Germany

Rental car: Renault scenic. Can't figure out how to turn Navigation on. Electronic dashboard does not show km traveled, only liters gasoline used (4280). Gas gauge signals empty so we stop at Shell to find out it was full. Attendant does not understand "restroom" but eventually gives us change for toilet fee. Espresso from a vending machine tastes better than Starbucks. Great dinner in a fancy Chinese restaurant where we were the only guests. Onto Brenner Pass to Austria and Italy today.

Long Distance Weekend

Both Marketa and I were quite busy with preparations for the April 21-22 weekend: her mostly dealing mentally with tapering before the San Louis Obispo Marathon, which meant no running for three days and worrying about various body parts that gave her trouble on past long runs. It also included a hope that her new Hoka One-One shoes, tested on one 24 mile run, will be a smart choice for 26.2 miles of pavement.

My anxiety stemmed from the fact that I had just one chance to test my road bike touring setup, which I intend to use in second half of May on a multi-day tour through California and perhaps even a bit of Oregon. I chose a Topeak aluminum rack and two yellow waterproof Ortlieb panniers. The mounting system on Ortliebs is very clever and worked as advertised. For tires, I used 32c Vittoria Randonneur, mainly for their triple puncture protection, but they barely fit through the brake calipers. And as the picture below shows (taken with a flash), they have reflective walls!

So off we were on Saturday, driving south on 101 in a 95F heat. The weather was supposed to cool down somewhat on Sunday, but this was the first heat wave of the year and we both worried as we have done no training above 70F. But on the marathon Expo grounds in SLO, it was pleasant 75F.

The plan for Sunday was for Marketa to hop on a bus shuttling runners to the start and me leaving the car at a hotel nearby the finish, then taking off on the bike. Meeting point: Monterey's Cannery Row.
We are both up at 1:30AM, then again at 2:30AM. We make coffee (the Vagabond Inn variety, yuck!) and she is ready for it at 4AM (two hours to the start).

There is a dense fog outside and the temperature may be 55F, feels freezing. While Marketa tries to keep herself warm at the start area, I find a 24hr IHOP and decide to have an international breakfast.

Hmm, one might think we are in France... but then I settle for a 4-stack of pancakes with bananas and strawberries. The "fruit" and the "syrup" on the pancakes smells really awful, no wonder, these things are petroleum products. It took me good 30 minutes to consume this "food", presumably worth 760 calories.
I got going around 6:30, wearing all warm accessories I brought for this trip, except a Gore rain jacket. In fog and drizzle, I stuffed my dark sunglasses in the jersey pocket, thinking that by the time I get to the coast, it will be sunny. Fourteen miles later, at Morro Bay, I'm soaked, water dripping from my helmet, and I am cold. Highway 1 north towards Cayucos is almost flat, so no hills to warm up. I pass a town of Harmony, pop. 18, as well as Cambria, resisting to check out the huge Cambria Bike Outfitters store, on my way to San Simeon.

The weather continues to be gray, but the drizzle stops eventually and it is not too unpleasant. The coast starts to get rugged and the road goes up and down somewhere around Ragged Point.

 There is a little traffic, basically I see a handful of cars and motorcycles, and after a while I realize these are the same vehicles, their tourist owners make frequent stops and then pass me again. I am glad I am going north,  though. It means I am on the "mountain" side of the highway and if a car or an RV gets little bit too close, I don't have to be riding two feet from the cliff, like the riders going south. There are no other bicyclists in my direction, but plenty of people going south. The weather is perfect by now, 65F and dry, although the marine layer is thick and occasionally I am being enshrouded by the fog at higher elevations. I make couple of stops, one at Gorda, another one at Big Sur, for coffee, hot chocolate and muffins.
Then all of the sudden, just north of Point Big Sur, the fog clears, opening beautiful views of the coast.

 Wind starts blowing, too. From the south, lucky me! I gave Marketa a rough estimate of my arrival at the Monterey Aquarium, but I am way faster, with strong tailwind doing 22-23 mph even uphill. I make Carmel Heights in no time and leave Highway 1 just past Point Lobos to ride around the peninsula, but somehow miss the 17 mile drive, only to find it again and climbing what seems like forever, before dropping down to Asilomar Beach. The last ten miles are painful, my (famous) butt is not too happy about the broken pavement and stops in heavy people and car traffic.

I arrive around 5:30PM, after 150 miles and 9500 feet of climbing, ready for a nice seafood dinner.
Marketa's marathon time was 4:28, way to go baby!

Run - Bike - Ski

Three days, three different sports, all made me feel pretty good. Friday, it was an out and back run on Sawyer Camp Trail, which would have been 12.6 almost all flat miles, but the obsessive part of me pushed me 0.5 mile further to make it a 13.1mi. Time: sluggish 1:54. But that's six minutes faster than my 2010 Kauai half marathon! Well, that course is very hilly.

Saturday, a road bike ride over the hump (aka the Skyline ridge) to the Pacific coast. First, warm and sunny Canada Rd and Woodside, then a nice climb on OLH, fantastic views descending the western part of Old La Honda Rd, big push into hurricane winds coming to San Gregorio, but rewarded by the bucolic California farmland sight on Stage Rd:

A mandatory stop at the Tunitas Farm bike hut:

Then entering the green and brown refrigerator of redwoods along the Tunitas Road climb, with the Tunitas Creek raging after recent rains:

and finally back down to the warm valley. GPS track here.

