Northern California - Pics from Richard's Berkeley Hills Sufferfest

First of all, kudos to all of you. It was very impressive that you could make it up Marin. (note to others - I know my limitations so I did not attempt this.)

View from the top of Marin


Side view of the very last section of Marin


Various folks near the top of Marin

You guys rock!! I am such a whimp.

You guys rock!!!

Great shots ... great job guys.

I am very impressed! Kudos to all, including Cliff for staying sane. ;)

I think Ruth's expression said it all: "that was stupendous." You guys are monsters!!! Good job.

Thanks a lot for the pics of Marin Cliff, I appreciate your photojournalism more now than I did at the time :) It's nice to have evidence of the suffering.


I'm just back from pizza @ Zachary's with Marco & Ruth. I got 42.3miles, and the 6350ft of climbing from my 305 all came in the first 36miles.

I'll post my pics and report later

lived in Berkeley a long time ago. Everyone knew about Marin. After reviewing your excellent pictures, it looks steeper than I remembered. All of you are studs for doing it. Pass along the message to the Calfee team that they need to tighten their transfer chain. Optimal is 1" deflection and torque values on the retaining bolts are 14-17Nm. I had the same problem on ours, so I called Calfee and got the numbers. Helps to use assembly paste (Tacx) too.

lived in Berkeley a long time ago. Everyone knew about Marin. After reviewing your excellent pictures, it looks steeper than I remembered. All of you are studs for doing it. Pass along the message to the Calfee team that they need to tighten their transfer chain. Optimal is 1" deflection and torque values on the retaining bolts are 14-17Nm. I had the same problem on ours, so I called Calfee and got the numbers. Helps to use assembly paste (Tacx) too.

The deflection is from the massive power differential between capt and stoker...shhh don't tell Ruth I said that :innocent:

It totally doesn't look like that on the flats. Only on >25% grades :lol: I wouldn't ride with our chain flopping around like that, it has (well had) <1" deflection before we set off.

But yes, it does seem to loosen after rides like this. I have the paste.. just sucks to pull the BBs and the cranks to apply it :(

Amazing ride all of you. It was even hot in SF, so I can only imagine how hot it was in the hills over there,

Hell, it was hot last night at 10 pm! Was it hotter today than when we did Hicks?

Was Ruth calling her friends, thinking I gotta get my head examined? "You wouldn't believe what I just did"!

Another great ride, guys! Thank you, again, to Richard for all the time and effort spent on getting us all together. There was whining, b*tching, moaning, and some cold feet in the days leading up to this ride, but in the end a good time was had by all.

The hills weren't that bad (really!) except for Marin Ave. The pics capture some of the absurdity but not all - you just gotta ride it to completely understand.

Thank goodness for heart rate monitors. I stuck to my plan to not exceed 170bpm, all day, and was in pretty good shape at the end. Now if we could've just done something about that heat! :)

How was Marin compared to Dalewood?

^^

More difficult than Dalewood - longer, steeper (I think), some sketch pavement and lots of cars.

I was there too. I rode up it, I swear.

Thank goodness for heart rate monitors. I stuck to my plan to not exceed 170bpm, all day, and was in pretty good shape at the end. Now if we could've just done something about that heat! :)

What's your MHR then? I learned that I can turn mine all the way up to 201bpm on Marin today. :twitchy:

here's a few more pics.

Marin was steep but short enough where you can get it over with. The climb that got me was #5, Claremont the least steep out of the six but the wear from the previous climbs and it really started to heat up. The short rest under the tree did wonders as I felt good on the charge to #6.

My totals for the day:

42.7 miles
5880 ft of climbing
27% max grade
46mph max down Claremont
27 minutes above 170bpm.

What's your MHR then? I learned that I can turn mine all the way up to 201bpm on Marin today. :twitchy:

My max was 186 bpm today. I've only had my HRM for 2 weeks now but I suspect today's ride this was a fair test. :p

Original thread including the internet ride and bikely route can be found here (http://www.bikeforums.net/showthread.php?t=563212)

Roll call (pic from Vollmer):

Beaker/Richard (1st pic), dl33/Donald, mellum76/Michael, ruthness/Ruth, uspspro/Marco, Bostic/Ramon, shatdow/Matt, Ygduf/Chris, chrisoco/NYChris (2nd pic) + special guest Robocheme/Cliff (not shown)







This ride was all about 1) Marin and 2) the heat. It was not about speed – in fact this might go down as the slowest average pace for a BF ride (10.7mph).We rolled from Rockridge BART at a timely 8:05, with a strong turnout

NYChris demonstrates his Marin strategy




We slotted our way through the streets of Berkeley to Marin circle, then it was game on for climb 1.



