Raod-bike Downhill Race?!?

[97CSI]

Anyone seen the listing on Velonews for the "Roadbike Downhill Race"? Supposedly Hincapie and 25 other top pro's will be racing (or, at least they've been invited). Not just the fastest down the hill, but 4-up racing, etc. Disc brakes are recommended. Seems pretty much 'only in America' type of thing to me.

[Bill Bove]

Just like when we were kids :banana: They should make it really interesting and have them race on Big Wheels, do they still make them?

[lnomalley]

you should see the canyon that they are going to descend. steep, crap roads, off camber diminishing radius turns. one of the scariest long descents around the coast (tuna canyon). yeeeeikes.

[tuco]

Anyone seen the listing on Velonews for the "Roadbike Downhill Race"? Supposedly Hincapie and 25 other top pro's will be racing (or, at least they've been invited). Not just the fastest down the hill, but 4-up racing, etc. Disc brakes are recommended. Seems pretty much 'only in America' type of thing to me.

It's not April 1st ... yet I remain skeptical.
_http://www.velonews.com/pr/prn/articles/8720.0.html

Full body armor required?

From another (automotive) site,
_http://www.mulhollandraceway.org/MHR/roads/tuna_cny.html

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Tuna Cny Rd: A perfect 5 on our 5 scale, south of Saddle Peak Rd -

Ever wonder where Satan and his 29 virgins live? They live on Tuna Cny Rd, between PCH and Saddle Peak, where brave drivers descend, save who may, 2,600 feet in 4.5 miles (!).

Somewhat indicative of Georg Hegel's perception of an atomistic synergy, thesis plus antithesis equals synthesis, where convergent phenomena never meant to occupy coincidental place in time and space catalyzes the aggravating, diabolical externalities that inevitably befall us, Tuna Cny Rd road is our "Eleanor" (reference to the cult film classic "Gone in 60 Seconds"; you do not belong on this web site if you have to ask for our active reading on Eleanor). This short, little 4.25 mile run? Never goes right. Pisses me off...

Let it be written: Drive Tuna Cny Rd enough, you will shunt. Tuna Canyon Rd is our equivalent to NASCAR's Darlington: Frustrating. If it's not one thing, it's another. There are always surprises on Tuna Canyon. It never drives the same twice. I have never had a perfect run on Tuna Cny... and, I never will.

Tuna Canyon Road is unique. There is no other road like it. From Saddle Peak Rd to Pacific Coast Hwy, it's only 4.25 miles. But, there is no other downhill in the world that's so easy to make a mistake on. Mile for mile, no other road possesses a greater axiom for pissing you off than Tuna Cny Rd.

Recall Porsche's 917 that dominated LeMans? So dominant was it that, in 1971, it set a distance record at LeMans that still stands over thirty years later. However, in Italy's Mille Migle and it's Targio Florio, Porsche's 917 wasn't only uncompetitive, the fundamental concept of this car was entirely wrong. Similarly, Tuna Cny Rd is proof positive track performance correlates imperfectly to canyon driving. Henceforth, Corvette, Aston Martin, Jaguar, Ferrari, McLaren, Lamborghini, NSX, and Porsche drivers? Take our advice: Spend your tread elsewhere. If you drive a Lotus Exige, a Mini Cooper, a 2002, a boat tail ALFA, a Datsun 510, an X-19 Fiat, a Lancia Scorpion, Miata, or an early MR2 (all but the former two, with a big brake upgrade), then Tuna Cny is your kind of place.

Tuna Cny is a great equalizer: It's not that pricy, status GTs won't be fast down Tuna Cny. They'll be no faster than a well driven Camaro.

Tuna Cny places a premium on lightweight vehicles with superb brakes, and it rewards drivers with ample bravery. It demands a supra normal confidence interval in your brakes. Given one question, this road would ask: "How much faith do you have in your brakes?" Take our advice: Cars over 3000 lbs? Tread elsewhere. It's dangerous, even on a bicycle.

North of Saddle Peak Rd, Tuna Cny is a two lane continuation of Fernwood Pacific, one lane going either way. South of Saddle Peak, it narrows to subsequently become a one way road, southbound traffic only, that spills out to the Pacific Ocean, between Sunset, and Las Flores Cny. Such a shame: From the beach inland, Tuna Cny would otherwise constitute the Santa Monica Mountain's best hill climb. As it is, it constitutes it's most problematical down hill. It has three redundant stop signs for which there are no intersections.

These three redundant stop signs are located exactly 1.6 miles, 3.0 miles, and 3.5 miles downrange, south of Saddle Peak Cny Road. The only important stop sign, the fourth one, at 4.25 miles, is PCH. That one, in particular, you'll have to take seriously.

Poor to fair visibility, variable poor to fair surface conditions, with perennial debris laden braking areas as a function of ephemeral runoff and mass wasting, Tuna Cny Rd is the only one-way canyon road in Southern California; it's the only place in the Santa Monica range where you won't have to worry about oncoming traffic. But, watch out for bicycles pedaling the wrong way (!). Coincidentally, of all the canyon roads in the Santa Monica ranges, the Tuna Cny downhill constitutes the toughest canyon road on brakes. Short straightaways, where speed bursts of 80-90 mph are punctuated by heavy braking areas, extremely sharp 1st and 2nd gear switch backs and hairpins that lie to either end of these short chutes demand more arresting force than what any car over 2600 lbs with single pot brake calipers can muster. Few of these switch backs have armco. Very few opportunities to pass on this one lane road. Despite its proximity to population clusters, Tuna Cny south of Saddle Peak is second only to Yerba Buena insofar as population density (nobody lives there). Prone to pea soup fog during transitional seasons, it is an area prone to mass wasting as a function of diurnal temperature variation in tandem with antecedent moisture.

Drives best at night (no bicycles going the wrong way!), under a full moon, in tiny lightweight vehicles with big brake upgrades. Having previously rated this road a 4 on our five scale, we've reconsidered. It deserves a perfect 5/5. A love/hate thing, next time we drive it, we'll probably downgrade it again. The time thereafter, back to a 5.

XXX ADVISORY: Watch out for the blind, flat out L/R chicane. Although this chicane can be taken foot-flat in any vehicle, if you do you won't make the subsequent 1st gear, hairpin left that becomes visible only after exiting the chicane that proceeds it. Going hammer down through that chicane, upon exiting you'll look straight ahead and say: "Ahh ****." I've made this mistake twice (!). If you find yourself in this predicament, just stay cool, stay hard on your brakes, scrub off as much speed as you can, and try not to grind down too much enamel. There's no Armco there, so you'll wind up nose first, into a soft road-cut of exfoliating rock embedded in subducted, uplifted, sheered pliocene marine sediment. At the penultimate moment, steer slightly to the right to equalize the impact, midpoint, along your front bumper. That way, all you'll have to do is replace your bumper and air dam. You'll have scrubbed off 90% of your velocity, so you won't be going fast enough to do any significant damage. That hairpin constitutes perhaps the best place on Tuna Cny to overcook it. You'll be pissed off, equivalent to 6 figures, but the most damage I've ever done there is 500 bux, or so.

NUSIANCE ADVISORY: Arguably, of the most anal retentive of residents in the Santa Monica Mountains seem to cluster here. Tuna Canyon Road is their oyster. Nosy busybodies; nothing better to do with their time than trying to figure out how to get a life, we suggest you avoid them...like the plague.

Stay tuned: Next time I go back, I'm going to run the odometer from Saddle Peak down to that chicane, then replace the cartography, above, with a larger scale map. I'll also have a turn count for you, as well.
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