1993 Chalone Reserve Pinot Noir

I was planning on making duck risotto last night utilizing both the broth made from the carcass and the fat rendered from it. I thought this would be a good opportunity to open a bottle that was a bit ripe. I'd selected a bunch of older Pinot Noirs from the glory days of the Chalone Wine Group, pulling those bottles with the best fill levels. With the older Chalone wines there's always a heightened danger of a corked bottle due to the TCA problems that plagued that cellar for many vintages until it was finally resolved in the mid 90's. I pulled the cork which smelled fine and decanted the wine. It hadn't thrown too many solids and seemed in good shape. The aromas were in fine condition given its age with the typical almost Rhone like spice that this vineyard always exhibits. As the fruit aired out of the wine a little bit of mustiness reminiscent of red Burgundy started to show, but it in no way detracted from the wine. The flavors were perfect and the palate still intact with enough grip to offset the weight of the risotto. I happily slurped down more than half the bottle and would have finished it if I hadn't had a few Scotches beforehand.

commuting

I have been thinking for some time about selling the second car and using the bike as my main transportation. When the tranny went south on the beemer wagon a month or so ago it helped me turn this vague desire into a reality. It is only five miles from home to work, and the weather in San Luis Obispo is mild to a fault. I hadn't really thought about the effects on my cycling. I was really more concerned with lowering my carbon footprint and putting my beliefs into action. I've ridden to work more or less four days out of five since. One of the happy byproducts is that I seem to be getting much fitter and faster as a result. I wouldn't have guessed that an extra four hours a week of riding consisting of half hour rides at an easy pace would have any athletic effect, but it seems that I was wrong. There is virtue in volume it seems, no matter how you achieve it. On Sunday I went on a ride with some friends. It was a good day to "test the legs" after a month or so of solid training, and an easy week leading up to it. We hit the Harmony Hill on the way to Cambria on Rt. 1 hard. When I checked the Strava data later in the day I found that I'd gotten up the hill in the same time I'd done it on Sept. 1st when I was in prime condition. I would never have guessed that I'd have this sort of form at this time of year, and the only real difference between this year and last is the bike commuting. Good for the air and good for the legs - hard to beat.

Bleeding Edge and The Signature of All things

If you had told me a few years ago that I would be delighted by an Elizabeth Gilbert novel, I would not have objected. But, had you told me that I would give up in boredom a contemporaneous Thomas Pynchon novel, I would have said, "No way!" I don't think it's my own taste as a reader that has changed. I still love Gilbert's writing, and found with a recent re-read of the Idiot that I still love Dostoevsky after a 40 year hiatus. So, I must conclude that my own tastes have seen no radical shift rather that it's Pynchon's writing that has fallen to its knees. It makes me sad as all of his prior novels a few of which I have read multiple times have delighted me. The failure of Bleeding Edge seems to me to be in the characterization. They seem more cut outs than fully fleshed. While Pynchon has always used outre characters that bleed into caricature there was still something real, vital and lovable about them. Belief in the characters is non negotiable issue for me. Almost any other aspect of the novel can be warped and messed with without me objecting, but the characters had better have breath in them. Finally I found the Pynchon dull and enervating. I couldn't keep my eyes open reading it, and every time I picked it up I'd have to go back a few pages to find the narrative thread. Gilbert's book on the other hand kept me wide awake. A book that causes me to stay up late is a successful book, when all's said and done.

1979 Acacia Iund Vineyard Pinot Noir & 1997 Acacia Carneros Pinot Noir

Not too long ago, just before this harvest started I had to move my private collection of wines from Tolosa to a couple storage lockers. We knew the vintage was going to be huge and that we would need every square foot of storage space for barrels. They had kindly allowed me to store the 150 or so cases for several years, so I was happy to oblige. One of the things that moving your cellar does is force you to handle every bottle or case and decide if they're really worth moving and storing. Roughly 20% of the bottles weren't for a variety of reasons, but many of them looked far better than I would have expected from an ullage point of view given their age. I set aside a mixed case of likely candidates to take home and drink over the short term. Two of the wines bracketed my time at Acacia - 19 happy vintages. A couple wine loving friends were over for dinner so I took the opportunity of opening them. The first was the '79 Iund. This was from my very first vintage at Acacia. The cork had held and the wine was at full fill level. Upon decanting we found the wine to be remarkably intact with the color still red and no maderized character whatsoever. The wine was old certainly - ancient by California standards, but it smelled pleasantly of earth, leather and spice. We had many bottles open that evening yet it held its own and most of it was drunk. The next bottle was the '97 Carneros. This was a disappointment. I've had other bottles of this wine recently that were very nice, but this one was faded and past its prime. We also opened a '97 Volnay for a rough comparison and that was the least preferred wine of the three. This particular bottle certainly didn't enforce the idea that red Burgundies outlive California Pinots. It was very sweetly nostalgic to taste these two bottles that spanned the course of my vintages at Acacia. The '79 was particularly resonant as it was my first vintage, and i didn't really have a clue as to what I was doing. By the '97 vintage I'd pretty much mastered my craft, and I recall in detail how this vintage showed as young wines. Both the Pinot and Chardonnay that year were light to medium bodied and always studies in elegance and perfume.

