TOC Stage 3

Took today off to go watch stage 3 of the Tour of California and what an experience. Though it was relatively short lived given the speed at which these guys ride, it was drawn out because the riders were so spread out (or "splintered badly" as the CHP put it on his loudspeaker as he drove by ahead of the front two riders). Well worth the pain for myself in climbing Sierra Rd to watch it all transpire.

I got to the staging point with my coworkers on Landess at 680 at the Target there around 12:10 PM. I was the impression we had said 12 to 12:15 leaving time (depending on when everyone was there) and so although I left later than planned because I was watching the tour online I didn't think I was "late". Apparently they were waiting for me and had expected to leave no later than noon so not sure what happened; I will check the email when I get back to the office tomorrow to see what time we actually said. I was ready to go in less than 5 minutes and although they all left ahead of me by about a minute, I still caught up to them at Sierra Rd traffic light...let the fun (pain) begin.

It's about 5 km to the top (around 3.6 miles or so on my odometer) thought as usual for the first climb, I kept wishing and hoping that the top was right around each and every next turn :(. About halfway up my lungs were dying and my throat wasn't much better, but I knew I had the strength to make it. I was being passed by riders constantly (keep in mind these are not the pros that are passing me ;)), but I rarely let that get to me seeing as it happens all the time. I passed my share of people at the bottom, but not sure I can count those.


As I neared the top one of my coworkers had turned around and said you're almost there (the plan was to reach the top, turn around, and stop about 200 meters or so below the top to catch the riders as they went by, without having hundreds of people around)! He was right as it was only about 100 meters or so to go (I'm using meters because a sign not far behind me at the time had said 200 meters to KOM). There were so many people the top that I was having to go really slow to weed my way through them to officially (for myself) make it to the top (part of the race is the KOM or King of the Mountain, but for me I felt like the POM or Pawn on the Mountain).

Turned around to go down a bit and find my group. We stuck around and watch each and every rider go by (often times one at a time ;)). There were a couple of small groups of 5 to 10 and the peloton went by as well, but clearly riders had been separated from it as it was much smaller than in the first two stages. Got to see Leipheimer and Gesink go by neck and neck(that would be them in the picture).

We made it back down to the bottom just in time to see Paolo go by and the pack not too far behind.

What a day...

Is he smiling? Cool!

Here comes the pack!

I think that's Hincapie on the right (I'm new to the sport so still coming up to speed on who's who)...look at his knee, did he have a bit of an accident? Ouch!

The remainder of the pictures I took can be found in my public Picasa album.

Tour of California!

It has begun! The Tour of California began this weekend on Sunday with the Prologue in Palo Alto. A short 2.1 mile course, these riders are moving fast!! Unfortunately with my bike spoke broken, it is at the shop still, but a coworker had an extra wheel that I could use and fortunately it worked just fine (despite being a 9 speed cassette instead of the 10 speed on my wheel).

Nahoko and I rode up to Palo Alto around noon to watch the riders race through downtown University Ave and into the Stanford campus. It was very exciting, not to mention a great day for riding (though a tiny bit chilly) for the what looked like thousands of cyclists in town for the race.

The sore point of the day for me was as we were just passing the Sunnyvale Caltrain station, the rear tire blew! Now, when I say blew, I don't mean, "pop" I mean, "BLEW"! First there was a little smoke that Nahoko saw, I heared this strange sound like something was stuck in the tire, but then all of the sudden, "BAM"! Sounded like a gun going off. Needless to say the tube was unpatchable with a 3 inch tear in it (not sure what happened, but now I owe my coworker a new tube). Fortunately my replacement tube held out for the remainder of the day to and from the event.



Looking forward to this Wednesday's stage 3; I'm taking the day off along with some coworkers to go ride up Sierra Rd in San Jose to go watch the riders suffer up that grueling climb (oh yeah, I haven't actually ridden it yet, so I'll be suffering as well).

Hopefully I'll have my wheel back on Tuesday ;)...

Is this really February?

Though I've been quite lazy when it comes to my "training", I have managed to get out at least once a week so far. I went out this last Saturday the 9th and had a great day. It was beautiful out and the weather was excellent as well so I decided to ride to the coast. My plan was a ride from Sunnyvale, up Old La Honda, make my way to Pescadero and north up Stage road on my way to Tunitas Creek.

