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10-07-07, 12:01 PM
I did the Grizzly Century yesterday with a group of friends - I was worried on the way up on Friday night because I kept running into small rain storms in the Central Valley. In the morning, my car had a bunch of frost on it - I didn't have my ice scraper with me, so I had to run the defroster for about 10 minutes before driving off. Temperature - 35 degrees.
We arrived at the school starting point at 6:30, and boy was it cold! I didn't think I had enough layers (base layer, jersey, wind vest, arm warmers), but it was too late to change that. They changed the route - it turned out that the descent to Bass Lake (a 20 mile descent that is supposed to be one of the highlights of the ride) had enough ice on it that the organizers decided not to risk it, so they turned the ride into a long out and back, extending the route a bit past the planned lunch stop.
It turned out that I had just the right amount of clothes - I was sweating all the way up the climbs, and just a bit cold on the descents. The revised route had about 9,500 feet of climbing - nothing real steep, but the climbs just went on forever. Several were longer than 10 miles. As usual, I was one of the slowest climbers - but I made up a lot of lost ground on the descents!
The real highlight of the ride had to be the scenery - spectacular views into Yosemite Valley from the south, with snow in the mountains. The 100k lunch stop had the best views (along with sushi and baklava). At the turnaround point, there was some patches of snow around that hadn't melted yet (plus a bit of slush in patches on the road) - nothing dangerous, but it was probably good that we didn't do the original route.
All in all, a great ride - I want to do it again next year, hopefully with a bit warmer weather.
JB
PS - I'll post a few pics in a bit
We arrived at the school starting point at 6:30, and boy was it cold! I didn't think I had enough layers (base layer, jersey, wind vest, arm warmers), but it was too late to change that. They changed the route - it turned out that the descent to Bass Lake (a 20 mile descent that is supposed to be one of the highlights of the ride) had enough ice on it that the organizers decided not to risk it, so they turned the ride into a long out and back, extending the route a bit past the planned lunch stop.
It turned out that I had just the right amount of clothes - I was sweating all the way up the climbs, and just a bit cold on the descents. The revised route had about 9,500 feet of climbing - nothing real steep, but the climbs just went on forever. Several were longer than 10 miles. As usual, I was one of the slowest climbers - but I made up a lot of lost ground on the descents!
The real highlight of the ride had to be the scenery - spectacular views into Yosemite Valley from the south, with snow in the mountains. The 100k lunch stop had the best views (along with sushi and baklava). At the turnaround point, there was some patches of snow around that hadn't melted yet (plus a bit of slush in patches on the road) - nothing dangerous, but it was probably good that we didn't do the original route.
All in all, a great ride - I want to do it again next year, hopefully with a bit warmer weather.
JB
PS - I'll post a few pics in a bit