eugenek

2012 worker ride https://app.strava.com/rides/7537355

The 2011 link has a small two-block detour in Beaumont, this one doesn't, other than that, as far as I can tell, they are the same.

ericm979

I'll be there. Wearing green Webcor kit, on a black Cervelo.

triplebutted

Anyone leaving from anywhere near Irvine? I'd love to carpool if you have extra bike racks. I'm good with jokes, I can fix bikes, and I can get a few Sausage Egg McMuffins for the ride.

jmX

My back pain has dulled to a tylenol level so I'll be out there for sure now, probably in a Death Valley Velo shirt.

The weather forecast sure makes it seem like it'll be perfect.

cdp8

I will be there on my Seven. Haven't decided on a jersey yet.

You guys deciding on your outfits days before a big event remind me of my wife!

Any updated info on Oak Glen? I debated taking my SPD's off of my MTB and putting them on my seven because the cleats are recessed and the shoes have tread. But I've never ridden a century in those shoes and pedals and it seems a little ridiculous to do that for .9 mile of dirt.

jmX, have you considered swapping to a higher rise stem to make life a little easier on your back?

calamarichris

You're a lucky man, for falling in love with a woman who's decisive, prepared and considerate. Nothing worse than a namby-pamby person who can't make up his mind.

Haha--just kidding. I did it so we'll all be able to recognize one another. It's kinda awkward to walk up to some stranger in tight black shorts and say, "Are you on bikeforums.net?"
"No... what are you talking about, weirdo?"
"Well, heh heh, see there's this internet forum, uh, and we all crack jokes and put each other down on it and uh...heh heh"

cdp8

I'll either be in the Seven jersey my wife just gave me as a present or a Red Wings jersey (despite their 1st round loss). Wait.. namby pamaby.. hey I resemble that remark!

I know what you mean about internet forum friends. I post regularly on another forum and my wife calls them my fake friends.

melgarpoe

OK, well you'll be able to recognize me as the guy dropping the rest of you on the sprint to the front of the food line at the rest stops. On the climbs and the descents, on the other hand, I'll be the one that Phil and Paul call the Lantern Rouge.

As far as what jersey I'll be wearing, I hadn't really considered that too much. I'll have to see what's cleanest! My bike will be a Black/White/Aqua Trek. I'll be the one cursing at my bike, "Damn you, why don't you have an 11-34 cassette!?!?"

ericm979

It's not like I have to decide- Webcor sponsors the club I race with so their logo is the main one on the team kit.

The weather looks warm and dry so I'd expect the Jackrabbit trail puddle to be dry. Hopefully the oak glen section won't get watered.

jmX

Just got the Friday email. We get socks?!! AWWWWW YEAH.

I like the b/w color scheme of the jersey this year. Still a shame about that font.

cdp8, I raised my bars this morning in fact. Great minds...

Alex & Deya

Eric, we are going this year, and we'll be riding our singles this time. See you all on Saturday

calamarichris

Erm... do you mean single-speed fixed gears, or non-tandem?

fishymamba

Well I am all packed up and ready for tomorrow! Ate a lot of pasta to fuel up! I should get to sleep now, have to wake up at 3AM.

bored117 

Finally finished packing up. Now... bringing in SPD shoes and pedal just in case. Hopefully will know road condition better today morning

jmX

Nice seeing bored117/triplebutted/eugene/chris out there today.

I think I agree with Chris, there's no way this thing is the "Hardest Century in Southern California". I think I could do 4-6% grades all day long, its the double digit stuff that kills me, and I didn't see much of that. It's certainly a tough one, but it does seem like Mt Laguna would be worse.

Back pain really kicked in at mile 20, and the advil I took seemed to have no effect. At mi 55 I took some tylenol, and after that it was so much better and I finally started enjoying the ride. Until that point I felt like I just doing the ride to get it outta the way as if it was a chore. According to my calcs, I finished with a time of 6:15. I'd hoped for a 5:59 or better, but it wasnt gonna happen today.

PS, this event was my first non-Death valley event and I have to say that I've been totally spoiled by them. The roads in death valley are so much smoother, the traffic is way less, there are actual shoulders on the road throughout the whole park, the crowds are less, and the scenery is nicer. The Breathless Agony ride has fantastic organization and I was certainly impressed, but the roads were pretty rough and there were many miles of basically shoulderless roads with blind corners. Im sure we pissed off a TON of drivers today.

bored117 

Nice seeing triplebutted/jmX/chris/Lesper4 today.