Dawn Patrol

During harvest commuting to work is a big part of my cycling as the opportunities for longer rides are limited compared to the rest of the year. I particularly love the early morning commute on the weekends. The streets are much emptier of traffic,and what traffic there is seems somewhat less frantic. Sundays are the best as the roads are virtually deserted, and I can with impunity blow through stop signs and stop lights. This morning, the final Saturday of October and likely the last working weekend of the harvest, was paricularly fun. The fog was thick and wet, and the temerature was just above the glove and full leg cover level. I put on a watchcap instead of a helmet, which always feels good for some perverse reason. Concious risk in some way makes me feel more alive. I was just cold enough to be stimulated instead of frozen. My legs felt good, and the sky slowly brightened as I rode in. There was just enough light to not worry about hitting the random road debris. My mind and my mood followed the lead of my legs and all seemed rosy and anything possible by the time I arrived at work.

Coffee and Cigarettes

There is a long established pattern to my riding. This year is no exception. Sometime between late August and mid-September my riding gets sharply curtailed. I came back to exceptionaly good form by late August this year and I was hoping to ride the Freemont Peak Hillcimb race on September 8th but this was not to be. We got exceptionally nice weather the week before which pushed the grapes to the point of the first harvest coming in on Thursday the 5th. And once fruit arrives the time to train, much less arrange the schedule so that racing is possible is out the window. This summer was unusually frustrating as I went from very good form in May to terrible condition by mid July. Partly this was due to a lot of work travel keeping me off the bike, but mostly it was due to a bronchial infection taking a solid two weeks out of July. As I picked up the infection on a business trip to NYC I guess I can blame the entire mid-summer collapse on business travel. When I can't ride I fall back into bad habits. For most of my winemaking career I have smoked during harvest. It is a little break in the day. My logic is that the three or four cigarettes per day over the course of the six weeks of harvest will have no lasting effect on my long term health or short term lung capacity. I haven't done that the last two years, but this year I'm at it again - taking the coffee and cigarette breaks at mid morning and mid afternoon. I'm also bike commuting pretty regularly which is good. Yesterday morning my tail light went out on the ride in - heavy fog and predawn did not help matters and I was almost run down by one of my co-workers as I was turning into the winery. I purchased a more durable and higher output set of lights on the way home that same evening so hopefully that increases my chances of staying in one piece.

Flogging It

I went out on a 55 mile 3.5 hour hilly ride today. In sections I went as hard as I could. I wasn't on a great day, but my form is coming along so well that I still managed 9 PRs on the Strava. It doesn't appear that the crash on Sunday's cote de Tolosa had any real effect on me beyond a couple days of discomfort and a few lousy nights sleep. I'm pretty confident of doing the District RR Championships the weekend after this.
 The descending is getting scary fast for sure. The other day I clocked 60, and today I clocked a bit over 55mph. It's funny at this time of year it just doesn't feel all that fast - it gets normalized because of the volume of riding. I recently upgraded the Strava to give them some $$. It's such a cool program. I felt a little guilty using it for free. One of the best aspects of the upgrade is I can now sort by my ten year age group (55-65) and for all time records or for this year only. It looks like I'm in the top third to quarter of riders on most of the common routes. On a few of the more obscure off road segments I'm sitting on top of the leaderbaord for my age group, but that's more a function of not many folks getting out on those dirt roads. It looks like I'm about 2-3% slower than the really fast guys my age on climbs, which is where it counts. It will be interesting to see if I can notch it up further or if I'm at a plateau at this point. My only wish is that I could sort for 5 year age groups as I'm 8 years into my 10 year group at this point. Oh well, in another two years I'll be 65 and hopefully DOMINATING that age group. One thing that I learned from watching my father is that the older you get the fewer the competitors.