The plan was actually for my mother and sister to meet me in Pescadero (though they started much later than I did, so I only ended up arriving about 20 minutes after they did) and then they would follow my path back and enjoy the beautiful day on the coast and see where I've been riding in the past year. My mother was down here because the family dog (Mickey; I'm not sure how my sister spells the name, but that's how I've always spelled it) died on Friday and wasn't doing so well (which is putting it mildly to say the least). In any case, rather that both of them heading back to Antioch on Saturday, I suggested it best to just join me instead and enjoy the weather.

So besides having craps in all major muscles of my legs I was doing quite well considering my lack of riding. Old La Honda time was 33 minutes 41 seconds (a few minutes slower than my best at 30 minutes 58 seconds), but still felt quite good. The ride from La Honda to Pescadero via Pescadero rd seemed much shorter the first time I road it...this time it seemed to take FOREVER!

Spent too much time Pescadero due to things being quite busy and then sitting around eating and chatting with my mother, but that was ok. It was fun nonetheless. The ride up Stage road towards San Gregorio and eventually Tunitas was very pleasant. Sun was shining, the views of the ocean that finally came into view were well worth the effort and pain. See the picture to the right (taken on Stage road a few miles before San Gregorio...remember, THIS IS FEBRUARY!)


So with all that, the day ended very weird. I planned to make it to the top of Tunitas Creek, ride down into Woodside, and then jump in my mother's car and get a ride home (it was getting close to dark and honestly that was a good enough excuse for me).

As it turns out, my rear tire blew only about a mile into Tunitas. It turned out to be a BIG hole! I fixed it quickly, one nice family stopped to see if I was ok (NOTE: my mother and sister had continued driving up Tunitas at my request so they did not know yet of my blowout) before I finally got going again. Hearing this clicking sound, I stopped, looked around, and about that time one of my spokes on the rear tire fell off!!! Needless to say I needed a new spoke and wasn't quite sure if it was good to even be riding on the wheel (though again, likely a good excuse for me to call it a day ;)).

I grabbed the spoke, checked all the other spokes, and kept riding (slowly to be on the safe side just in case). Arriving finally at the so called "bridge of death" (I think this bridge isn't really call that on Tunitas because you don't actually cross it, but still, from that point on it is always uphill and quite nasty for 1.9 miles...fun just the same. It was at this point that my Jedi mind powers finally worked and my mother had turned around to come check on me (it was getting really dark quickly at this point). Hurray! No more riding...though physically I could have made it, I really wanted to call it a day.

Still waiting for my wheel to be fixed at GoRide Bicycles before I can go riding again, but they apparently didn't have the correct spoke in stock and had to order it (ashame they couldn't figure this out when I dropped off the wheel and spoke on Monday and told me it'd be ready on Wednesday; instead they figured it out on Wednesday and ordered it that same day).

So without my road bike, not sure how I'll be going to the Tour of California Prologue this Sunday, but so long as I get my wheel back before next Wednesday so I can ride up Sierra rd to go watch stage 3 of the TOC I'll be happy (I'm taking the day off work, so I better have my bike, or I'll be riding my mt bike up there).

Ok that was too long...

Oh the wonderful weather

No really...the weather really is wonderful. While I would love to be getting out and about on my bike (mountain or road for that matter), the excess moisture that has come through has made my snow board very happy indeed :)! Went to Tahoe this last weekend with Nahoko on a planned trip which started at Kirkwood very early on Sunday morning and finished with a trip to Diamond Peak on Monday (yes we took a day off).

The primary reason for the Monday portion of the trip was the free passes we had picked up from the Bay Area Snow Show back in November. We were down to the last week and wanted to use it up...for me it was the first time in 3 trips to the show that I actually used the free pass.

As for the trip itself, the powder was deep, the wind was howling, and the roads were completely covered, but we had a great time and my 4x4 did too! Would love to be back up there again this weekend, but with the SuperBowl here, the incoming bad weather once again, and frankly my knee needs a break from the run after run after run after run that we did on Monday. Be sure to check out the pictures Nahoko has posted to Picasa!

Hoping to get out at some point this weekend for a short bike ride, but if not, this coming week looks good so I think I'll be able to start my slow beginning to my DR training. There's always the gym as an alternate if necessary of course ;).