RR: Blackstar > 2 miles past the golf ball > and back

[guero]

i thought it would be good to get in a training ride today so I picked up gouge and met up with pho'd up, willie, waldo, loismustdie, jasonmason and willies friend, marcin. we parked at the tree lot and were almost ready to roll out when tim (jasonmason) decided to try, key word being try to tension his spokes...he's been working out alot lately and ended up breaking a spoke...not wanting to risk breaking more, he decided it was best to call it a day right then and there.

we rolled out and once you get off the asphalt the dirt is very sticky, almost like you are dragging a brake, but nothing too bad. the rest of the road up was in great shape, there are a few ruts here and there to keep you on your toes, however there is one heckuva large chunk missing out of the road...literally about 8 feet of the 10 foot wide road as slid down the hillside. it is easy to negotiate, but it can sneak up on you on the way back down. this was willies first time up blackstar and she did great. we kept a pretty mellow pace, some of us were pushing faster, then we'dd wait up for the others. we reached beeks and kept going past the golf ball. we ended up stopping and chatting with a couple other riders at the first 'saddle' after the first real b*tch of a hill heading towards the motorway...one of the riders was STR's own chewyeti, nice to meet ya bubb. at that point we had pondered continuing towards eagle road, but werent too thrilled at the fact of having to climb those sections on the way back...we were also thinking of descending eagle road into corona and coming back up skyline, but none of us had the exact route of how to get to skyline, so we ended up heading back towards beeks from there. we had contemplated heading up to sierra peak, but i think we will hit that wednesday night.

this was my first taste of the main divide after beeks and i know the hardest stuff was yet to come. i did feel really strong though and middle ringed everything up until 1/2 way up the first 'b*tch' about 1.75 miles after beeks. i dont think anyone suffered any major mechanicals and no one flatted. i believe the total mileage was right around 23.

oh yeah, we had a mtnbikej siting at the gate at beeks and then saw mrs. mtnbikej right after we crawled under the gate on our descent. we also saw j_sims on his way up when were were in the uber sticky section towards the bottom...looked like he was flying solo.

great ride today everyone and it was nice to meet you waldo and loismustdie (bob & scott). carl, gouge, willie and i hit chronic where racinjason met up with us for some grubb, tastey times!

[mtnbikej]

That washout is huge......kinda like the one on the Motorway.

Yup saw the STR contingent at Beek's Place. Seemed like every turn I was running into someone I knew. Cool to see everyone out riding.

My goal was Blackstar to Skyline and back......that changed when I got to Beek's. So instead, I head back down with the Mrs. to the car. She drove home and I rode the mtn bike through the canyon to Glenn Ranch, over to Portolla, to Bake and around to Irvine Blvd. back home. Figure I added about 22-24 miles of road riding. Was kinda nice to get a close up look at the back side of Whiting Ranch.

[slayer]

i was also up there today. i did blackstar to eagle to seirra peak and back down. 37 miles and 5675 elev.

trail was in good shape and weather was awesome.

that washout is gnarly.

[jasonmason]

Sounds like y'all had a great ride up there. I'll have to get this in another weekend soon, having not been up blackstar for a while and i want it fresh in my mind for vq.
I ended up going home, fixing my wheel, then heading down to aliso to get a good training ride in: Meadows->TOW->Rockit->Mathis->Lynx->Cholla->TOW->Meadows...looked out east and if i squinted could see y'all out on Blackstar!

[Chewyeti]

Too funny running into you guys. We had a few more miles to go until eagle.... next time

Good to meet some new faces, and some familiar ones.

I wish i had a camera... these guys were doing the SKYLINE SINGLE TRACK (aka troy lee trails) on .... UNICYCLES!!!!!

you missed out... i woulda shuttled yall back to the top - the gate WAS open

[queenwilhelmina]

I'm glad I finally did Blackstar today, and it was nice to pop my Blackstar cherry with some good friends. Too bad Tim missed out - that sucks man!

I brought my friend Marcin along since he usually rides alone and has only done a handful of trails. He was getting pretty fatigued, but he hung in there and did a great job, considering he's never done anything beyond a 12 mile ride at Chino.

As for Gouge, Bret, Carl, Waldo, and Scott, it was great riding with you guys. I'm up for round 2. Maybe even doing the route slayer mentioned, if anyone knows that way. No night ride for me though, it's too damn cold and I'm a wimp!

Oh yeah, I was surprised/happy to see Mr. J Sims climbing B-star as we were headed down. I hope you had a good ride Jeff - good to see you back on the bike (not in your living room).

