Rock & Road Trail Permanent

Rock and Road Trail Garmin Stats

Inaugural ride of the new Trail Permenent. Different kind of route, with some actual dirt trails mixed in there. Not a lot of technical dirt riding, but need to watch the clock as 9.3mph average won't happen on dirt trails.

Keith Olsen, new rando Devin Mortensen and myself showed up in San Marcos on Saturday. Weather was forecast for partly cloudy today. We chatted a bit about stuff and started 5 minutes late. Keith was riding his brand new Salsa Spearfish MTB. He even had new shoes and a new Garmin 800! Devin had his Surly Long Haul Trucker with 40mm tires on it.

Inland Rail Trail over to Escondido, then looped and missed the turn to the Escondido Creek Bike Path as we were chatting. Turned on Citrus Street and enjoyed the nice downhill on Old San Pasqual Valley Rd. Keith was already dragging up the hills, a theme which would continue throughout. 12mph is a moderate pace on the flat hard surfaced roads. We stopped too long at the Ysabel Creek INFO control. Onto the trail, we waited for Keith at Raptor Ridge. Then I got a flat on by the strawberry fields. My spare had a zipper cut in it too, so I had to patch and pump. The guys went ahead to the Mule Hill Control and got a receipt for me. We hit the Lake Hodges Trail to lite traffic and then Keith went off and climbed the upper trail. We waited and waited for him until we finally spotted him above. Both trails merge together by the gate/parking lot. It was at least 15 minutes before we got together again for the run down Del Dios Hwy.

Santa Fe Trail switchbacks

Santa Fe Trail is neat due to the 33 switchbacks. I had rode this several times and explained the use of your arm to hold the posts as you slingshot around the switchbacks. Keith finally got the hang of it and we rolled over to Artisan Lane. A little technical single track here as we got over to Lusardi Loop under Camino del Sur. Keith lagged way back on this climb. I stopped at the park and put in a patched tube, found a Timex Ironman watch and patched the other tube as a spare. I borrowed Devin's full frame pump. Finally Keith arrived and laid down on the grass. He said to go ahead, since he wouldn't make the time cut. I checked the time. It was after noon and we wouldn't make it anyway.

Devin led out on the hard roads to the Shell Control. We were there only 5 minutes. Los Penasquitos was a fast ride through. We had several near misses with some young riders coming at us! Roselle St. was a nice up hill and then onto the Rose Creek Bike Path. We did the full route through and around Sea World and across the channel to the Ocean Beach Control. We shared the 2 for $3 Gatorade and then climbed up the tough Hill Street. Around the SD Bay and into heavy traffic through construction zoned before the Santa Fe Station. Got there at 3:00 PM. Too late for the rando time, but time enough for the Coaster Train back up to Oceanside!

Interesting ride. In good rando spirit, we waited for Keith the first part of the route. He just couldn't get up the hills and walked several times. I suggested he work on his climbing and check out his life style as far a his described need for weight loss. Also he should have been bombing down those hill on the new full suspension Spearfish. He didn't. Keith is a great guy and nice to ride with. I'm sure he'll get stronger as time goes by. Devin rode strong all day. I thought he did real good with the smaller tires on his Surly. He's a great rider and good Stagecoach 400 material!

Good rando experience,
-randorides