Tour of California

Where do I start?

I again joined my new friends at the San Fernando Valley Bike Club this morning, and went with the intermediate fast group this time. Much better. But definitely harder. Lets start at the end of the ride, where I am going 13 miles and hour, have nothing in my legs, nothing in my water bottles, and pretty much want to die. (Okay the ride really ends about 10 miles from our cars, so it wasn’t critic that I go fast at that point, but still...)

From the start, things we a little quicker today. About 18-20 miles an hour to the base of our first climb. Climbing with these guys definitely didn’t feel like levitation. Not when they were passing me. 1000 feet over two miles again, and I finished about in the middle. As I began to descend, I remembered from last week how bad the road was, but still somehow I managed to hit a pothole going forty miles and hour. My front tire exploded, and my bike seemed to explode beneath me. I always wondered what this would be like, and now I knew. Not fun.

The important thing to remember when your front tire explodes is not to slam on the brakes. I ever-so-gently slowed the bike down and pulled off, and then changed what seems to be my fourth or fifth tire in a week. (Different story.) By this time everyone had passed me and gone down the hill, so I proceeded to try to catch up. At the bottom I started hauling, in the upper twenties, and close to thirty a few times. I seem to be hitting that number more and more. I remember when 30 was this “magical” threshold. I ended up catching them, and we continued on – through the rolling hills of Thousand Oaks, Hidden Valley, and Westlake. There were breakaways up hills, and sprints on the flats, and everything you could ask for, including stops for water every 30 miles or so.

At the first of these stops, we pull up to a Carl’s Jr. (Like Wendy’s) We get our water, and go outside and we are all laughing because the was a girl inside with her two little kids, and one of them had a t-shirt on that read, “my mom’s hot”. And she was, but come on... So we’re laughing about that when some guy opens the door of the Carl’s with plastic bag full of pills and asks, “did someone drop this?”. Obviously it was some guys vitamins, but the significance and awkwardness of the situation was too much for us. We all died laughing and dubbed the episode “Operation Carl’s Jr.”.

Now were rolling through Hidden Valley (which is full of ranches incidentally) and Blaze and I have found ourselves up front after a small climb. All of a sudden four guys fly by, and I join them. We are pulling 28-30 through this flat area, with wind. Guy peels off, I’m up next and I go... 32...33...34...34.5... I hit the wall there and came back down, and was saved by a traffic light. But I think everyone thought I could keep going. That was nice.

We stopped for Jamba Juice at 55 or so. I got lots of questions about florida. I talk about you guys a lot. The guys here can’t understand how I got so good without any hills. In fact they can’t really understand what we do down there... Maybe one day we can educate them.

Next up was the same ride up into the Santa Monica mountains/Mullholland area, this time four of us, Blaze included. I did worse today. I think by this time I was really drained. I think difference may be sleep. Last weekend I was still wasn’t working. I also did about 75 miles total this week, riding to work and with a group Friday morning. Lesson learned.

I got dropped on the last climb again, this time a bit sooner I think. I almost got dropped earlier, but in true Zmotion fashion, I saw myself cracking and falling behind, and decided to sprint instead.

At the end, riding back into the valley, I had consumed three 24 ounce bottles of Accelerade, I bottle of water, two gels, I clif bar, and a medium Jamba Juice. And I was still dehydrated. Crazy.

I was invited to do a a double metric century next weekend, but I have to find a ticket, which may be tough. I have a funny feeling I’m going to be riding a lot here. I found another club that does race rides during the week, so I’m going to try for Tuesdays and Wednesdays with them. Plus a Friday recovery ride... Puts me back at 170, 180 per week.

Wish me luck.