Day One and Day Two

Today is the second day of our adventure and what a wonderful time it’s been so far. We found out that Evelyn is the youngest cyclist this year! Go Evelyn! Many cyclists decided they wanted to race through the event, not us! When we started yesterday, we were the last ones to leave (busy taking pictures of the moment) but not the last ones to arrive. Close, but not the last. It was clear and sunny in San Francisco. It was the most beautiful day. There was not a cloud in the sky and the view of the Golden Gate Bridge was spectacular. We rode 85 miles to Santa Cruz and arrived at 5pm. (The first cyclist arrived at 1:30!) We saw over 100 people at a parasailing event and stopped at every vista point to take pictures. Christiana taught us a lot about not taking life for granted so we’re taking the time to enjoy God’s beauty. After we arrived at our destination, we pitched our tents, showered, ate a wonderful prepared meal and then went right to bed!

Today, we detoured a bit here and there to get a better view of the sites. In fact, we rode with 15 others and detoured an extra 15 miles. Our Daily Route Guide had us riding 52 miles to Pacific Grove (near Monterey) but we rode 65 miles. We had a snack at a nice place called The Farm in Aptos. We rode through a strawberry farm and it smelled so good. We had lunch at a place called Phil’s in Moss Landing. Good seafood! We ate dinner at Bubba Gump. The portions were really small so we went searching for Ghirardelli to have some icecream. Unfortunately everything closed by 8pm so we searched high and low for a Baskin Robbins. Found it! Can’t help but think about food after such a long day of biking. When we went back to the campground, the sprinklers came on soaking all our tents. So much adventure!

Counting down the days...

So we have 5 days until the big ride begins. This week will officially be the best week of training ever. We're supposed to be going at an easy pace for no more than 1 hour (basically only 10-11 miles). I've been feeling pretty tired lately on the bike, so hopefully I'll be rested enough before Saturday.

Here's the layout of miles and climbs per day:
Saturday - 82.9 mi and 4,270 ft of climbing
Sunday - 52.6 mi and 1,770 ft
Monday - 38.0 mi and 2,220 ft
Tuesday - 64 mi and 4,530 ft
Wednesday - 55.6 mi and 1,270 ft
Thursday - 63.8 mi and 2,400 ft
Friday - 86.5 mi and 2,410 ft
Saturday - 63.3 mi and 1,430 ft

As you can see, days 1 and 4 are the hardest (day 7 seems pretty tough too). When I say they're tough, I'm speaking relatively because obviously all of the days will be hard. Like one of the doctors who are riding with us says, take it one rest stop at a time (hahha).

Oh! We got our jerseys in the mail... here they are!
The first is the front; the second is the back.

Tour de Tahoe video

Here's a video I put together for the Tour de Tahoe.

So. The Tahoe ride.

We rode 72 miles around Lake Tahoe on Sunday. Needless to say, I was nervous. Weather.com said that in the morning when our ride started it would be a little over 40 degrees (wow). We started the morning off with arm warmers, leg warmers, a jacket and full-fingered gloves. By the first stop (after 13 miles and one of the big climbs) we were ready to strip it all off.

The first 10 miles were flat, and we were probably averaging 17 mph. Hardcore racer people still passed us, and they would comment on the little SpongeBob attached to my bike bag or on the AMGEN jacket I was wearing. Then the climb started, and it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. It zigzagged up, and it was funny to see so many bikers going so slow. At one point a truck went by and there was a guy drafting the truck flying up the hill. Some ambulances passed us about 10 miles in because a lady broke her arm. Mel went into the sag wagon before the first hill because of her back, and we passed her on the way up the hill. At the first rest stop, there were a lot of people. We stayed there for awhile (that's probably how we got to the back of the pack) to relax, get some food, take off our extra clothes, and take pictures.

When we finally got going again, it was about 10 more miles before the next rest stop. It was fairly flat. At the next stop, I saw a little girl (probably 12 or so) who was doing the ride too. That amazed me. She had her little biking gear and muscular legs like she'd been riding for awhile. At that rest stop they had potatoes. Oh. At mile 16 I got stung by a bee. We were going downhill and a bee (wasp?) nearly flew into my mouth. For a split second it was stuck to my mouth until I spit/blew it off. Then, sting! and it was gone. I kept spitting because I felt some remnant in my mouth (a leg or something, gross, I know). And it stung. I've never gotten stung before, so I bit my lip to keep it from stinging and swelling. A couple minutes later when my dad and I pulled over, it was swollen. Mel gave me some medicine at the rest stop (I forget that they're doctors) and it was just sore for the rest of the day.

We kept going. Lunch was at 42 miles. It was a beach, and that's where we started to see the pattern of people leaving when we barely got to the rest stop. We had turkey sandwiches, peanut butter with bananas, powerbars, brownies, etc. It was pretty comforting that we were more than halfway done, except for the fact that there was a 7-mile climb looming ahead.

