solvang prelude

WOOOHOOOOOOO!!!! Just had my personal best ride this weekend! I am so stoked. I went down to Solvang, Ca for the Solvang prelude and rode a metric century (63 miles). It was a great warm up for the Solvang Century in March which will be a full century. The course is rated as difficult and the prelude had about 4,000 feet of climbing. (The full century has around 5,000 feet). This was a major challenge for me. My personal drawback with cycling has been "hills." And believe me, there were plenty of them in Solvang. If I don't say so myself, I think I'm over my hill phobia now. I completed the metric century in just over 4 hrs, which is a great time (my personal best) when you take into consideration the amount of climbing involved.

This ride, I had 0 flats, 0 blown tires, 0 crashes, and 0 busted rims. It was so nice just to be able to actually ride. Though there was a lot of climbing, I can tell I'm becoming a stronger cyclist because the hills didn't really even bother me. Although the last hill they threw in was about 6 miles from the finish line and was kind of a dirty trick if I don't say so myself. Everyone thought we were done climbing and with 13 miles to go, we hit a gradual grade for about 4 miles. Then at the end of that grade there was a hill with between 12-15% grade (probably the steepest of the ride) that went for about 2.5 miles. That was just low down and mean. But I did it with no problem aside from diminishing the last of my water supply. It felt good to be able to make it over that type of a climb when I already had 55 miles on my legs.

Solvang is a cute little Danish community. I will post some pics later today. Very cool. It's like you stepped into another world. The ride was all through the country side around Solvang and was gorgeous. The weather was picture perfect. I finished before noon, so I didn't have to worry about the heat or the wind very much at all. The other riders were a breath of fresh air after Hawaii. Hawaii was a lot of fun, but full of inexperienced cyclists that would pull bone head stunts in the middle of the road. I think because this ride is so much more difficult, the majority of riders had a lot of experience. It was a pleasure to ride with them. Everyone on the road called cars out, passed on the left, let you know they were there-- in short had good road etiquette.

Can't wait til the full century!!!! For now, off to train some more. E team watch out- here I come!!!!

Great view of a winery along a ride...


Somewhere along Ballard Canynon


more scenery along the ride


even more along the route


Downtown Solvang


more of Solvang


I dunno, there was a "tarantula crossing" sign infront of M. Jackson's ranch?!?!?!

my award...

so we had a wrap up party last weekend for those who did the honolulu century. i was sick as a dog with the pneumonia i undoubtedly caught at the rainy pasta party. it was cool to see my teammates, Ron had framed photos of each of us crossing the finish line and a disc of various photos for us, and we had awards.

Joseph Wall is one of our honorees. He has able to go to Hawaii with us at the last minute because someone else couldn't make it. Joseph suffers from non-hodgkin's lymphoma, and they have just discontinued his chemo because of side effects. He is terminal. Joseph, not only has the misfortune of this disease, but also is not fortunate enough to have what most of us have. He has no family (they are in Peru) , no medical insurance, no job, (he was homeless before he got into disabled housing through the county) but you'll never hear him complain about a word of it. He is also one of the sweetest, most humble people I have ever met. He actuallly reminds me quite a bit of my father. Sitting on the plane to Hawaii wearing his mask another passenger asked someone on our team what our group was, and about Joseph, ect. The passenger donated some money and asked that we use it to get Joseph some souvineers in Hawaii. We all signed them and gave them to him at the wrap up - that was great!

My award is quite silly compared to Joseph's , but Ron put together a few comical awards about things that happened in Hawaii. For instance, Ben went surfing the day before the ride and didn't wear a rash guard. Well, as a result his chest was very tender the next day, and he had to ride the race with bandaids over his nipples to keep his jersey from rubbing. So, Ben of course received the "best use of a bandaid" award.

My award was the "I'm through with my bike, but not with cycling" award. If you don't know the story it's because by the end of the ride, I wanted to through my bike in the ocean. As I crossed the finish line, that's what I yelled as I threw my bike!!!