[genusmtbkr5]

Here is the link:
You may need to have a geoladders account to view it, but if you do, you can drag it till it gets to the streets.

http://www.geoladders.com/gmap_display.php?route_id=11118&walk_thru=1

Heres' the overview:
http://www.geoladders.com/show_route.php?route=11118

[Chewyeti]

ahh... we were gettin close to eagle...next time

[Waldo]

That WAS JSims, eh? I did one of those "out the corner of my eye, realization hits me 10 seconds too late" things about who that was. Good onya getting back out there man. And ChewYeti - I didn't catch your name up there, but Howdy

Marcin (Martian) was the stud of the day. The guy's never done a ride more than 12 miles long, or a climb more than 3.5 miles....until today! About 2.5 miles up Blackstar he asked me how much longer we were gonna be climbing. "Oh, a little more, then it gets easier, then a little more," I said. He he he. But he bulldogged it all the way and was smiling at the bottom (and cursing in Polish). GREAT job man.

Cool to see/meet/ride with y'all today. BTW Willie - did you get the distance/elevation data? This was a good reality check for the CC, especially those steep climbs above Beeks. I have a LOT of work to do!

[J_Sims]

Originally Posted by guero

however there is one heckuva large chunk missing out of the road...literally about 8 feet of the 10 foot wide road as slid down the hillside. it is easy to negotiate, but it can sneak up on you on the way back down.!

Sometimes a picture is worth a thousand words







Great to see you all out on the trail...

[Ladd Jasper]

Nice report, B. Glad to hear you made it past the golf ball. Gets nasty quick out there, eh?

Originally Posted by genusmtbkr5

Here is the link:
You may need to have a geoladders account to view it, but if you do, you can drag it till it gets to the streets.

http://www.geoladders.com/gmap_display.php?route_id=11118&walk_thru=1

Heres' the overview:
http://www.geoladders.com/show_route.php?route=11118

Are there coordinates available for download on the route above, Gene? Don't really use Geoladders often, so not sure what all they offer. I'd like to do this route next week, but don't want to miss the Eagle TT turnoff. Thanks.

[Pain Freak]

Do you know how much I would of paid to have a picture of guero ridng the road thru Corona?

[genusmtbkr5]

Originally Posted by Ladd Jasper

Nice report, B. Glad to hear you made it past the golf ball. Gets nasty quick out there, eh?



Are there coordinates available for download on the route above, Gene? Don't really use Geoladders often, so not sure what all they offer. I'd like to do this route next week, but don't want to miss the Eagle TT turnoff. Thanks.

Most routes on Geoladders you can download to your gps with turn by turn navigation if you have a Garmin Edge. Not sure if this route has that feature since it's not an "official" route. I just got mine today, so I'll be busy trying to figure it out.

[klutter]

Originally Posted by Ladd Jasper

Nice report, B. Glad to hear you made it past the golf ball. Gets nasty quick out there, eh?

Are there coordinates available for download on the route above, Gene? Don't really use Geoladders often, so not sure what all they offer. I'd like to do this route next week, but don't want to miss the Eagle TT turnoff. Thanks.

If you don't have a 205/305 unit, look under 'Get GPX (non-Edge users)'. You can download a generic route (sans turn by turn navigation), but you can at least get a general idea of where the turn off is located.

[TBlazen]

Man does that washed out section come up quick... I almost went head first into it on the way back down Blackstar from the Eagle trail head today. The wind was howling... anyhow, thanks for the RR.

[queenwilhelmina]

Originally Posted by Waldo

That WAS JSims, eh? I did one of those "out the corner of my eye, realization hits me 10 seconds too late" things about who that was. Good onya getting back out there man. And ChewYeti - I didn't catch your name up there, but Howdy

Marcin (Martian) was the stud of the day. The guy's never done a ride more than 12 miles long, or a climb more than 3.5 miles....until today! About 2.5 miles up Blackstar he asked me how much longer we were gonna be climbing. "Oh, a little more, then it gets easier, then a little more," I said. He he he. But he bulldogged it all the way and was smiling at the bottom (and cursing in Polish). GREAT job man.

Cool to see/meet/ride with y'all today. BTW Willie - did you get the distance/elevation data? This was a good reality check for the CC, especially those steep climbs above Beeks. I have a LOT of work to do!

I just PMed ya again Waldo - we actually did 3,433 ft of climbing and 22.31 miles. Not too shabby!

I need to get Marcin on STR! He was struggling a little bit, but I know he's glad he came. He's a Polish masochist!