2013 Cote de Tolosa

From a personal point of view this post could also have been called "Crash Test Dummy". I should have thought about the concept of tempting the fates when I pulled on the bright orange crash test dummy socks in the morning, but they matched the new orange black and teal kit so well I couldn't resist. We got a lot of last week sign ups for this year's race, and over 70 riders took to the course at almost exactly 7:30. Normally a big pack of mixed skills riders like this gives me pause, but I was at or near the front for the cruise through town so I didn't give it much thought. Things strung out a little bit as we entered the 101 freeway shoulder and I was cruising comfortably in the first 20 or so riders not working very hard. About a mile or so before the first climb the rider immediately in front of me had a fluke accident and went down sprawling across the shoulder and leaving nowhere for me to go but over him. Luckily neither one of us was seriously hurt, but this is a far from ideal way to begin a long arduous race. I picked myself up quickly remounted the chain and got going. I was bleeding a lot from my right elbow and could tell that my right knee under the warmer was badly banged up. The adrenaline got me up the first climb without any problems, but the wounds started bothering me on the next 10-12 miles of flats. My knee was tender as the next section of climbing began, but calmed down on the steadier shallower upper parts. The long steep descent was no fun as the jarring had it's impact on my bruised and tweaked body. I managed to slam my already tender knee into the bar to add insult to injury on a creek crossing near the bottom. The final 10 miles or so of flats were particularly bad as my right hip to knee along the hamstring started really complaining. I felt pretty studly about finishing and at 4:45 came pretty close to my goal of 4:30 for the course. I think without the accident I could have hit the 4:30 or less which was my goal for the day. This would have moved me up from 40th to 30th place overall so only losing ten places due to bad luck was no big deal. Blake Anton won for the 3rd time of the four editions in a time of 3:24 for an average of over 18mph. Everyone liked the new course and it was all in all a good day. The weather cooperated being neither too hot nor too cold. The winds got a bit rowdy for the later finishers. Only one person got seriously off course and even he found his way back eventually after an extra 20 miles or so of descending down into Pozo and having to climb back out.

Acclimatizing

One of my goals this year is to race the district raid championships in Bakersfield. It's on June 1st and the start time is 10:00 am. It will be hot - no doubt about it, and the course has lots of climbing. I've never done well with climbing in the heat. There's something about 90+ and climbing that tends to leave me on the side of the road seeing spots and pouring water over my head to stave off heat exhaustion. So on Sunday I thought I'd better start getting myself at least mentally prepared for this. I left SLO at 10:00 on an already warm morning and headed to the north county where I knew it would be high 90s by the time the ride was over. It was and I suffered, but I managed to tough it out. I never completely cracked, but rather had to slow at times to keep it together. I stopped in Santa Margarita about 12 miles out from home for a coke to cool off, and went into the bathroom to fill my water bottles. I looked a horror - beet red and sheeted with sweat. It must have grossed out the other patrons in the cafe, but I just didn't care. I'm going to repeat on my long rides for the next three weeks leading to the championships and see if it helps. It certainly can't hurt.

Putting it on the line

Now as we exit April it's time to put all the hours of suffering to some good use - racing. There's lots coming up in the next five weeks. This weekend is my third outlaw race, and unnamed epic in the north county that will cover about 80 miles with three significant climbs - all on dirt. It's the day before my birthday so it's going to be my celebratory ride. I'm hosting a cocktail party the night before so this will enforce a bit more sobriety on that activity than is my wont. Two weeks after that is my Cote de Tolosa which should be huge fun, and I mean by that incredibly painful. Then the next two weekends bring the Norcal RR Championships being held on the Mt. Hamilton course followed by the Socal RR Championships being held on a hilly course outside of Bakersfield. I'm going to try and do all of the above although the Mt. Hamilton race will be very difficult because of the amount of driving and the fact that a shuttle needs to be arranged. Then a pretty busy travel schedule in June followed by some bike time in Oregon in July. Maybe a bit more racing to end the summer in style depending on how I'm feeling.

