Wow, where to start? I'd been hearing about a schoolmate of Kevin and Brian, someone who is fighting cancer. He'd missed some school, but was playing T-Ball and seemed active. Then we heard about a prayer vigil - it looked like Cooper's fight had taken a definite turn for the worst. Cooper continues to fight his battle against Neuroblastoma, but frankly, the prognosis is not good. You can read more about Cooper and his family here: Cooper's website.
So, our TnT team is riding this weekend in honor of Cooper. Originally we were going to ride on Mt. Hamilton, but the route has been changed to a very scenic, but very tough, 100 mile route starting in SF, heading out to the Marin headlands, the Nicasio Wall, some other climbs and then climbing Mt. Tamalpais. We'll have another weekend with close to 10,000 feet of climbing in one day. Cooper's positive attitude is an inspiration - reading the guest book at Caring Bridge makes it clear how many lives he's touched. Our prayers and thoughts are with you, Cooper!
In the Meantime
It's been a few weeks since I last posted - so I've got updates on a couple of rides. Both were long and hard - each one was a significant step up from the rides we had been doing.
The first is a classic ride on the peninsula that our coaches call "Upenuff". Silly name, isn't it? Turns out that it is named after a street on our first climb of the day, up Old la Honda. The street is about 3/4ths of the way up, and rumor has it that Eric Heiden, the former speed skater, used to live there. What is confirmed is that Eric Heiden used to own th
e record for fastest climb up Old la Honda - less than 15 minutes! It took me longer - a lot longer. The first picture is our ride group at a rest stop after climbing Old la Honda.Old la Honda climbs a ridgeline that separates Silicon Valley from the much more rural coastline. We continued west, descending and then climbing and finally getting to the coast. It was a beautiful day - ideal riding conditions. The 2nd photo is from road called Pescadero (it also leads to a town by the same name. Coincidence? I think not). This part of the ride became much more rural - after leavi
ng the area just south of Palo Alto behind it's kind of a shock to be riding somewhere this undeveloped.The ride culminated with one of the toughest climbs in the Bay Area - Tunitas Creek. The road is about 10 miles long, with a long hard climb taking up more than 6 miles of that. Oh, and it goes up something like 2,000 feet. The steep part is really steep, and it just seems to go on forever. An old problem cropped up on this climb - my lower back tightened up and got very painful. I'm going to have to stretch and work on my core a lot between now and the Death Ride!
Terrible Two
The Terrible Two is a double century bicycle ride in Sonoma. Yup - you read that correctly - it's a 200 mile long ride. In one day.
This is one of the hardest doubles in California, and our ride last weekend covered almost all of the climbs from the Terrible Two - in a 100 mile ride. We ended up climbing well over 10,000 feet, and the ride basically took all day - it was tough.
Take a look at the ride profi
le - almost all of the climbing is in the first 60 miles - we had just shy of 9,000 feet of climbing by mile 60 - an insane amount of climbing! The climb up from Ft. Ross (the last double summit on the map) was really tough - both very steep and long. My back was bothering me again, which really didn't help. We all made it, though! Here's a photo of a lot of the team at the top of the Ft. Ross climb.We started early - really early. I've also attached a photo of one of our recumbent riders climbing the first hill as the sun rises behind him. This ride was beautiful - one of the nices rides I've been on. The thought of doing the Terrible Two started crossing my mind - then I remembered the pain of those climbs - never mind! Once my back
loosened up, I felt pretty good for the last 40 miles or so and the relatively easy (we fought 20mph winds all the way back) return to our starting point. A long, hard but satisfying ride!Finally, a group of us returned to Mt. Diablo yesterday. We decided to go up to the halfway point twice instead of doing one long climb. After the tough weekend, this seemed easy! The steep parts that bothered me in the past weren't as big a deal, and it was a nice way to spend an afternoon (good thing I have an understanding boss!).
JB
I almost forgot - the fundraising continues! If you want to make me ride more, you've got some catching up to do! My mileage is close to double the amount we've raised so far - go ahead, make me ride more! Jon's TnT fundraising website
