First word to describe this ride...........WOW!!!!

Jason got to Harrah's about 6am, I got there a lil before 6:30 running a lil late. Wasn't TOOO cold when we start but still cold enough for me. Got on the road about 7am, the road was cold, I was shivering a lil, I'm a puss when it comes to the cold. We get past the taco shop and the warm up for both my legs and my body begin. Most of this part was in the sun so it felt good but my legs were still hurting from lack of warming up.
We make it to the summit in pretty GOOD time, I got to the top at 8:50 with Jason a few minutes behind me.
We stop at the store for water and soda then head to the observatory for the next leg in the climb. The DH from the store was fast and fun, but COLD BURRRRRRR. The climb up to the observatory wasn't too bad, pretty short. We stop there talk for a few was leaving the parking lot and $HIT something FELL off my bike It was my REAR BRAKE PAD We're at 5550 ft up and my brakes BRAKES OMG I was getting scared $hitless. The setscrew that holds the pad to the housing came off, iduno where and when but it wasn't around. Trying to figure a way to macgyver this to get my butt to the bottom in one piece. I pulled the rubber band from the spare tube and wrapped the pad between the cuts arounds the housing. There was three cut and made sure the rubber band will not be on the braking surface.

Scared $hitless I make my decent from the observatory, trying not to go any faster then I have to and scrub off the speed in the turns w/ the front. I make it down teh first decent up the short climb back to the store and we head down the East Grade. Were I got STUNG BY ANOTHER FREAKING BEE
Pulled the stinger outa my side and continued down the S7. The decent was rough, dips, cracks, not biker friendly. The smoothest line was near the centerline so thats where I rode cutting into the turns. I'm glad there wasn't much traffic on the decent. I wanted to take of rolling picture of Laken Henshaw but that wind was blowing me around alot, I would either have to stop for my pic or risk crashing at 30+mph. So I had to skip the picture, maybe next time. We stop at Lake Henshaw for more water then head to Mesa Grande.....boy did I wish I knew before hand the pain I was about to receive. Before enter the first hairpin, Jason said somehitn glike take a deep breath now cuz it's gonna be a while. 3 turns later I wished I listened The inside hairpins are just NASTY steep WOW holy butt kicker, I was in my granny gear that I didn't even touch on Palomar and here I was suffering, grinding in pain in that gear. Coming outa one of the steep harpins, my bike was chaking as I got outa the saddle, I was moving prolly 2 mph grinding. I cleared the turn and had to stop Found out that we were one turn from the summit of the steep stuff DOH

We ride through the nice DH section and rollers w/o much of a prob then Jason knee cramped up on one of the climbs. I was getting tired, the wind was taking it's toll on my. We make it to San Ysabel for a nice break. Jason got his PIE. I passed on pie and just had a cliff bar. Getting outa San Ysabel was scary cuz there was very little shoulder on teh RV's passing sucked me out into the road a bit. And the head hind I got from teh passing cars kicked my butt. We both limped outa the last climb from San Ysabel and was HAPPY for the DH section that drops us on the 76. Not much headwinds on teh 76 so I was able to set a good pace for us. There was a small fire on the other side of Lake Henshaw. We stopped at the lake so I can catch my breath and get ready for the next pull. This pulle was FAST, mild DH slope no wind, I was moving and Jason was right there. We limped up the last climb on the 76 making it back the fork and enjoyed the 7 miles of DH from there. Mahn that felt great. We got to our cars at about 3:15
The rubber band was still on the brake pad

I got home, ate, took a nice hot bath then slept.....I hit the pillow before 5pm and woke up at 2:30am.

Great ride and great write-up Mr. MacGyver

*sigh* i need to move you guys would be the best riding buddies ever. and the weather is like paradise every day!!!

I'd say, "WOW" too. Exciting report. Crafty one, you are. I would never have thought to do that thingy with the rubber band. Glad you guys did it and finished. But my question is, are you now ready for the Pie Ride?? Pics are great.

We'd love to have ya too (well, of course, the chicks would like it more)

Wow...great report and pictures. This ride is so beyond my capabilities at this point, but I can't wait to do it when I'm stronger! Glad that your MacGyvering worked!

+1

Great job guys! Thanks for the great report and pictures... what a perfect day for that ride

Great pictures. Glad you had fun.

btw j.... what's with you and the bees?

Pie ride? What pie ride? Oh that one.... yeah, you can count me out, fer sure, yo.

Thanks for the report and pics Jeff! I was wondering about you guys...

Sounds like a fun adventure.

Dang... something like 4500' in 13 miles, and you make it sound like a rolling hill. That's a killer climb!

Sorry I missed it J. Woohoo, sounds like fun, even with the bee sting and brake pad issue.

Great write up and pics Jeff! I can't wait! The PIE RIDE coming up is gonna be good!

Thanks for the report/photos, Jeff. So, this was the "lite" version of the actual Pie Ride? Yowza.

you doing the pie ride fixer?

Yep! This will be round 2 for me...

way cool! ... somehow I managed to miss that on the other thread

beautiful pics-sorry about the mishaps. i can't wait until i whip myself into shape for rides like this. bravo sir.

I'm ready for everything but doing Mesa Grande again....OUCH that area HURT

I need to burn all my red jerseys

We were BOTH beat as we got back to the cars, it appears Jason knocked out too. I think I pushed the pace a lil hard and we were suffering on the last climb to the fork.

Actually, Palomar was kinda easy for me somehow. After getting warmed up, I got in a good rythm w/ my legs and breathing I made it up w/o feeling outa breathe. I'm happy w/ the result and the my personal record for making it up. I think the ride time from Harrah's to Summit was about 1h 40min

Not sure if this route is an option for the real Pie Ride, but either way it's a BUTT kicker. From Pie there were two climbs, everything else is either flat or mild DH slope. So pending on wind direction, it can kick you butt heading back. The winds on the 79 tore me apart. But recovered enough to pull us on the 76 at 25+ til the last climb

It was great riding with jsigone. He basically told all in his ride report, so I'll just add some side commentary.

jsigone is a good rider. He led the way 95% of the time, with me taking two token pulls. One on the short stretch of highway getting to the Lake Henshaw store, one on the downhill home stretch. (Yes, that last one lasted for about 5 miles, but 4 miles of it doesn't really count because I was simply coasting. ) He set a blistering pace up Palomar compared to his last climb. I tried my best to follow, but he climbed it a good bit faster than me even though I was putting in a personal best effort on Palomar. I definitely paid for that effort later in the day. (I don't regret it, though. It was great training, and I really appreciated having a faster rider out there with me to get me to ride faster.)

jsigone was also great company, and as a result, we spent a bit too much time at rest stops on the way out to pie. Nonetheless, we did this ride in about 8 hours, with about 5:40 ride time (for me... jsigone's was quite a bit lower).

Oh, and my new ZeroGravity brakes work great. Many thanks again to dog hair for helping me set them up just right.

Afterward, on the way home, I first went for dinner. Then napped. Then showered off and went to sleep.