That climb took FOREVER. It wasn't steep, but it was annoying to be gradually climbing for so long. You'd wind around the corner and still be going uphill. On one of the stops during the hill, we met this group of ladies who made their own jerseys for this ride. They were so sweet! They kept taking a ton of pictures and laughing... since Papi had the same camera, he took pictures of them. They loved it. Then we saw them at every stop after that and we all yayed each other for finishing the next leg of it.

After the loooong climb we got to go downhill for 7 miles and then had rolling hills for the remaining 5 miles. The rolling hills were even hard. Finally we got to the end. (There was even an uphill to the finish line. That was cruel of them.)

THEN we had a pasta buffet. It was awesome. By that time most of the riders had made their rounds through the party because we were probably within the last 50 people. Once we ate, we were stuffed. So we went to the hotel room, watched TV and fell asleep. I was tempted when my dad suggested using a "Buy one get one free" Coldstone coupon, but once I was in bed, I couldn't get up.

It was hard. It was beautiful, but it was hard. I feel a little better about our ability for the CCC.

The Last Two Weeks of August: Just the stats, sort of

I haven't blogged in a while and I have no excuse. Well, except that I lost some of my stats and had to get some data from Jerry to fill in my table for August 18th. Unfortunately that means I don't have my ride time, MPH stats, or max grade for the Pescadaro ride. I recalled the average grade but that was about it! I had two firsts with this ride- first time I made it to the top of Old La Honda and first time riding four days in a row (Aug 15-18). I was supposed to ride the next day with Joyce but I bailed on her after the big Pescadaro ride.

I rode the Pescadaro ride without Joyce because she was on call. We started at Canada Road at 92. Towards the end of Canada I found myself riding by myself. I could see a few riders far off but none of the others. I didn't notice that many had stopped at the bakery on Woodside so I pushed on without a break. As I kept going I thought it was odd that nobody was passing me (which is my usual M.O.). Turns out most people had stopped at the bakery and were waiting for me! Finally, they decided I must have gone on ahead so they took off again. I was suffering through Old La Honda with my music and my thoughts. Taking my time, stopping about every mile. Suddenly I saw some of the CCC green jerseys coming up the hill. I was about 2/3 up when everyone had passed me. That's more like it :) Of course Jerry stayed with me to the top and I was greeted by the rest of the group with lots of congratulations. It is so great to ride with such a supportive group, don't know how I would have made it through the training without them. Also, thank goodness for Weldon who had parked his van in Pescadaro the night before so I didn't have to try and do the whole ride, which is 62 miles with 5200 feet of climbing. Here is a map showing the route, I did the red line (up Old La Honda not Woodside):

Here is a table of my rides for the last two weeks of August.

The training took a hit during the last week because I was on service and busy with my clinical responsibilities. I wanted to try to get out at least once midweek but I was working until after dark each day. Joyce and I had left Pinkie and Tumbles in our office in case we could get away but it didn't happen until Saturday August 25. I think we worked out at the gym one day but can't recall which day.

That Sunday, August 26, we conquered Old La Honda together and we were celebrating our accomplishments. Well, we were celebrating until it turns out Old La Honda had conquered me! I woke up August 27 with a bad back spasm. I have had these before over the years and a couple mild ones since training. However, this one was pretty bad. I decided to get a sports massage that afternoon, which seemed like a good idea, but it turned out to be BAD. I had a 75 minute massage focusing on all the spasm that had taken over my back such that I couldn't stand up straight. It was one of the most painful massages I have ever had but when I got up I could stand up straight and felt less pain. I then had dinner with my friend Jessie who was in town for a few days and when I got up from the booth after dinner I had severe spasm and could hardly move due to the pain! I had to head home and take a muscle relaxant (flexeril) and ibuprofen. I spent the next day in bed essentially in a flexeril coma. When I still had significant pain the next morning I had a novel idea - maybe I should go to my doctor! :)

I knew something wasn't quite right when I couldn't lift my right leg off of the examining table without excruciating pain. For those people not in the medical field, that is not a good sign. So, an MRI was ordered, I got referred to a Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation specialist, increased my ibuprofen from 600 mg to 800 mg, and used some heat and rest. Over the week my back improved but never got back to normal. The MRI was done August 30 but I had to wait until September 4th to know the results. In the meantime, we had a big ride scheduled with Jerry for September 1st so Joyce and I decided to do a slow and relatively easy ride Friday August 31st to see if I would even attempt the ride Saturday (Crissy Field, Marin Headlands, Tiburon). The 8/31 ride went ok so we decided to go for it the next day. Of course, that is for another blog since this entry is about August. Can you stand the suspense?

Many new victories...some defeats....

Hey, there's a new video feature to blogger! I'm going to test it out by putting on this little clip of Mel climbing up to the summit of Devil's Slide during our Half Moon Bay bike ride on August 11...