The first part of Marin was a little rougher than I remembered from my scout run, but the top was just the same. There’s nothing subtle about it. We talked about those 3 blocks on and off for the whole ride. There’s no strategy here, it slaps you in the face and you try to survive. I think almost everyone used the cross streets to allow HR to return to “high” from “extremely high”. I did have a moment on Marin – just after passing Cliff (who was stationed, just like the SF Bushman, at the side of the road waiting to surprise cyclists) I tried to tack across, misjudged the tack and ended up almost running into the back of a parked civic. After letting go of the trunk lid, I was able to walk to the curb, and ride perpendicular to the road to get clipped in and complete my punishment. A close call.


Matt reflects on what we just did



Given the warmth we elected to take a shortcut to climb #2 – South Park. Much nicer than Marin – scenic, no traffic, but deceptively steep. Cliff put in a nice effort for his first climb up South Park and then rode off into the sunset.

We rolled to the little trains, which would become our staging point for the ride. We chit-chatted with some ladies while filling our bottles – they quickly deduced that we were in fact nuts, we thanked them for their uncanny assessment and went on our way down Grizzly Peak and for our first descent of Claremont - always fun. We slotted our way round the back roads, navigated by Matt to climb 3, Centennial.

This wasn’t bad at all, I was feeling comfortable and could keep a good cadence, but the warmth of the day was already making itself felt by 10am. We stopped to down water, energy drinks and electrolytes under a tree on Golf Links Rd. After regrouping, we made the journey through Tilden past Inspiration Point, down the scenic, wooded descent of Wildcat. The descents on this ride were very welcome as they provided a nice breeze to cool us off, and also a rare opportunity to lower HR (not all of us were as disciplined about that as Michael).

A pitstop at Orinda starbucks for frapps, refilled bottles and ice was in order. We were halfway through, my legs felt good, but I was starting to wonder what the exposed parts of Lomas and Claremont would be like.

Orinda Fire Danger – Moderate: Steep-ass climb Danger – High



Climb 4 El Toyonal/Lomas was the next toughest climb after Marin, we took the Low Key route including Loma Vista which makes El Toyonal a little tougher putting a little 20% ramp in half way, and then proceeded to bake on the slopes of Lomas. I found the climb OK, I was able to just reduce my pace to a crawl, but keep the cranks turning pretty fluidly, getting my 27 on was probably a good move. At the stables, a group of women were painting landscapes by the side of the road – Marco noted that we were going so slowly they probably could have painted us as well.

Marco and Ruth join us after El Toyonal before we hit Lomas Cantadas



Back to our staging post for water and shade then a glorious ride along Grizzly Peak to Tunnel. The views today were truly spectacular, the clarity was surprising, no doubt the lack of fog on the peninsula helped.

By climb 5 (Claremont) the accumulated footage was starting to take its toll on several of us. I sensed with dread that I was getting the first twinges of cramps in my left quad/hamstring, so I pulled over close to the bottom of the climb and popped a couple of Endurolytes. Amazing – problem fixed. Several of us were glad for those today.

Well there’s no bones about it, the exposed upper surfaces of Claremont were not nice – unrelentingly hot. Once again, I found that my legs were in pretty good shape, but the heat meant that a slow/steady pace was called for to keep HR in check. We all took refuge under a tree at the corner of Grizzly Peak and Claremont for a while to regroup and drink/get out of the sun.

This says it all (thanks Donald)




Ramon and Chris looking chipper as we head off



We were almost done, it was time to take a somewhat easy spin up Grizzly Peak back to the staging post to douse our heads, drink colder water and refill for the short but steep climb up Vollmer.

I’d never ridden Vollmer until this week and the scenic payoff is significant. Uninterrupted views to the east, to the north and across the bay greet you at various points on the trail. The sting in the tail of the ride was the 25ish % grade up to the radio towers. Mercifully short, but a bugger nonetheless. So there we had it – by a relatively short mile 36, our Berkeley Hills Death Ride was in the books, a few less miles than planned due to an earlier shortcut, but every foot was climbed. All that remained was another descent down Grizzly Peak and Claremont (where I made friends with the wrong end of a bee) and back down College to BART.