SLO Roubaix

Yesterday was one of the best bike days ever for me. I felt a bit of pleasant anticipation as I woke up a bit later than normal, ate heartily, togged up and went to Foothill Cyclery for the start of the 2013 SLO Roubaix. Pancho was kind enough to tune the squeak out of my front cantis and at about 8:30 twenty plus riders headed out. The first special stage was a dirt out and back of about 3 miles total length with a standing start. I hit the pedals hard and found myself in the lead group of ten or so. I made the mistake of entering the turnaround last and got gapped, but still managed 10th much to my surprise garnering one point. I was pretty gassed after, but pleasantly so. The next section was 3+ miles of single track that was supposed to be a neutral section, that is no points on offer, but I found myself on the rivet the entire time. I was thinking " I've got to pace myself a bit here or I'm not even going to finish to day much less garner any more points."
The next points on offer were at Turri Rd and I knew this sort of short poer climb didn't suit me so I didn't even attempt it. After this was a fast flat sprint to the city limits sign and I sat on the wheels and kept the pressure on to pick up 5th and the single point on offer. The food break was after this and what had been 23 or 24 riders dwindled to 9. I was surprised by the attrition, but happy that the point scoring possibilities were much improved. The next section was the hardest, the Sycamore KOM/Pave. My legs were suffering before this, but I somehow managed to get to the top ahead of three of my companions picking up more points. We all drank a little beer at the top and I led out the very sketchy descent.Then started a series of four sprints over the next 5 miles that I couldn't manage to even attempt. I just let the other riders flow around me. By this time we were back in town and headed out into a howling headwind towards the final Foothill KOM/Sprint. I did my share of the work on the front on the lead up. To the degree that Pancho said to me, "Larry, you are a true hard man." I was surprised and tickled as I was feeling fairly worked over at this point. Coming into the finale of the day I really wanted to do something so at about 700m out I initiated the surge to the top I managed to hold everyone off till about 100m to go and then got swamped and finished fifth. I might have done better if I'd started it a bit later, but who knows.
We all met at Central Coast Brewery for pizza beer and prizes followed by watching the real Paris Roubaix. I was strangely moved and honored to be given the "Courage" award. This given to the rider who shows the most guts through the day - purely subjective, but my guess is my last desperate attack made the impression. I have always in work and play striven for the respect of my peers and that is what this painted brick was all about. It's proudly displayed in my office right now.
The real Roubaix was great ending with Cancellara winning it in a sprint on the velodrome and then collapsing on the grass. Watching a great race with 20 beer swilling bike buddies is almost as much fun as play racing with them all day.

Anticipation

I'm starting to get stoked for the first local outlaw race, the so called SLO Roubaix as it is held the same day as the real Roubaix. This morning I wasted a happy few minutes looking at photos from Paris Roubaix and it got me really excited about the race and our own little local homage to it. What was particularly inspiring about the photos was the number of racers with looks of absolute misery and exhaustion on their faces. It reminded me that these guys despite their strength are not super human and that the essence of bicycle sport is the ability to withstand suffering.

SLO Roubaix Pre-ride

Sundays have been turning into endurance suffer fests the past couple months. The drill is to chose a route hard and long enough that it takes 5 or so hours to complete and leaves you close to crippled by the time you're done. This past Sunday was no exception. I rode an exploratory pre-ride of the 2013 Slo Roubaix. This event is held the first Sunday in April to coincide with the real Roubaix. A dozen or so local maniacs normally show up to ride a combination of pavement and "special sections" which can comprise dirt roads, single track, climbs and sprints for points. Each year's course is unique and this years looks great. It has a high giggle factor and a high suffering score. The highpoint on the giggle scale is some twisty single track between Morro Bay and Turri Rd. that if you don't finish it grinning you may as well commit suicide. The leader on the suffering board is the fireroad climb up behind Sycamore Springs Resort. I'd never ridden this beast before, but it rivals in difficulty the steeps at the top of Black Mountain and that says a lot. Yesterday's group of five was a lot of fun. I wasn't the slowest nor was I the fastest on any of the sections. Let's hope it stays that way two weeks from now when we do the real thing.

Strava

While I have abjured the use of cyclometers and other bar mounted info systems for years with the exception of their use for finding my way around new routes just recently I've started using my smart phone for orienteering and now recording rides. The use of the smart phone maps was the first step. It allowed me to bring up maps while actually lost out on new remote loops. It hasn't prevented me getting lost but it's been a help finding my way. Just a week or so ago I downloaded the free Strava app and I have to say that it's a bit addictive. You hit the start button and stick the phone in your pocket and it takes care of the rest. The level of detail is amazing. From how hard and fast you hit the Huasna hill (315W and 10 mph) to the fastest speed you clocked this week (47mph). The only downside I see so far is that it seems to suck up batteries. I tried to use it to map the new Cote de Tolosa route and the battery was dead before I'd finished the route. It's curious that knowing you have a device in your jersey pocket recording your every move motivates you to ride harder. So probably not a good idea to turn it on for rest days or routine riding. Save it for the days when you're out there really killing it.