(Good thing the video is so small that you can't really see which finger she is pointing at me!)

Well, we've been busy in the last 3 weeks. I was on service after our Half Moon Bay ride, and Mel was able to go on a Jerry training ride when I was busy working. She successfully climbed up Old La Honda! Then, they went on to ride half of the Pescadero loop that I had done a while back. After I was done on service, then it was Mel's turn on service, so we didn't get out much during that time.

Finally, we were able to get out on August 26, 2007 to really get a great ride in. I wanted to try Old La Honda again since I was green with envy that Mel had reached that milestone without me. We set out from campus, out to Alpine and Portola, which was a good warmup to Old La Honda. Finally, we started climbing. We did stop a few times, took a break, talked on the phone, had some Gu, and slowly but surely, we were inching our way to the top...close to the summit, this is what we saw...
Somebody on Old La Honda has a sense of humor! By car or by bike, Old La Honda is a steep, windy, treacherous road. My favorite part of the ride was seeing a biker dad climb up Old La Honda with his toddler in a bicycle side-carrier, much like a sidecar. Of course, they were able to pass me and Mel (actually twice passing us...once going uphill and once going downhill). Little kids are faster than us!

But, 45 minutes of riding time later (not counting all the stops we had made along the way), we reached the top...a great feeling! We reached Skyline and proceeded on another new route that we had never tried before. Here's Mel in some inspirational-looking biking photos on Skyline...

It was really gorgeous- - a quiet, forested area with little traffic, just lots of trees, the way it should be.

Unfortunately, the victory of climbing up Old La Honda was soon marred by a severe back spasm in Mel that required a variety of prescription drugs, a hobble to her internist and a trip to the MRI scanner. Fortunately, her back muscles did eventually calm down with just some residual twitches and soreness. Good thing, because yesterday, September 1, we had a big ride with Jerry and the gang...
I've posted this map of Marin county before, but this time, not only did we ride around Richardson Bay, Sausalito, Tiburon and (my favorite) Paradise Cove, we also conquered the Marin Headlands! It started off really steep, which really sapped all my climbing confidence, but did eventually get a bit easier. You know it's steep when runners pass us cyclists struggling up the incline. The day was sunnier and clearer than our first time up to Marin, so we were able to see a lot more. Here's the view from the top of the Marin Headlands; you can see the fog shrouded Golden Gate.

The descent from the Headlands was the scariest downhill ride I've ever taken! It was steep and so twisty! One bad turn and off the cliff you go...

After the climbing, we were able to relax and enjoy Marin...we rode through tourist and cyclist packed Sausalito, which was having an art festival that day, so it was even more crowded than usual. We were rounding Richardson Bay, with great views of the water and Angel Island, when I met for the second time, my Right Turn of Shame. The first time I did this turn, I could not turn sharply enough and fell into the hedge bordering the turn. This time, I felt ready--I had the energy surge of finishing the Marin Headlands, it was a gorgeous day, and I hadn't fallen for quite some time now, so I was in really good mental shape. However, as I got closer I did a little wimp-out. I will blame Mel, who was in front of me, for turning too slowly, forcing me to lose momentum, and scrape the wooden rail with my arm, necessitating me to stop and walk the bike through the turn. Yet again, I was defeated by the Right Turn of Shame! At least I didn't fall over into the surrounding hedge, but I do have a little road rash on my arm as a reminder. Next time...I will make it!!

After lunch at Shark's Deli, we rode on my all-time favorite route around Paradise Cove. It was breath-taking...blue green water dotted with lots of sailboats, the view of the Bay and the city beyond. So beautiful! After the eye-candy, my legs, however, started to poop out. My climbing legs were gone, and I was left with legs of jelly. We had two more momentous climbs ahead of us, and I was really worried about my jelly-legs, as well as Mel's back, which was acting up again. Fortunately, Chapman Ave was not as bad as we feared and had remembered (are we making progress somehow??), and then I lost Mel altogether going down from Chapman back to Sausalito! She was swept up, bad back and all, with the faster group of riders! I hung back with the not-as-fast group, barely keeping up with them, back through Sausalito. By early afternoon, it was packed with cars and we actually had to weave around some of them to get through the streets! Mayhem indeed! Well, the last climb was tough, but by then I think I was numb to the pain. We climbed back up to the Golden Gate bridge through Fort Baker, then had to fight the tourist surge crossing the bridge (hazardous!). It was a gorgeous day...really sunny, clear for the most part except for a stubborn cloud on part of the Golden Gate, and just perfect for biking. See?

Today, both Mel and I are tired and sore. We were supposed to go out riding this afternoon, but my achey legs protested, so I am blogging instead. Tomorrow, we will get out for a long ride...I can't believe it is September already! Next week, we have our Tour de Tahoe ride!! Then in 4 weeks starts the CCC! This is it--the last month of training!!!