A good, if hot, day at the office.



My stats

42.3miles
6358ft elevation
3h 57min ride time
10.7mph average
Time above 180bpm 70mins (I might need to redefine my LTHR of 180….)

Huh.

I had 19 minutes above 181.
45 minutes between 168 - 180
35 min between 154 - 168
28 min between 141 -153
30 min between 127-140
1:16 below 127

I guess my HR zones are pretty well on...

Impressive! I was sweating watching my kids play soccer, did a nice flat ride this morning before it got too hot! I think you all picked the hottest day of the summer to do this.

JB

Good grief! :eek: Nicely done.

Richard, thanks again for organizing this ride. I really enjoyed myself in between the bouts of agony. Good to meet everybody too.

I'm trying to decide if I every want to ride Marin again. Probably this time next year I'll have forgotten and will be stupid enough to do it again. :)

Yes, thanks for putting this together Richard. I can check off "the most difficult half and full mile of climbing in the U.S." or one of them at least. Definitely the hardest mile I ever climbed.

In certain stretches, Marin Ave required extreme force/tension/stress. It really felt like something on my bike was about to explode, whether the chain, the cassette, bottom bracket, etc. (or of course, my heart, but I didn't feel that except at the top of the harder blocks, where there were tiny respites). But nothing exploded and it was a very successful day.

In certain stretches, Marin Ave required extreme force/tension/stress. It really felt like something on my bike was about to explode, whether the chain, the cassette, bottom bracket, etc. (or of course, my heart, but I didn't feel that except at the top of the harder blocks, where there were tiny respites). But nothing exploded and it was a very successful day.

Yeah, the sounds coming from everyone's bikes was not comforting. A lot of stress required to push up 23% grade.

I found myself fantasizing about a chain break or somehow ripping my bars off the steerer. Fortunately I do not possess the strength to achieve either.

Does anyone have an elevation profile from Garmin or Polar or something?

Here you go:

Elevation profile



Route

Hey that's only 4 peaks, not 5 like the DR earlier this summer! :p

That needle tip in the last peak looks very sinister, however.

Let me decode - the first "peak" is Marin then followed by South Park. The last "peak" is Claremont, that then rolls into Grizzly peak with the final spike being the part that goes to Vollmer. I have to say I was intrigued to see the shape of that spike, it's aas though the ride was sending me a message...

WOW! What an incredible ride you put on Richard, and how ever did you manage to get the extreme temperatures to land on this ride as well? I was breaking a sweat just looking at the gradiant and photos, what a stout group of riders. Maybe when my schedule permits I'll make one of your rides in the future.

Thanks Tod, but I can't really take credit for this ride. I believe that it was originally threaded together by a guy called Tom Holub, and it's been posted online since 2001 (see original post/link) - I just made a few changes here or there to make it more convenient/easy to remember for me and with a BART start point.

You should definitely come and join a ride sometime - Primavera was a long time ago ya know!

27% max grade? Holy hell...

Ah... the only one not on this route is to go up Hiller Drive where it shoots up to the left of Tunnel. :)

20%+ grade.

I mentioned that looked like a good hill but after descending Tunnel in the heat it was not given serious thought.

I've ridden Hiller a couple of times, it's not a bad climb, but it's fairly short. There are quite a few other climbs that could augment this if one wished - Moeser, Thornhill/Thorndale, Sobrante. Maybe sometime this will end up being revisited as a BF 'Nifty TenFifty'...allegedly 10,000ft in 50miles.

27% max grade? Holy hell...

My garmin showed a max of 23. Still, it was like riding up a smooth set of stairs.

Here's my Garmin data from the pre-ride I did of Marin. The numbers always vary, even between computers, but I can definitely say that those are the steepest 3 blocks of pavement I've climbed.

^^
It's Tuesday and we're still talking about that hill. I predict that Marin Ave. will be our cycling equivalent of a "big fish" story. :)

The deflection is from the massive power differential between capt and stoker...shhh don't tell Ruth I said that :innocent:


Oh, come on. She isn't that much stronger than you.

:p