The GranFondo Adventure
I took off Friday morning with the Bleriot in the back of my car and headed up the desolate central valley, cut over to Walnut Creek and ended up here.
The ancestral home of the Bleriot
I had a nice lunch and headed up to Santa Rosa where I checked in at the start area and checked out some of the vendor wares.
Went to bed early figuring it would be a big day on Saturday. It was a cool morning as I rode to the start park, a couple of miles.
Each person choose their start position by their riding abilities. I figured I could keep up with the aero recumbant
I rolled across the start line at 8:30
We left the city of Santa Rosa and headed toward the sea, the roads were hilly, but the climbs not bad, from the look of the crowd, I thought I would be the only rider on a steel lugged bike, but I came up to a father son riding together. The father was on a Rivendell, a very early Rivendell. We chatted a bit about bikes and then I left them behind. There was a rest stop at an old train depot, very picturesque, I fueled up on bananas and fig newtons, they also had water and electrolyte drinks.
The road split and the 100mi guys headed to the hills. My ride went through the Russian river valley, and spilled out onto the ocean road, where there was a moderate crosswind, made for dicey bike handling. Little did we know what was coming.
After the amazing ocean scenery, we took a left turn into a wall. It was nothing more than a paved forest road, that went straight up;. I heard that it was 18%. I believe it was at least that. I put the bike into the 30x34 gear and just started grinding my way up, many were walking, guys were cramping and it went on forever, but I did get passed by the pros, and some guy on a LHT (that's for you Errin).
After that was over, there was some awesome descending and then through a very rural area, and finally a nice touch was added. They directed the riders to a 3 mi gravel bike path, which came out right at the park for the finish.
The after party had good beer, good food and an expanded vendor display.
and the scenery was nice there too.
Wish some others from the cigar band could have made it.
Scott Nydam, a pro from the BMC team I believe, finished fastest, He did the 103 mi with 6500 feet of climbing in 4 hrs 48 min. I did the 65mi with 3000ft( I think it was more) in 5 hours
If this link works, it should open the route in google earth, there are more pics there linked to the route
Levi__039_s_Granfondo_2009.kml
Bruce
That was a nice description of the tour. The route looks very scenic. Did Lance ride?
ReplyDelete