I'm in Madrid again, brought a bike, and I'm riding as much as possible. I thought I'd share some pictures from today's ride. I set out on a
60 mile loop that included two climbs from past Vueltas: La Morcuera and Puerto Navacerrada. Beautiful weather, great scenery, and somewhere around 6000+ feet of climbing: it was a good day.
As I rode into the town of Miraflores, which is perched on the slopes at the bottom of Morcuera, a road race peloton passed me heading downhill. I took pictures of the group with the support cars and motos following, but the camera fritzed these.
I did Morcuera about 2 minutes faster than the last time I was here, 39 minutes and change, and with less gearing: 53/39 with a 12/23. I needed a 25, though: the 10% grade sections made me stand and I suck at standing climbing. Note that the guy I rode it with last time did it in 29 minutes, just to keep me humble.
Top of the la Morcuera climb at the fountain with a couple of Spanish guys, Mario and Augusto, I met up with; they did most of the ride with me today. Looks like this kid is going to drop a rock on our heads...
The ride down from Morcuera was absolutely stupid fun. Very narrow road, switchbacks, 40+ mph with the wind bringing tears to my eyes. That's why I climb up these damn things.
The town of Rascafria is below; it's in a green bowl surrounded by mountains. It's the site of a very ancient monastery and a great place to stop for cerveza (not today, though..we had another 3000 feet to climb up the back side of Puerto Navacerrada).
Switchbacks and more switchbacks, 16k of em, to be precise.
The climb tops off and then the road winds its' way along the side of the mountain for 8k to Puerto Navacerrada proper.
It's in sight, across the dropoff! (Yes, I smudged the camera..)
Top of Navacerrada; you can see the flatlands of Segovia waaay in the background.
The descent down from Puerto Navacerrada is 10k of the fastest sustained speed I've ever done on a bicycle. I passed two cars going down at 50+, trying to keep up with Augusto, who knows the descent very well.
One more of my ride companions: they live near here in Becerril de la Sierra; that's the reservoir and we're atop the dam. Mario invited me to his house and we sat on the patio and drank a beer. Super nice guys.
After the beer, I rode on; it was a mercifully fairly flat stretch to Manzanares el Real and then to Soto del Real. Here's the castle at Manzanares:
Came back to Madrid and wolfed down a Doner Kebab from my favorite hole in the wall restaurant nearby. I have no idea how many calories I burned today but it was a ton.