Sunday: skiing at south lake Tahoe, namely Sierra at Tahoe. A foot and a half of almost fresh snow, but that "almost" turned it into a deep slush. Warm, sunny day, tough skiing off the groomed runs, finished off with a great cup of latte at Cosmic Cafe in Placerville. Life is tough....

My Butt Is Finally Famous!

On Easter Sunday, I went for a bike ride with Jill Homer, whose blog I follow. Jill is an author of several books, an adventurer, and her ultra-cycling and ultra-running resume is too long to list here. Her blog has about 1300 followers! Her rides are an inspiration for me, although I know most of them are out of my reach due to my physical limitations and old age.
So first, I was stoked that she joined me for a bike ride, I think mainly because she was still recovering from her recent extreme snow biking race in Alaska. You can read all about it on her blog, but I cannot imagine being so tired that you need to take power naps in the middle of a bike ride and yet plan another 5 hour "recovery ride".
We started up Windy Hill, on a steep climb where I usually walk a few sections. We rode the hills at human pace, the difference being me completely out of breath at the top and Jill showing no oxygen deficits.
Secondly, she took this picture of me on Windy Hill and posted it her recent blog entry, thanks Jill!

Besides the fact that I enjoyed having company on a sunny day ride, I gained more confidence that the "Ronda Grande" distance of the Garda Marathon (86.6 km and 2705m vertical) should be doable.

Running in the rain

It seems that mother Nature is trying to catch up on the hydro deficit of December to February now in March. We are getting soaked and so are the trails. It is good of course and the vegetation responds with an explosion of green mass. My nose, eyes and ears respond to the pollen amounts with tears and itching. Whenever there is a rain free day, I go to run some of the neighborhood trails, either the XC course or Edgewood Park. On Sunday, the wet weather started as a drizzle, but the forecast called for drier conditions in South Bay. We drove to Los Altos for a jog down memory lane, or to be specific, down the Steven's Creek trail. We found the trail to be now extended further west, to the level of Cuesta Park. We ran four miles out to the Computer history museum and back for a total of eight miles. We were soaked but after a while, it did not matter much. One lesson learned, though: guys, when running in wet weather wearing multiple layers, tape your nipples!

Monday this week seemed like the only dry day of the week, so I went out for a longer road bike ride to get at least some miles in before the Garda race. It was a steady pace mostly flat riding down the valley south towards Cupertino, but Los Altos hills on Elena and Redwood Gulch from Steven's creek to Highway 9 as well as Mt. Eden road hills added some variety to the ride.



First Spring 70-miler by jan.r.berka at Garmin Connect - Details

So what's next? Biking in the rain? Horror! Not unless I'm forced to! I hope it snows a lot in the Sierras this week.....

2012 Biking and Running Events

At the beginning of 2012, I have scribbled some biking race names and dates on a large sticky note. This is an online version of that list, since the glue on the piece of paper is not holding very well and I am sure the note will get lost soon. It is by no means a "race calendar" or a list of races I am planning to attend, rather a reminder of how many cool events there are nearby and one could register for some, assuming the legs feel good, the race hasn't sold out etc, etc....

April 14-15     Santa Cruz mountain bike festival

April 15     Napa Valley Dirt Classic

April 19-22     Sea Otter Classic

April 22     San Luis Obispo Marathon 

April 28     Garda Sympatex MTB marathon, Rive del Garda, Italy (I'm registered)

May 5     Tour of the unknown coast century (rode it in 2010, absolutely scenic and challenging road century, but I will be in Europe this year)

May 5     Boggs 8-hour (Bikemonkey event, another scheduling conflict, bummer, as I heard this one is beautiful)

May 13-15     Tour of California (not riding, going to watch it!)

May 15-30     A placeholder for a road trip with John?

May 19     Weaverville 6 hrs (Team Bigfoot)

June 2     SoNoMas

June 8-10     Hammerstein 8/24

June 16     Tahoe 4/8 hrs 

July 22     Tahoe Trail 100 (60mi)

July 28     Arcata 6/12 hrs

August 18     Annadel XC race

August 25     Kirkwood 9-5

September 1     Kirkwood 6 hrs Enduro

September 4     Kauai Marathon

September 29     Levi Leipheimer's Gran Fondo

October 6     Whiskeytown 9-5

October 14     Sugar Pine 50 miler

October 21     TBF Racing 50 miles at Folsom Lake

Spring Break on the Divide

Spring break means a chance to experience winter and go skiing, since the signs of spring have been all around us since about the end of January here in Northern California. This March, in a strange whirlwind of events and news (mostly bad ones), we ended up in Keystone, CO.

It was Rocky Mountains skiing in style: we were upgraded to a 2-bedroom condo which could have easily accommodated six people and received discounted lift tickets from organizers of a conference I was attending. The weather was perfect, slopes nicely groomed, despite a general lack of snow, beer was OK, just the food, like in all American ski resorts really sucked.

We skied at Keystone, Breck and A-Basin (picture above), which I liked the most. On the way back to Denver, we drove over the Loveland Pass and the Continental Divide. Just running across the highway at 12,000 ft made me gasp for breath. I can hardly imagine riding a fully loaded bike up the pass during the GDR race, yet every year, many hardcore bikers accomplish that. Perhaps one day.... with spring here, it is time to get on the bike again.