What? why are you setting that alarm so early! The wife was trying to convince me to roll the wake-up time a little more. Even with the extra time I barely made it on time to the start of the March 1/08 SFR 300k. Took to much time to eat something...

This year I've taking an approach of no-training training for the brevets, in other words just ride like I always do, no real plan. During the colder months I was getting a hard time finding motivation to ride. Avoiding the muddy trails not to cause erossion on them kept me glued to the road and  I am not very found of going to often on long pavement-only rides, I need dirt. So to avoid burn-out I deciced to limit my paved riding to a minimum starting somewhere in December. That worked of for the 200k in January, since then I had ridden about 400 miles total I think, not a lot not to little but of those unfortunately only about 100 mies were off road.

After signining in I rode to the start just to hear Rob give the "ok let's go" right when I was getting there. I did not stopped and kept on going and was for first time ever at the head of the group crossing the Golden Gate Bridge. I rode at an easy pace but the group kept getting smaller and smaller when I looked back. Eventually some riders passed me. By the first hill, Camino Alto, I was very hot from having raced thought San Francisco streets to get to the start so I stopped to take the jacket off. Keith and Greg B went by. I never saw them again, they did ride a very fast 300k this time.

 Fenders and Mudflaps would be appreciated, I sent a message with that subject to the sfrandon list. As per the forecast, rain was a sure thing for the 200k.

I had made a mudflap using some plastic JimG had laying around, restored the waterproofness of my jacket with Granger's Wash-in Waterproofing, sprayed some water proofing stuff on the extra gloves I would be taking, wrapped the bicycle computer and the Pencam in plastic food wrap and even set aside wool socks. All this to make the rain goods happy...

My first test run at La Ruta Loca, a 200k Mixed Terrain route I designed

At 6:30am the skies were cloudy and the view outside my window was gloomy at best, another 45 minutes would pass before I got the courage to get ready and rool. I'm doing this ride as if it was a brevet, I need to see how long it takes me to do the whole route as there is a 13.5 hour limit for completing a 200k brevet. That means I'll be doing few and short stops. However I will need to stop more than usual to check the distances on my cue sheet against the reading of the bike computer and take notes.

The night before I installed a second bike computer on the Habanero just to make sure I have a backup in case the primary computer dies in the middle of the ride like what happened a month back when I was confirming distances on parts of this same route I'm attempting today. The extra computer is one of those old Cateye CC-AT-100 that supposedly can measure altitude. I is my wife's computer and I hate it, it has some of the least intuitive controls I've ever seen on a bike computer, just like all other Cateye computers I've seen before. Cateye makes some reliable bicycle electronics but usability of their bike computers is where they sin.

8:10 and I am at the Golden Gate Bridge reseting both computers pushing the left leg over the left crank.

Well another season of San Francisco Randonneurs brevets came to an end (for now?) and now the 2007 version of PBP is under way. This year I rode three events, as usual with no purpose 'cause that is the way I ride, no real purpose, just for fun. Doing PBP was never on my mind and don't think it will ever be. However this year the San Francisco Randonneurs series was very well attended in part because riders had their eyes on PBP. I like seeing more people getting into the "Rando" thing, I always think the more the merrier. Our club "regular" series traditionally starts in January and ends in April giving more than enough time to re-do a given brevet with another club in case something goes wrong and there is the dreaded DNF next to the name in the results. But again that may be only important for those seeking RUSA points or titles or whatever.

My hat off to our RBA, Todd T. for a job well done for so many years. It seems we may be at the end of his administration so there are many questions regarding the future direction of the SFR. On my conversations with other SFRs and other cyclist I tend to express my ideas for what I would like to see on a SFR series, a SFR wishlist:

Well I do love riding. I don't discriminate, a ride is a ride and a good one can be recognized when you smile, push and make unspeakable noises all in a few miles.

Back in 2005 I mapped a Populaire on Mixed Terrain for the San Francisco Randonneurs. The event was cancelled due to low registration but a couple of us did it anyways. Our event would have been the first such event in the US. Some months later a similar event ran successfully in the East Coast, its name escapes me right now but I know is still going strong and is quite popular over there. So I ask the Randonneuring community in the San Francisco the Bay Area, are we going to let the East Coast beat us on this? Hope not :)

This year I've been obsessed with creating Mixed Terrain routes complete with cue sheet and all so others can have the same fun I'm having. These are rides that cover both paved and unpaved roads and can be done in almost any bicycle. In my neck of the woods, San Francisco, I use mostly the paved and gravel roads of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area (GGNRA) Mt. Tam and South Marin in general. The rides are tough because of the amount of climbing involved and are definitely not for beginners. Not so much because of the small technical skills needed but the endurance required.

Anyhow the idea of Mixed Terrain rides has been gaining baby momentum; recently we have had some memorable ones. I started the official Mixed Terrain "season" around here with a posting/invitation on the SFRandon list @ Yahoo groups. Little by little new faces had been showing up for these rides. At the end of every ride people are happy, tired, wasted and hungry for more so we must be doing something right.

The format is simple, we start at the Strauss Statue on the South end of the Golden Gate Bridge and ride a combination of gravel roads ("fireroads" around here) and paved roads. Anybody is invited, I would say our Mixed terrain rides are "any" rides. Any terrain, any, bike, any tire, any cyclist, any day. I always recommend tires with some thread as opposed to slicks, knobs are helpful but full knobbies are NOT required to tackle these routes. As a matter of fact tire selection is one of the most crucial aspects of preparation, after all a good percentage of the ride is done on pavement, so it is a compromise between rolling resistance and traction.