velocity

Let me say first that there are hills in Texas. This last week I found my self nearly in the middle between Austin and San Antonio. I had gone there with the Six13 for a B-day ride with my good friend that had moved to Houston last year. I agreed to go for a ride or two while he had some time off and since Oregon was inundated with rain his State was having the best riding weather. I got a ticket for a couple and a half and the bikes box from a friend at work and fifty bucks to the airline to keep it safe and I was off. I arrived Tuesday and put the bike back together in my friends garage in Houston pack up the car with bike rack and bags making sure not to for get helmet or shoes and took off down the freeway with the satellite radio blaring and conversations about anything from armadillos to lance. Mark (my friend) is another Texan that doesn't understand that hills are hard and proves it with his climbing ability. So I ask "where we riding?" to which he hands me a topo map (see below) that shows a place called Devils Back Bone. I look at the elevation gains and they don't look so bad and I think why do they call it the devils anything? We arrive at the hotel to which we get our rooms and unpack our bikes- Mark has a gorgeous Pinarello F4:13 full carbon and a special beauty Dogma that he left at home (I am suppressed that this OCP doesn't have an Opera bike too). So we get in and go for food and make plans for the next day looking at the map of the devils backbone. It really started out heavy and then seemed to descend and I was like cool 55 miles and its maybe 25 hard and finishes fast... WRONG


Let me tell you this -I hate chip seal! And this rode course had a bunch and the Six13 handled so well but was not able to dull all the pain of that vibration. I am just glad that I didn't have the R600 on this ride. When we got to the rode known as "Purgatory" I felt relieved to get off the initial descent of Highway 306 from Gruene about 9 miles in- the cars are close in those areas and makes me nervous even though the shoulder is wide missing the road kill can be adventurous. Now "Purgatory" means somewhere between heaven and hell and that is when the hills started. The steepness of the grades made riding fun non lasting longer than 3 to 4 minutes each but there was one hill around mile 25 that was just huge and lasted a good 6 minutes to climb sometimes coming out of the seat to endure the test. This is where everything is supposed to finish fast but that was not the case cause as soon as we turned onto FM 484 the wind started up and the resistance of the down hill was great. at times pedaling down hill to try and gain speed. Around mile 40 there is a beautiful loop that the 55-mile section takes you on. The river is as green blue as it can get and is a area that most go to raft in the latter summer months. The road crosses twice over the water, which looks like there is someone up stream that is dumping coloring in the water to make it look so awesome. All in all a nice heaven to cruise around then back on 306 to Gruene and the finish of day one. I have pictures that I will post later. If you ever get a chance to go do it you will love it so much but bring steal carbon or ti cause the chip seal feels like riding across the devils back bone.
Velocity

CardiacKid

Please don't post those pictures. I grimace every time Ravenmore posts pictures of his rides. We don't really need any more people moving here.

velocity

Gotta dude its the "Ride Report" way
V

CardiacKid

I was only kidding, I'm looking forward to seeing your pictures.

velocity

Cool I am just tring to get them under 100 KBs so I can post them any one know a good way to down size them?
Velocity

velocity

Here are some of the photos I promised.
Velocity

ravenmore

Hey Velocity - I almost did that ride too! Its an ACA ride and I've been a member for a while although I haven't made it out to too many rides. This one sounded very interesting and I wanted to go but I think that was the day I'd planned to ride w/2Roadies on the 360 Cycleworks ride. Not sure but I remember there was a scheduling conflict of some sort.

Cardiac Kid - I'll try to make my pics suck more or take pics of really ugly stuff like Leslie downtown..... That'd scare anyone off!

As far as the pics - what I like to do is get a free account with some kind of image hosting site and then link to the pics. I use photobucket.com. There are others though. You upload the pics from your computer to the hosting site. Then right click on the full sized image in your online album and select "properties". It'll give you the web address of the image. You copy that. Then you paste it in your thread like this example: [img]"paste image web address here"[/img]. Once you post the images are much much larger and your not restricted as much on the size limit.

I haven't ridden much around Gruene but would love to some time. As you noted the scenery down there is pretty cool. BTW - bit of trivia. The Gruene dance hall is the oldest dance hall in Texas and a lot of big big names have played there. It was also used for a scene in the John Travolta movie "Michael". I believe its where they stop have dinner, get pie, and then get into a bar fight, yadda yadda yadda.

Chip seal, hills, and wind. God I love Texas!

velocity

Thanks Raven great trivia -Great State to ride in. I plan to go back soon I hope.
V

mellowdave

I love being from Texas.

CardiacKid

One of the funniest things I have ever seen was when I came up behind Leslie riding his bike, wearing his bikini, with his long hair flowing in the wind, with an out of towner in the car. He made some comment that would offend Koffee and almost died when he saw the beard.
For the vast majority, who don't know what we are talking about, here are some pictures of our perennial mayoral candidate.
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ravenmore

Leslie - Keeping Austin Weird.....

SSP

I love being from Texas too...especially now that my local rides include scenery like this:



Sorry, couldn't resist the jab ...for more pics of cycling around Mt. Lassen (in northern California) look here.

FWIW, I get back to Richardson about once or twice per year (sans bike) to visit my mom and brother.

CardiacKid

How did that dirt get so white?

RoadToad

Don't ride in Texas if you don't want chip seal...that's my motto!

Nice ride and pics by the way!

ravenmore

hmmm, I can't see the pic either at home or at work.....

SSP

That's odd...I can see it in my original post, and in your reply. Try hitting F5 (refresh). The pic I posted is from this web page.

Edit - hmmm....must be a forum glitch. Sometimes I can see the picture, and sometimes I can't.

ravenmore

Yep, did that. Also right clicked where the pic should be and selected "show picture" - still nothing. Weird.

velocity

That guy is wicked ugly dudes Glad I did n't run into him
V

2Rodies

Hey Rav Velocity stole your CSC jersey!!!!

Yep there are hills in and around Austin but no mountains. I do miss the mountains, and yeah chip seal SUCKS!!!

Rav in late March and early April I've got to do some sustained climbing in prep for Ft Davis, you and I should head out to Backbone if your interested.

ravenmore

Hehe - actually my CSC jersey is a bit different. I think Velocity's is from a different year.

Sure, I'm in. I need to work on my hill climbing as much as possible.

velocity

Ivan Baby! I like how the shirts give you abbs just in case you are off the diet
V

cuda2k

Bout the only want to combat chipseal roads is a good steel frame. And even then it's only delaying the beat down for a while. Hopefully one day I'll be able to work my way down towards Austin with the bike. Looks like some fun riding.

2Rodies

I would like to completely put to rest the myth that Austin is a great cycling town. It sucks. The entire town sucks. We didn't even make the list of Bicycle mags best cycling towns and for good reasons. Everyone stay away. The foods awful. The music is terrible. Austin sucks. Austin sucks.

velocity

NO its not dude it rocks! public nudity, drinking and eating. Home town of Lance and besides you got that Leslie charactor running around.
V

2Rodies

Hey you keep talkin' that way and we'll all move the Pac NW and clog up your roads