Ursa Minor Revival With OFR

Garmin Stats from todays ride

At 0400 it's 64 degrees outside under mostly cloudy skies (keep in the heat). That's the word via The Weather Underground and the official weather station near the Twin Oaks Valley Post Office. Close enough. Looks like a regular jersey ride today. I'll carry my usual paper vest in my HB bag for those cool downhills. Try out the cleat adjustment on this ride. Riding the SOMA today. Left the new G'skin HARDSHELLs on for this ride. Took the back way over to the start. Mike Shaw was joining up for this ride, but didn't see him at the 7-Eleven start. His car was there and I figured he went on a warm-up looking for me on Mission Road. There he is. We left slightly after 0600.

Passed a rider with a unique array of white rear lights. Sort of like Christmas lights around his seat stays and under his seat. Quite visible from afar. His front light was visible from 10 feet! Chatted with Mike about his new Populaire route he is working on. Rode past Palomar Hospital and it looks like someday they will have Citracado Pkwy. going straight to Valley Parkway. Some work being done on the extension now.

Traditional Red Velvet Donuts are baked. Ours weren't!

Del Dios seemed busy for this time of day. We rolled into Solana Donuts for our control stop. Both got a "Red Velvet" donut. Lady said they were deep fried instead of the traditional oven baked! Bummer. Didn't hang around long. As we cycled up to Coast Hwy., my Velvet and sack left my HB bag and laid nicely on the street. I looped around and picked it up. No worse for wear and not much sand on it. The frosting was a little sticky as I tried to keep pace while riding one-handed northward.

Several riders went by and we finally hooked up with "David" on a TREK hybrid bike. Had his rear rack and 700x38 Bonti tires on, so he must be rando material? He was rolling at 19mph, as we hung on and chatted about randonneuring. Dave seemed interested, so later on I handed him a Rando Card and pumped up the sport.* He turned off at Palomar Airport Road toward ViaStat, where he works, commuting 3 days a week. Mike and I stopped at the Carlsbad Oak St. 7-Eleven for a time break and ice refill. I anted up for bananas. We rolled into Magee Park at 0820 at hit the bathrooms. Several OFR riders were waiting around the parking lot.

We thought we would ride to Dana Point with the OFR gruppo today. Maybe 12 of us total. Rode through Camp Pendleton, where the pace quickened on the first climb. Bruce Tipton (new Focus AG2r bike) and rando Mike (TREK Domane) were off to the races. I was pulling Al & John till I dropped them on a hill. I soon rode up to Mike and we reqrouped at the Las Plugas parking lot with the others.

Commuter "Dave" rode a TREK with disc brakes & rear rack.

Mike & I went ahead and finally waited at the San Onofre Campground #1( the usual #11 was closed for the season). I later learned the others stopped at #10! We regrouped in a bit and took the neighborhood through San Clemente. Mike & I turned eastward on the San Juan River Trail to SJC, while the others went to Dana Point Harbor for lunch. If all went well, we would be back in 50 minutes for a regroup. Rode with a nice positive-attitude lady toward SJC. I've seen her on the trail before. We ended up at Carl's Jr. for a control break.

Oreo IC Sandwiches were the order of the day. After sitting around for too long, we retraced our route back to Dana Point. We were 5 minutes late, but I spotted a green jersey far up the road. The group took the "neighborhood" through San Clemente. Us Randos took El Camino straight through. We waited for them near the Trestles Bike Path. Bruce and I took the surfer road over to Trestles Beach to check it out. After a high speed pursuit, we finally caught the gruppo at BR #10 in the campground. Mike had gone ahead to Las Pulgas. We had a final regroup in the parking lot, where several riders hopped in a van for the ride to Oceanside.

Bruce Tipton was smokin' on his Focus AG2r today.

Kiwi Stuart, Bruce T., Mike & I were off to the training races through the camp. Stuart dropped a chain on the first climb. Bruce took off like a rocket. Mike & I did the rando thing through the base. My ankle tendon was acting up so I hit it with some "White Flower" as Mike led out on the SLR eastward. Nice quick pace along Hwy. 67 over to Bonsall under clear skies and nice riding temps. Of course, no ice cream at McDonalds again! I opted for a Parfait Yogurt and stretched the ankle out.

Easy rando pace on Camino Del Rey today. Mike had been talking about using the big-ring on climbs today and something about the same gear-inches as the 34 chain-ring. I had a nice big-ring pace starting up Champagne, but later geared down and we rode up together. Mike took off near the top for some reason.. something about Strava records? The new road sections on Centre City are nice... if they would only cover the bumpy stuff next. We finished up at 7-Eleven before 1600. I figured that was good, since I wasn't in a race mood & we stopped and hung around quite a bit today.

Got in some good training at speed today: up Coast Hwy. with Dave, northward through the Base, catch-up after Trestles and the final base run again. 3/5 for today's ride. Left ankle is still jacked up. Tendon or maybe a muscle strain? White Flower and a 1-Advil day today.

* - David Danovsky did email me later in the day and was interested in some Saturday Rando rides. I put him on the notice list. Said he needs to dump his real heavy Bontrager tires for some lighter ones. He also has a MTB he rides out here. Mmmm?

Cloudy early, clearing later
Hi: 87     Lo: 64
132 miles


-randorides