I have more in common with most 25 year olds than I do 55 year olds. I want to be fast, and don’t believe it’s beyond reason that I can get faster, while many 55 year olds are paying attention to AARP (American Association of Retired People) and thinking about cruises and getting senior citizen discounts at movies.

Actually, I don’t even know how old the guys I ride with are. Todd? Late 20s maybe? And Mike & Andrew? Maybe very early 20s? It’s actually a bit strange thinking I’m twice as old and then some. Besides trying to keep up with them, my main concern is to not become those older guys I rode with when I was much younger, who’d keep trying to come up with ways to put the young guys down because they had bad form or didn’t do things just right. Besides it being a way to try and make up for them (the older guys) being slow, it also had the unintended effect of backfiring on them, causing us younger guys (yes, I was young once) to really want to ride them into the ground. Which, of course, we did!

Todd, Mike & Andrew don’t try to ride me into the ground; they just let me run near 100% for as long as I can before they eventually get bored and take off. On today’s Woodside/Pescadero/Tunitas ride, our early start (7:45am) meant that it was still pretty cool out, so my breathing was pretty ragged climbing up Old LaHonda. I was OK on the moderate grades and had them waiting for me when it got steep. A pattern that repeated later in the day as it got warmer, so it’s probably not really fair blaming my 22 minute time up Old LaHonda on it being cold.

Best reason to not ride quite-so-early to the coast? Because the Pescadero Bakery doesn’t open until 10am! Fortunately, the general store/coffee shop/bar just down the street opens earlier, so I was able to buy a coke to help with the grades on Stage Road. And yes, it was beautiful out there! No clouds, hardly the slightest breeze and not much traffic.

I’d be lying to say that I was looking forward to the Tunitas Creek climb; up to that point I’d taken a few pretty short pulls at the front but didn’t feel like I had my good stuff this morning. We held together until just past the Bridge of Death (the bridge over the creek on the right, just as it starts to get steep) and then I got to watch them charge up the hill while my world was literally swaying from side to side. About 15 minutes later I caught up to Andrew (on the upper, flatter part of Tunitas) and we paced ourselves back up to Todd and Mike, who’d been soft-pedaling for a while so they didn’t finish the climb a day ahead of us.

In the end about 58 miles, just over 15mph average speed (sure seemed faster than that!), and back before noon.

Kevin pulling up to Frys Electronics in Palo Alto. It was only a matter of time before my bike found its way there.

Yuck. It was a great ride while it lasted; over a month since we’d last seen any rain, the longest stretch of dry weather I can remember. So instead of riding our Madones it was time to check out the rain bikes, which needed new brake pads, something I don’t have at home. No biggie; we rode down to the shop and got a bit of much-needed work done on them before heading back out onto the now-wet roads. Tunitas Creen was no longer in the cards, because I had to get back in time to pick up some hard drives at Frys. And that gave me the idea of using our bikes to avoid driving to Frys. Why not pick up the stuff via bike? Plenty of room in the rack bag for some hard drives and a copy of Windows 7, and why not walk through the place in cycling garb? The only thing I didn’t plan for was my inability to read product details without my reading glasses! Hate that.

After Frys we dropped in at Mike’s Bikes to check out how they’re doing things; now that we’ve got most of the remodel under our belt I feel a bit more secure visiting other dealers. Funny how that works. Graham, their manager, showed us around. Very nice guy; I should have asked if he’d be interested in attending the annual DC Bike Summit in March.

From there we rode home via The Loop, 48 degrees and raining and generally pretty comfortable… which caused us some amusement when, watching the 49er game later that day, the announcers were talking about the “miserable” conditions at the game… 52 degrees and raining. Wimps.

I like to try and find something new to see on each and every ride, even when it’s the same route I might have done many, many times. Like today’s ride, a classic Woodside/Pescadero loop with the added kicker of West Alpine thrown in for good measure. This was Brian’s birthday ride; not sure how old he is (was he 42 before so now he’s 43, or is he now 42?), but it was an all Chain Reaction cast, with Kevin, Mike, Mike (me), Andrew and, of course, Brian. What was new? On West Alpine, passing the big ranch towards the middle of the climb, there was a pair of donkeys playing around like puppies. Not sure why it seemed so surprising; maybe that’s normal for donkeys, but it wasn’t anything I’d seen before.

Winter is beginning to seem more real with each passing day; the lower temperatures (low 40s everywhere but the coast) and winds remind us that there’s more to winter than just rain. The mental quandry is due to end shortly; rain by Thursday, or so they tell us.

Today’s route took us up Old LaHonda and down the other side, then out to San Gregorio where it finally warmed up to the mid-50s. Then it was south on Stage Road to Pescadero for lunch, followed by, for Kevin & Mike, a very fast run up Haskins Grade. Smokin’ fast, as in so fast I could only watch as they rode off. So fast that Kevin now “owns” the fastest time for the Haskins Grade climb (from the Pescadero side) for his weight class (180-199) and 4th fastest for his age (24 & under). Details here. The kid is getting way too fast!

An even-bigger accomplishment than Kevin’s was scored by Karen Brems, a fairly-regular member of our Tuesday/Thursday-morning rides, who today won the Masters UCI World Cycling Championship in the 50-54 age category! Obviously, if Kevin races Cyclocross next year, we know someone who can give him some pointers.

This is what the end of the beginning looks like. That’s Kevin, my son, riding up Old LaHonda in 20 minutes, 9 seconds. I’d like to claim I hung onto his wheel for dear life but he nipped me at the line, but that wouldn’t be quite right. I lost his wheel maybe a mile up the climb, and watched helplessly as he rode away, in pursuit of someone further up the road. I arrived at the top over 2 minutes behind.

Nevertheless it was yet another beautiful day to be out on a bike. A much shorter ride than normal; just 42 miles, with a quick (too quick, as the evidence shows) run up Old LaHonda, down the other side, and back up West Alpine. I’m sure he could have dropped me on West Alpine too, but he decided to be civil.

For those interested, the 10 day forecast still shows no rain, and all Sierra passes remain open. The absurdity of a ride in the Sierras in January remains possible.

Video from our annual New Years Day ride up Mount Hamilton. The greatest hits version, just over 11 minutes, so you don’t get too bored. –Mike–