Road Ride Report Tour of 3 Valleys and Points between

This was last weekend's ride but I've been too busy with my teenage daughters and a new job to post. Intention was to make it 4 Valleys but the high temps, wind, and old creaky joints halted us at three. This was to be a big ride for me; ~160 miles and 12K' plus elevation gain. Start was smack in the middle of the San Fernando Valley near Corbin and Saticoy at my very close friends Martin and Maria's house. Martin has been riding for over 30 years and is capable of pounding out 100's of miles at a steady 20+ mph like a Union Pacific loco. His wife Maria is a former marathoner from Austria and climbs like a falcon!
So the day started off just before 6AM down Roscoe Blvd which after a mile or so was all torn up for resurfacing forcing us onto the sidewalk for several miles. This may have been a sign of how the day was to unfold. No pictures from here through to the start of Big Tujunga - mui feo y susio!
Martin's better half - Maria on the way to Big T

Martin's better side - on Big T

more Big Tujunga

Big T goes on forever it seems

On the bridge looking up the wash

Big T meets AFH - finally

Time for some shade, a quick bite and a stretch

Looking up toward the 2 and Red Box

Caught a pretty good group on the way to Red Box

Big Pines 42? Ugh!

Up Up up!

Martin begins a battle with his right knee IT band and starts falling back

Kinda how I would feel later (dead and toasted)

Jones'n for the MTB right about now!



Newcombs! Big coke, ice water, and an egg sammich. Martin & Maria (& my smelly shoes)

Finally hit Cloudburst and into a hot headwind the rest of the way.

PCT

Some gorgeous thunderheads starting to form over Hisperia and Apple Valley

thank goodness - Yes there's Toilet Paper here

Entering the tunnel

First good glimpse of the Antelope Valley

Dawson Summit - a very welcome sight

Somewhere on the way down from Dawson

Grassy Hollow - I really hate that little 1000' climb with a vengeance!

No shots for the rest of the ride as it was HELL-HOT and a very strong wind in my face all the way through AV to Acton. Maria calls it quits

Martin are you still alive?

My jersey says it all.

Thank God for metro link! $9.75 from Acton to San Fernando.


So the better part of valor... If we had have finished the plan was to continue down Sierra Hwy to the Old road then over to Rinaldi to Tampa back to Martin's. We will try for a re-do in the Fall.
http://app.strava.com/rides/16742577

 

Nice RR, thanks. Long day for y'all! I haven't had a good long day on the roadie in the mountains for a while, Angelus Crest brings back some painful but good memories.

I was looking through some past RRs that I missed and saw your WRIAD ride, that looked pretty cool too.

 

Thanks - this ride is tough but very cool as, if you were to complete the entire route, you ride through every type of terrain and climate. Last time I did this ride was with Martin about two years ago and it was brutal but we finished it.
WRIAD was tough but not as difficult as I thought. Rode that one with the legendary grannygear. The toughest thing was having to carry 35+ lbs of water and gear on the bike and hydro pack.

 

What an insane route, like a stage in a tour, lol.

 

I like the jersey BATHLESS AGONY.

 

That's a great big ginormous OMFG!

 

Abui - you are a funny guy but I have to agree with you, the other passengers on the metro link gave us a 3-4 seat clear zone. I was one stinky dude!

The ride is long and has a lot of cumulative elevation gain but the grades are pretty mellow, mostly 5-6%. I have old man gears on my Lynskey (50-34 rings and 11-27 cassette) so can pretty much spin the whole way or stand at will. The head wind and hot air from Wrightwood to Acton though, is almost always soul-crushing. For comparison, it is much longer but way easier than Bathless Agony:lol:

BTW - the one casualty of the ride seems to be my Garmin Edge 500. It will no longer record my rides. Lost both my weekend rides this last week. I wonder if the heat killed it? Couple times in the durect sun it registered 120* (actual temp only got up to max of 104* on Tejon and Mt Emma roads).

 

Awesome report!
Man! Those pictures of Highway 2 really brings back memories.
I would ride road with a guy named Pat Marek from Palmdale up to Wrightwood, meet a guy named Greg Nelson, and then ride over to Newcomb Ranch, back to Wrightwood fly back down to Palmdale to hit those mega western headwinds. Take a shower and go to Northrop Grumman to work swing shift by 2:30pm. Then get up the next morning and do it again the next day. Ahhhhhhhh! Pain at the time, but it sure paid dividends on the race course...
Thanks!! ~Mikie

 

Have you tried to record any more rides? I wonder if you were the victim of memory wrap-around. When the 305 filled memory it would delete the oldest ride. I read a blog about the 500 and the blogger seemed to say the 500 would delete newer rides. Hard to believe but I decided to never test the limits, recording everything on Strava and Garmin Connect and deleting rides about once a week. That makes searching and loading new rides faster anyway.

 

mebbe so - I've never deleted a ride so there (was) stuff on there all the way back from early 2010. hope that's it. I'll go ride now and see.

 

Yep it works! memory must have been full up.