Had wonderful start today... Woke up a little later than hoped for but I live close enough. I took the road cyclist will be taking to get to Alessandro on reverse to get to Sylvan Park from home (about same as taking freeway for me... and good chance to know if there is any anomaly. Other than fogs starting up... not much I noticed). Weather broke up nice. Jack rabbit was completely dry! So was Oak Glen.
Took it easy keeping it at low end of zone2... until... I saw Chris. Well, the plan got thrown away and I started going with him which was more in upper zone2 and lower zone3 range through Oak Glen. As I was coming down, Chris zoomed by... (I am slow at descent... not used to it with curve yet ). Met Chris & Lesper4 at ranger station...
Damnation alley was quite warm and... I don't know... I just was in rythm... Think I was doing about 190W avg through out the whole thing without much fluctuation. Angelus Oak stop was good... but no bacon for me... (punishment for being slow I presume). Feeling pretty good, I really wanted to crack the 7 hour mark. However, after hitting a big (pothole?... can you call entire length of road that just acts like big pot hole a pot hole?)... my right shifter (ultegra DI2) just won't operate while left one would. Sat there panicking, reseting,... etc... Finally a logic gotten into my brain and 20 minutes later I am back on road but a little upset. (Cable on shifter end was loose... I had to dig it out of hood cover/bar tape which wasn't the funnest thing to do on road side) Basically the 7 hour idea just disappeared at that point.
Got to Onyx Summit about 7hours and 20-30 minute (I don't remember exactly) range.. actual ride time was 6:37:36 to there...
Unlike MC, I was more at ease, enjoyed the ride a little more as I rode all sections of road in different occasions already once, and had a lot of food. Each stop, I had half PB&J at least, half banana, and something I felt like... In fact, I measured my weight when I got back home and gained 1 lbs from today morning...

jmx... I think the drivers are used to it. Every weekend, there are plenty of riders on the road on there The only bad thing I noticed was... even when there are cars behind, people will be going in double line or even triple line! I yelled "Car back" quite a few times but eventually gave up on those crowds...

eugenek

Made a bunch of mistakes and ended up doing only 3 passes.

Mistake 1: decided to stay home overnight. Didn't get much sleep, and only got to the starting line at 6:15. With my speed, I really needed to take off at 6 or even earlier.

Mistake 2: shut off the brain too early in the ride and followed the riders in front of me. The whole group (~10 people) ended up missing the turn on Highland and chugging uphill in the wrong direction for two miles. Most of us turned around, but two people from the group decided to keep going. I wonder what happened to them. All in all, lost 25 minutes on that detour. As I was approaching Highland, met two other very serious-looking groups happily racing up the same wrong street.

Mistake 3: was too stressed out so I think I went a bit too hard on the flat section. I even tried to chase Chris's pack. Didn't catch up but managed to get my heart rate up to 176. Bad idea.

In the end, I got to Angelus Oaks just as they were announcing that the top was closed, and I was too drained to keep going up anyway. 6:45 to do three passes. 6:20 excluding the wrong-way section.

melgarpoe

OK, well now I know, sort of. Doubles are harder for longer than Breathless is, but Breathless is still pretty tough. My lack of climbing this year was a definite impediment today, but I rode easily and kept my heart rate down to reasonable numbers and pretty much decided to stay out of my red zone until we were on the descent, heading back to Sylvan Park.

Also, although Breathless is by no means easy, it also was not nearly as hard as the Death Ride was, at least for me. Of course I rode the Death Ride with several folks who are stronger climbers than I am and I made an effort to stay with them which thoroughly kicked my butt.

calamarichris

Big fun!
This has been my favorite ride this year. It was so green & lovely. Oak Glen was a LOT easier than I was expecting, and I enjoyed riding up Damnation even more than I anticipated. In fact I enjoyed the ride up to Onyx even more than the descent. No foolin'! I'm used to walking away from everyone on technical descents (I may climb like a stone, but there is a happy advantage to that), but anyone can fly down that mountain without touching the brakes, and too many riders were hitching their wagons to my star for my liking. I'd motorcycled up that way dozens of times, and ridden up to the San Gorgonio trailhead a few times, but this was my first time up there on my bicycle.

I inhaled 7 of those darn flying bugs on the way up and one more on the way down the mountain. They looked like gall wasps to me, but I suppose they could have been emerging queen ants like we had swarming on Mount Laguna the Saturday before last.

