october 28 rides

From Randy Newman/ I love LA:
Hate New York City
It's cold and it's damp
And all the people dressed like monkeys
Let's leave Chicago to the Eskimos
That town's a little bit too rugged
For you and me you bad girl

Rollin' down the Imperial Highway
With a big nasty redhead at my side
Santa Ana winds blowin' hot from the north
And we as born to ride

Roll down the window put down the top
Crank up the Beach Boys baby
Don't let the music stop
We're gonna ride it till we just can't ride it no more

From the South Bay to the Valley
From the West Side to the East Side
Every body's very happy
'Cause the sun is shining all the time
Looks like another perfect day

I love L.A. (We love it)
it was cold enough to have a jacket
I went to the club ride, no else showed,so I scooted over to a shop ride. Rode with them for 15 miles. then split off , did some hills, with Santa Ana headwinds. The Santa Ana's are pretty strong winds that blow from the Desert, so it made things nice and toasty, and got a metric in without playing crash test dummy :) :) :) got to try some hammer goodies (yes, I'm becoming a hammer junkie) and it felt really good (aside from the uphill into 30 mph wind part!) Average speed was not shabby ,considering I did about 4,000 feet of climbing

DH and I went riding in San Marcos. The weather was fantastic!!!!

BRUTAL!! Wind Advisories Rode downtown to catch bus to CNC breakfast ride. Caught bus, but it was 10 minutes late causing me to be late to ride anyways!! I almost caught up with group, but fighting terrible headwinds even at 8am that wasn't going to happen. I ended up taking a short cut to breakfast and thought I'll try to finish second half MAYBE. I should have stayed in bed.
I decided to ride to Cicero which ended up being a VERY UNWISE decision. I'd hoped the north wind would give me a nice tailwind home, but unfortunately the winds changed on me, by the time I reached Cicero, the winds had changed to WNW and were steady at 20+mph and building gusts of 30+ to 40+mph!!!! I had to ride back with these as HEADWINDS and CROSSWINDS!! At more than one point, I was trying to go up slight grades and barely getting over 3mph or so. It took all I had to get back to the park and nearly 3 hours of riding to get the distance! I hurt so bad and I'd started to bonk, all I wanted to do was pull to the side, put the bike down and cry. I didn't of course, but I got to the point I was afraid that I would if I had to go much further in those brutal headwinds. My mind was in a fog and I was concerned that I'd wreck, I was glad that I was in a lower traffic area for the most part.
I made my way back finally to the MONON and a water fountain. I believe I was dehydrated as well since I'd only brought one water bottle with me today and I was concentrating hard on not getting blown over by the winds and not drinking. I sat and rested out of the winds and refilled my water bottle. While I sat, I grabbed a gu gel and washed it down with another good drink of water. I finally started back down the MONON glad that most of my trip would be out of the winds I'd hoped and a good portion downhill. My legs were rubber and my mind was trying hard to recover as well. I make my way through yet ANOTHER detour on the MONON and decide I'm going to try to finish off for a metric since I was close to it. I get my metric and fight my way to College Ave to try to catch the bus to town, my legs were pretty well spent for now and I needed a break and didn't want to take another hour or more to get to town riding.
I got downtown and stopped for a while at The Bike Line downtown resting a bit more while I visited Jimmy and the crew before making my way to my final bus home. I finished a very hard earned last metric for October.

OC Wheelman Fall Metric out of Redlands. Hardest ride I've ever done. Almost gave up on the climbing and was tempted to call the SAG wagon until I finally got behind a guy that was going the perfect (read...S L O W) pace for me. 67 miles and 4700 feet of climbing...almost all of which is in a 10 mile stretch. It was hot out and I was a human salt lick, but the descent and a long stretch through a canyon with tailwinds made it all worth it! Ready to do it again. :eek: :D

Brandy,
I almost did the OCW ride. I hadn't ridden much lately, and wanted to have a "wimp out" option.
Oak Glen, it sounds like you went up the Yucaipa side? via Hiway 38? You did some climbing(1300 feet) before you turned on Oak Glen. and Oak Glen road is pretty retlenless too! GMR is a lot easier.
Good job!:)

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Fredwina

Brandy,
I almost did the OCW ride. I hadn't ridden much lately, and wanted to have a "wimp out" option.
Oak Glen, it sounds like you went up the Yucaipa side? via Hiway 38? You did some climbing(1300 feet) before you turned on Oak Glen. and Oak Glen road is pretty retlenless too! GMR is a lot easier.
Good job!:)

---

fredwina..... i agree that gmr is a much easier climb than oak glen... no matter which side you go up.... but yes... with the OCW ride you are basically going up to some degree just about from the time you leave the park.... the elevation profile of my garmin edge shows that as well as the grade that displays on the device during the ride!

they did a time trial on the hill (apprx 5 miles... some point just past stater brothers to just before los rios).... but i haven't seen the results posted yet....

i rode with sylvia and fred a bit.... of course tom and sue FLY past! but were at the rest stop waiting for the rest of your club members that were riding!

this is one of my favorite rides... but probably cuz it was my first ever paid organized ride! the route is great.... little to no traffic (the ONLY exception being the VERY short stint on alabama right before the freeway.... but hey.... you gotta take the good with the bad.... right? everything else was traffic-free!)

the weather was absolutely PERFECT, too! not too hot.... and not too cold! i was able to start out with no leg warmers! and just my light jacket and lost that during the pre-oak glen climbs..... i put it on for the descent but didn't need it! i wish all the rides i did had such wonderful weather! lol!

the only bad thing... the apple pie was from costco instead of los rios! the nerve!!!!!

i'm sure you've heard about tom and sue's blowouts! :eek:

no , I hadn't. I usually skip the Sunday rides, so I won't see them until Thursday. There's lot harder ways to get to start of Oak Glen, too. Found that by riding with the Redlands clubs. I think i did about the equivalent amount of climbing and mileage. so I probably could have done it, but didn't want to reach too far(I do a century in a couple of weeks)