Davis to Calistoga and back

[Veronica]

There's nothing like riding north for 63 miles into a storm heading in from the north. It was cold and dreary right from the start and the cold made me sleepy. I kept thinking about my warm bed and how good it would feel. More than once I wondered what on earth was I doing out there. Still I made pretty good time to my first planned stop at mile 32, even with the climb over Cardiac. This is a two mile climb with an average grade of 6%. After my stop, I was really cold for a few miles. My legs and arms were shivering.

I didn't see any other cyclists until I was heading down Sage Canyon to Lake Hennessey, about 45 miles from my starting point. On a less dreary day, this would be a gorgeous ride. It passes two lakes, at least two creeks and more vineyards than you can shake a stick at. The harvest is over but the vines were still beautiful turning shades of yellow and orange.

I saw more riders heading south on Silverado Trail as I continued north. By the time I got to the turnaround at mile 63.6 in Calistoga, my legs were pretty fried. I had been riding into a headwind for nearly 5 hours. I had a goal of finishing this ride in under ten hours. That meant I had to get to the turnaround in under five hours, so I had been pushing pretty hard and the headwind didn't help.

Amazingly the return trip was a bit more pleasant. That is until it began to actually rain. It had sprinkled off and on throughout the morning, but this was a real rain. It rained for about an hour and stopped as I was heading up the back side of Cardiac Hill. I'm climbing along when suddenly I see... HTFU painted on the asphalt. I laughed out loud. Gee, I wonder who put that there?

I usually descend pretty fast off Cardiac, but the roads were still damp, so I was a bit more cautious. Usually I will hit a top speed in the 40s on this descent, not today only 37.4 mph.

I called Thom when I had 16 miles to go. I had been trying off and on since mile 32, but there is no cell coverage for big chunks of this ride. It made me think about getting a SPOT. Those 16 miles flew by with an average speed of 17.3 mph. Yes, that tailwind helped, but when the road turned about 7 miles from the end, it became more of a cross wind. The start/finish is about an hour from our house , so I got there before him.

I felt much better at the end of this ride than some of my recent 200Ks. I really wanted to finish this one with a sub ten hour total time and I did: 9:54.

Only 3 more 200Ks to go.


Veronica