It's a matter of taste, but I liked the scenery today even better than Death Valley. I really enjoyed seeing the BF crew, but my favorite part was flying up Damnation Alley--so beautiful and that kind of sustained moderate grade really suits me a lot better than the disruptive, alternating steep/false-flat/rolling climbs like Mount Laguna and l'Etape. Once I got the big locomotive revving right, I was flying past everything up Damnation--gave me a taste of last year.
Sole downside today was desending from Live Oak to Moreno Valley, we had a great paceline forming and everyone was cooperating, and I was taking my turn at the front when we hit a sudden red light. No cars, but there was some old, chubby pr1ck on a Trek standing there with a camera (some wannabe rentacop?) who pushed the pedestrian button, and we were stuck there for nearly two minutes while he was aiming his camera at us, waiting for someone to run the red light. A few guys rode up and prepared to roll through, but I stopped them with, "Pri1ck with camera at 9:00." There were no cars at all, just this old j3rk lifting up his camera every time someone looked like they were going to roll through.
The rest of the day was just gravy, and I was happy to see jmX doing better and relieved that his back trouble is probably just muscular.
At the end, my Sweetheart gave me a massage on a blanket at that beautiful park, and we went for a swank dinner and shared a first-rate bottle of zin and tipped the street musician too much. A day like this makes you fall in love with the World all over again.
I'm sorry for your troubles today Eugene, but I hope you take away at least a few fond memories. Lauretta and I were looking for you at the park, but I'm glad at least you made it home safe on Drinko de Mayo. Next year will be better, and I can't wait.
Oh yeah, and the dirt road through Oak Glen wasn't bad at all--much less unpleasant than I was expecting too.

Lesper4

Great ride once again. I saw Bored (Jin) and Calamacichas (Chris) and Rick at rest stop #2. I took off and got to rest stop #4, they never passed me but then again I never saw them stop, I waited and then left. Made it to the top and looked around again,you guys must have sneaked passed me at Angelous Oaks and then passed me going down while I had my down on the last climb? I think I shaved 30 mins off my time from last year! Anyone see the big snake coiled up towards the bottom of Oak Glen? Or the big Bee swarm at the bottom of 38? I heard one lady got it (cut-off) by a car on Oak Glen and a guy got hit by a trailer climbing Onyx. This is the year we can say we road BA, the day of recokening, with Oak Glen all tore up which wasnt really that bad and then the plague through Barton Flats all those black fly bugs, super annoying!!
https://app.strava.com/rides/7974668

edit:
I think my time to the top was a 8:05 or something. Mentone was a B*****with that head wind at the end! I seemed to ride solo most of the day except for 2 of us through Moreno Valley. I pulled a few people up to Angelous Oaks but no big deal it was my pace anyway, nothing lost.

calamarichris

Sorry we missed you at the top Lesper. Maybe we passed each other when I was on the way back down? On my way down, I was shouting out the distances to the summit to the climbers.
And sorry if I seemed a little curt at the rest stop. I was pretty eager to get to Damnation, and I always spend too much time in rest stops.
Good work on the improvement over last year. This was my first reconnoitering mission, and I'm looking forward to nailing this one next year. I always imagined the climb up to Onyx too narrow for comfortable cycling, but I'll definitely be making the run up there a few times before next year's BA.
Believe I finished 6:18ish--just a few minutes slower than jmX. (Thanks old redlight vigilante. )
I also drank way too much. (Water this time, haha.) Despite sweating profusely, I peed (clear!) 3 times on the climb up.

fishymamba

I was slow and in pain most of the time, but I finished! I had not done any riding for two weeks, so I was not prepared for the ride.
Those last 4 miles to the top took forever. Hopefully I will do better next year.

Not sure about what time I got, I was too tired to pay attention to what the check in person said.


The Strava app on my phone crashed and the whole ride got deleted. Got the gps file from one of the guys I was riding with so I could get the strava credit!

eugenek

I stayed in the park long enough to eat lunch and lie on the grass, but I didn't see anyone I recognized. There weren't many people around, I think you were all still on the mountain. I got to the park at 2:15 and left maybe half an hour later.

idoru2005

Hmm.. I should find someone with a MLBC gpx file so I can get Strava credit for my ride as well. I use iPhone for Strava. And it wasn't working out in Eastern SD county.

jmX

You know, speaking of running redlights, I was pretty annoyed with cyclists during the event. The organizer very clearly implored people to please stop at the red at the bottom of the first big descent (onto Bryant). When I did so (well, I slowed to as slow as possible without unclipping), probably 15 people blew past me and ran the right on red, a couple buzzing me way too close for comfort. It's a RED LIGHT people, at least california roll it at 3-4mph if you can't be bothered to stop. It's not like these people were doing it in <5 hours.

Eugene, I saw tons of people going the wrong way right where you described. I had to convince the people that were following me that I knew where I was going and everybody else was wrong. I showed them the route sheet and reluctantly they turned...meanwhile we watched 20+ people pedaling off down the wrong way. "Route Sheet Anxiety" is what I said to you that morning at my car....it's real! The Edge 800 with the course preloaded on it helped out my anxiety a bit. Anyway I was up at Onyx peak for an hour or so chillin' and talking (and eating kettle chips), so I didn't make it back to the park until 3:30 or so.

Fishymamba/Idoru, sounds like it's time to start saving for a garmin. You'll get less elevation credit (the strava app seems optimistic), but it won't crash or run out of batteries.