Cote de Tolosa recon

Yesterday, Karl and I rode the route that Blake proposed for Cote de Tolosa 4 coming up at the end of May. We both were wishing for end of May fitness by the time we rolled in just before sunset. The day started a little bit late due to two of the guys starting with us having less than impeccable ride manners. One of them showed up with two flat tires and no pedals on his bike! We should have taken it as an omen. Even with the late start it was chilly, and everybody was happy to get on the first climb at about 8 miles in. The dirt Old Stagecoach Rd. had everybody well warmed by the top. We cruised though Santa Margarita and south down Pozo where I got a rear flat. It was a little micro staple of some sort. Not even a Kevlar belt would have prevented that. Karl and I turned into the Rinconada trailhead and took a break for lunch. Almost immediately after starting the single track climbing the valve stem on Karl's rear tubular pulled out. After replacing that tire we got going again. Lot of steep twisty single track - hike a bike in part we got to the meadow and began the dirt road climbing to the High Mountain Lookout. Not a moment too soon as my back was starting to seize up. The descent was sketchy and at one point I can so close to losing my front wheel it wasn't funny. Closest I've come to a high speed crash in a while. At the gate where High MT. Lookout and High Mountain intersect it was a long wait for Karl. One of his spokes pulled out of the rim and he was forced to ride the 25 mile home with a wobbly and rubbing rear - no fun. The last hour or so of pavement back to the winery against a moderate headwind were a bit of a suffer fest. This is a much harder ride than the first three with about 45 minutes to an hour of extra saddle time. Mentally it's harder as well having to battle head wind home after torturing yourself on the dirt.

Going viral

I thought I'd just ignore a low level viral infection last week. It started with a little sore throat, but I didn't feel that bad. So I just did my normal riding for the week. I wasn't recovering from the very hard effort at Old Caz, but didn't think too much about it. I had thought that I would do the Poor Students Road Race on the following Saturday, but woke up feeling a bit worse for wear so I skipped it. Lucky thing too as I could barely manage an easy two hour cruise that day. The next day, Sunday, I woke up feeling truly wretched. I should have guessed I was getting sicker on Saturday as my mood was so piss poor all day. Mood is a good indicator for me if I bother to pay attention to it. Yesterday was bad as well, but today on Tuesday I'm feeling a bit better so I think I'll ride tomorrow - easy.

Old Caz Hopper - 2013

The course has changed since I last did this event in 2007. It had also gone from a free to a fee status. The turnout was massive - over 300, and the clear cold weather meant there would be ice as well as mud. I started towards that back as that many riders of mixed skills in an open event looked like trouble waiting to happen until they got spread out by the many climbs. Trouble didn't wait around and on the first real curve on Bitner Rd at least 50 folks went down on the black ice in a little shady hollow. I picked my way through the debris- very happy to have the 2.0 Supersonics on my MTB. The typically grippy Continental rubber compound didn't seem phased at all by the ice. This was to be tested multiple times in the first section of the ride. After a bit of climbing we went down Willow Creek Rd. The dirt descent was fun if chilly. The bottom section of this road had lots of ice and claimed lots of victims, but my tires once again held tight and I was able to roll through at full speed without a wobble.
The next section was Hwy 116 up along the Russian River. Folks were flying up this smooth pavement in pacelines, but I decided to take an easier approach this early in and went piano in this section. The next climb on Duncan Rd. is short and brutal followed by some dirt with one crazy washout that actually had a rope in it to assist the climb out. Back to pavement and then the long and at times steep climb up Old Cazadero. The dirt descent off this was the best part of the ride for me with the MTB allowing amazing speeds and the jumps providing plenty of amusement - maybe a bit too much on the one I landed into a big mud hole. The crossing of Austin Creek at the bottom of this descent allows you to soak your shoes so you can have numb feet the rest of the ride. I hooked up with Ken and Grayson at this point - old Napa riding buddies. It was both good and bad. The good was seeing them and feeling part of a community of riders. The bad was riding at the tempo of the 8-10 man group we were in as we tore along the pavement towards the final climb back up Willow Creek. I like pacelines, but in retrospect should have either dropped off the rotation or out of the group entirely. I ended up toasting my legs and regretted it as they began cramping about a mile from the top of the climb.
All and all a good first competitive event for the year. I finished, and not DFL either. I choose the right whip for the event. While most went the cyclocross bike route the full suspension Santa Cruz Superlight with very light race tires performed like a champ. It both kept me off the pavement when things got icy dicey, but probably most importantly it insulated me from the impact of the rough roads and trails allowing me to finish with only my lower body in agony instead of the full Monty.

