Epic Rides

The past 2 days have seen me doing my fair share of training. On tuesday I did a 115 mile loop up thru the Santa Ynez valley and again yesterday I did a 110 mile loop in the valley.

Tuesday was by myself and took a full 7 hours with a blistering head wind for the first 4 1/2 hours while I rode up the freeway to Gaviota and Beulton(spelling ?). Then all the way out and up Drum canyon as well as most of Alisos canyon. Once I made it to Foxen canyon the wind turned in my favor and after the climbs I flew back into Santa Ynez in the 53×14 the entire way.

Once I got a bite to eat it was back 154 and up Stagecoach Rd. to get into SB. It was propably the fastest that I have ever riden from Santa Ynez back home.

Yesterday was another 7 hour day but this time I did it with 5 of the guys from UCSB and with 11,000 ft of climbing which included Figuroa Mountain. It started when I met the others at the bottom of Old San Marcos. Once we were over the pass it was a steady grind into a slight headwind along 154 then the rolling Happy Canyon Rd to the base of the climb up Figuroa Mt. About have way half way up the climb Aaron and myself both went down going across a very small creek covered in moss that I didn’t see. So the both of us were a bit stiff for the rest of the ride. On the way down Ted and I but a good bit of ground into Aaron while decending and a lot of ground into the 3 others. At the bottom of the decent it was all tailwinds home and we took full advantage and rode along 154 faster than I had done the day before. Plus we had the added bonus of a tailwind up Stagecoach.

Then it was down 154 and Old San Marcos and out to the bike bath by UCSB where I turned off and headed into SB, but not before I decided to go thru Hope Ranch and up the Meza. After that it was an easy cruise up State Street and on home to finish another 7 hour day.

A few firsts, but no win

Today was my first race in the rain of the season, it was the first broken chain ever, and my first and hopefully last crash of the season(seperate incidence). The course was a 6 corner lap with only a small bump between turns 1 and 2. There were painted lines in all of the turns and quite a few manhole covers over the course.

The field was good with 11 BMC guys, a Healthnet rider, Symetrics rider and 3 guys from my team along with all of the Nor-Cal 1’s and 2’s. In all it was about 80 riders of 110 that had signed up for the race but only about 30 finished.

I started with a bad start and ended up close to the back and had to work my way to the front for the first 10-15 minutes. Then after 20 minutes there was a big split because of a crash in turn 1 about 20 riders back from the front. Then later that lap my chain breaks accellerating out of the last turn and I was skiding on my cleats siting on the top tube all the way to the pits. I got back in the next lap on my teamate Jamiel’s bike(who wasn’t racing), I was losing 6 bike lengths every turn and after a lap I was at the back of the group and struglingto keep contact. Then, trying to stay close I took a turn too fast for the training tires to handle and ran into a driveway that was blocked by a banner and I got closelined and hi-sided into some very gravely asphalt.

Again it was too the pits. This time I changed to the wheels that had been I my bike and was again in the group, but now with some good road rash on my ass and back so it hurt a little. Also, since I was riding Jamiel’s bike I was too low and my quads were getting really  tired whenever I was on the front so  I sat back till the last 10 laps.

In the last 10 laps a BMC rider was away with 15-20 seconds so Dom waved to go help Skyler bring him back. I went to the front with 7 laps to go and pulled for 3 laps and brought the gap to 7-8 seconds. Then Roman of Healthnet took over and slowed the chase so the group wouldn’t catch to early and I sliped back to rest.

On the last lap I was leading out Dom, but in turn 2 the guy in front of me opened a 2-3 length gap to the front 5. I sprinted to get in front but couldn’t get there with the gap, so I was shut down in the final 4 back, to back, to back, to back turns. in the last turn somone in front let a big gap open and I let Dom up the inside of me in the final turn but he was shut down by the guy off the front who was getting caught. He got 10th, I got 5th and Skyler was 23rd.

Hopefully I can sleep tonight with the road rash and I’ll be racing Cherry Pie tomarrow. Yummy a cherry pie to the top 3.

-Cody