Saturday Half Century
Lately, I’ve had a routine for my Saturday rides on which I almost always ride exactly the same route every time. Usually, that’s because I’ve stayed up late on Friday night, gotten up about 10 or 11 in the morning, and eaten lunch late enough that I have to push to complete my mileage by sunset, which almost always fails—I frequently get home well after sunset. So, in order to have an easy-to-think-about route, I jump on the same route every time.
Today, there was a slight variation, because another company is working on either the lights or the road on Santa Cruz Avenue between Sand Hill and Junipero Serra. For those of you not in the area, this stretch of road, a mere tenth of a mile, has been the bane of my existence lately. There’s been construction on this little stretch every Saturday for eons. I’m usually coming from the northwest on the first pass, with the idea of continuing straight down Alpine Road to climb up to Portola Valley. After the Portola / Woodside Loop, the idea is to come through this same stretch of road, except taking Junipero Serra east for the second part of my Saturday route. On the third pass, I’m heading the opposite direction, but it’s usually after five by then, so the work crews have gone home.
Today, traffic was diverted and I had to loop around through Stanford University. Of course, I couldn’t loop back, so I looked at my map and decided to change my route slightly. I’ve never climbed Page Mill before and it was really spectacular. I had also never climbed Arastradero to Portola Valley before, but it was the only way to get through Portola Valley. I had a little less than three hours until sunset, which was not nearly enough time to replot a whole different route. The hills up Arastradero aren’t very challenging to cyclists on nice light road bikes, but my heavy ass with my heavy trunk bag against the wind…I got a decent climbing workout.
I continued my customary route through downtown Woodside and down Woodside Road, where I really hoped to spin up in my tightest gear and go for 45 mph. I missed that mark by 2 miles an hour, but the feeling of the wind and gravity and that big 52 tooth ring grinding along as I leaned into my drops and ducked out of the wind—that’s pure ecstasy.
I finished my half-century day with a 30 mile round trip toward Outfitter, raced the sunset (such as it was) and struggled against a 15 mph headwind home, and closed out my loop by zooming around the impeccably smooth Atherton Avenue in the dark and got home exhausted and happy that the sun stayed out enough this week for me to throw a good number in my log book.
Today : 51.24 mi in 2:47:08 (18.4 mph avg / 43.0 mph max)
February: 508.02 mi in 27:12:27 (18.7 mph avg / 43.0 mph max)
2005 : 1023.25 mi in 55:18:41 (18.5 mph avg / 43.0 mph max)
Goal : 5000.00 mi (3976.75 mi to go : 20.47% complete)
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