The Bike Geek

I met my buddies, Jaime and Anthony at 5:15 am and headed south to Irvine. When we arrived, a lot of riders had left and a lot more were arriving. We gathered our goods and headed to the registration lines. Once we got all set up, we started our long journey to San Diego. Although we had route sheets, we mostly followed the packs that seemed to know where they were going. OCW, the organizers of this century, strategically placed SAG stops at 25-mile increments. The stops were fully stocked with food, water, Gatorade, and cookies. We mostly cruised the coastline and this year, we were allowed to go thru Camp Pendleton. Not much was going on at the base, we got to see a group on the archery range and that’s about it. Right at mile 60, the SAG stop was fully stocked with sandwiches, bread, cookies, water and Gatorade. All the volunteers did a great job at handing out the goodies. As we came down to the beach, and right at the 80th mile, we hit ‘The Hill’. The hill was about 1.5 miles and it was not too steep. What made it a challenge is that we already had 80 miles on our legs. Right at the crest of this hill, the final SAG stop awaited us. This time they were handing out Ice cream! A sign next to the tables read ‘20 miles to go and is all-downhill’. Yeah, right. Although the terrain was not all downhill, the biggest challenge was the traffic. I highly recommend riding with a pack while trying to cross the different merging streets and making left turns on 3 lane wide avenues. Jaime and I rode with a small but fast pack towards the finish line. When we finally arrived, we were both extremely happy and relieved that it was over. We did the ride in a decent 6:13 with an average of 16.1 mph. The ride back on the train was good. We picked a car that was quiet and allowed us to take a nap. The ride is known for riders partying on the train, we were in no mood to party, and we were drained.

I’m very satisfied that I have achieved one of my cycling goals. Although I couldn’t have had accomplish it without the support of my family, my riding buddies, and of course, the big man upstairs.