I am the first one back home fresh from a nice shower so I have the honor of the first report.
Thanks Paula for initiating this beautiful ride, we were 8 BF riders and met several others at the start or along the road, notably BigBossman and his lovely family.
The temperature was on the cool side at the start but actually quite comfortable for a long ride (54 miles, 4200' of climbing). The strong headwind prevented us from establishing new personal speed records on the downhills (only 42 mph where I hit 49.5 last year) but we will have other occasions. I had ridden almost the same route in the last 3 Grizzly Peak Centuries but with the climbs in a different order. The GPC starts with McEwen followed by Alhambra Valley and then the Bears. Today we started by the Alhambra Valley making it and the following Bears a lot less tedious, they were actually nice warmups. McEwen is still its own intimidating self however I had the advantage of knowing it so I could pace myself quite nicely. Pete, as usual, flew away and left us in the dust, Ramon was not far though. But that wasn't enough for Pete... he went down to catch the rest of the crew and up again. This guy is a mountain goat.
Here are links to my Garmin map and elevation:
http://gpelpel.startlogic.com//photo...F_Ride_3_1.png
http://gpelpel.startlogic.com//photo...ation2_3_1.png