Race Rigging

Getting the rig ready to race is always a pleasure especially if you're not pressed for time. I took the morning off today as I knew I was going to be working till 8:00. I took the big heavy tires off the Santa Cruz that had been on there forever and put on some new shoes - very light 2.0 Continental Supersonics. You know you've put light tires on when the factory packaging says these are designed for speed and will wear faster and get more flats than standard tires (trans. don't bitch about it!). I took the opportunity to clean and lube the entire drive train and tune the brakes while I was at it. The front tire did not want to go on but finally submitted. The whole process took about two hours and I still had time to eat breakfast make some smoked trout pate and get showered and shaved before I had to go to work. Only thing left to do tonight is pack the gear bag and ready for the Grasshopper Old Caz.

Flat

Flat is what my legs were yesterday. I started the strength phase of the gym work a few days ago, and my legs are feeling it. I wanted to do 3+ hours with a significant climb, but I was feeling gassed on the rollers and instead of feeling better as the ride entered its second hour I was feeling worse. This is a reliable signal from my body to pack it in. A flat is what I got about a 1/4 mile out of town on the way home. It was fortuitous in some ways as I noticed that the vulcanization on the tire sidewalls was shot, which I assume means the tires are overdue for a change. I went and spent that $100 today. That means $800 in tires this month. $300 each for the moto and the car rear tires as well as another $100 for new MTB skins earlier. Oh, well they last a long time once they're on. While I was changing the tire on the side of the road two gals rode by separately on bikes. One of them looked pretty pro. Neither said a word. If they had been guys I would have thought, "Rude". But with girls you never know.

Sierra Madre Epic

A few years ago I did a loop that included the long climb up then closed Sierra Madre Rd. It had recently burned over and they had closed the area to protect it. It was an eerie ride. Not much had grown back at that point so there was a surface of the moon quality to the landscape. I had never been on the roads before so there was that nervousness about what lies ahead. I was doing it solo which added to the tension. That day turned out to be very hard, and running out of water and fuel 15 miles from the end wasn't much fun either. But I have thought about that road since then and returning to ride it which I did with my buddy Karl yesterday. We got a reasonably early start at about 10:30. The day was cool - mid 40s with some high clouds. This ride is an epic extended dirt climb. The road is now open and we saw perhaps 6-10 vehicles in the 4.5 hours we were out there. It opens the climbing account with an hour and a half of steady to steep climbing ending at a saddle where there's a radio antenna. I managed to gap Karl a bit in this section - not intentionally, just riding my own pace. The views from this part are great. It then continues climbing but not as steadily for another hour and a half till you hit the highest part of the ridge at 5,500 ft. There were many sections with snow and mud on them. These proved a challenge going up from an effort and balance point of view and going down from a staying upright point of view. Just before the very highest point of the ridge after we'd been climbing for close to three hours, I called it quits. I couldn't face another muddy snow covered slog to the next dry section. We turned around and an hour and a half of slipping sliding and bone jarring riding later we were back to the car - shot and satisfied.

New Year, New Year's Day Ride

I woke up with more than a rumor of too much fun the night before, but more apropos with sore hips from working in the kitchen for hours and hours prepping for a dinner party for twelve. If we didn't have a thoughtless house guest banging around the bath and kitchen six hours after lights out I might have gotten a couple more hours sleep. All cavilling aside, I cinched up my belt at around 10:30 in prep for the scheduled launch at 11:00. I needn't have rushed as Karl was late as usual, and needed to fuss with his rig a bit more once he arrived. No worries - it was a cold morning so it allowed a bit more warmth to build. We rode up the Old Stagecoach Rd. then dodged across the freeway to start climbing East Cuesta/Mt. Lowe. The climb was very hard with my left knee and right hip acting up for most of it. We persevered and got to the very end of Mt. Lowe. It was a gorgeous day, and I've never gotten that far on that road. We were trying to hook into Burrito Crk. Rd. and then down and out Rhigetti, but missed the turn and ended up descending the very rough Reservoir Cyn. Rd. This is steep and the surface is mostly "cow cobbles" and it ends up spitting you into a mud wallow at the bottom so it's less than ideal. About half way down the descent Karl noticed that he'd lost three of his five chain ring bolts - oops! He got the remaining two tightened and amazingly finessed it home. All and all a very good start to the year. The bike and especially the shoes took a lot of clean up after.