Eroica California 2019

[choke]

A friend on Bikeforums was wise enough to rent a house for the weekend and we filled it up. Forum member Spaghetti Legs also stayed there. On Fri night we had dinner at Linns with a special guest in attendence who then came back to the house to regale us with bike stories.....none other than Jim Merz.




Alex Singer tandem and some detail shots







I have never seen a one piece Ti stem and bar. This is on a Passoni.



This Wilier was made with Columbus MS....one of ten made with that tubing according to the owner.



Elephant seals lounging on the beach

[Spaghetti Legs]

Originally Posted by cgolvin

For some reason I posted over in 'Photos from your rides': https://forums.thepaceline.net/showp...postcount=3308

I really enjoyed myself, it was a special time with my brother and I enjoyed riding with Mark H. Was hoping to recognize a few other Pals but only remembered Spaghetti Legs' Moser from the advance discussion and didn't see it. Met a delightful young Italian woman, a journalist, who told me she had a particular affinity for Gios because she is good friends with Alberto's nephew. [Edit] Here's a photo of her between the two of us:

Sorry to miss you, I definitely would have remembered the Gios/Brooklyn kit. I have a friend with the same kit/bike who did the short route. My riding mates wanted to start early to avoid the worst heat on the hard climbs, so we were 0600, probably first group of the 80 miler route. Definitely a harder ride this year with the climbs later in the day and the rest stop fuel, in general, wasn't as good. I was very, very close to blowing up my legs with full on cramps but made it up. Next year, I'll bring my salt tablets along. I gorged on the chicken rice soup at Hallter Ranch because it was the only salt I could find all day.

Apologies for the non-matching jersey (I do own a Wilier though), my Gelati Sanson jersey is too small!

[rccardr]

Rode with Mark and CGolvin for a while, I think on Cedar Mountain, but it might jave been Kiler Canyon. Mark's new Bianchi is Sweeeet.

Beauiful weather, much warmer than forecast. Food and organization not as good as previous years (this is my fourth) but fellowship as always was awesome.

Didn't stay at the Bridge Street Inn, but did partake of their hospitality several times. Great group of people!

No surprise, the Davidson performed flawlessly, nice 25mph run down to Cayucos, then the easiest roll ever up to to and over Santa Rita Road (my fave part of the course). Great Tin City rest stop.

Then the day got A Whole Less Pleasant. Kiler was a nightmare, freshly plowed amd graded, with soft 4" deep surface for about two miles...whicj softened me up for Cypress, always a challenge.

Back side of Cypress, crappy surface and super steep downhill as usual. Maybe worse this year due to erosion, as I saw several riders ahead of me overshoot turns.

Last 10 miles were hard, mostly because I was completely blown up. Changing the starting point, I think, made the course much more difficult. Or perhaps I'm just, you know, older. At 68.

[mhespenheide]

I rode with Charlie ("cgolvin") and his brother for almost the whole ride, as we met up at the Cayucos pier and rode the rest of the ~80 mile route. I had thought it was basically the former "Coastal" route with a different start/stop point, but it did have a different section from Templeton to Kiler Canyon, which omitted going through Paso Robles entirely. Rode with rccardr for a while on Kiler.

The climb up and out of Cayucos was easier than ever, with fresh legs. But Kiler was a beast this year, and then I cramped up on the Cypress Mountain climb. Overall, I think the route was definitely harder in this direction, particularly since the winds were offshore in the morning and onshore in the afternoon (as usual), but that meant headwinds both ways.

The Bianchi did great. I, on the other hand, should have drunk more water in the early stages. With the coastal fog and overcast clouds, I got lulled into a false sense of security and paid for it with the cramps later. I thought the weather was near-perfect, with (for me) temperatures not too cold in the morning and not too hot in the afternoon.

I still love that descent off Cypress down Santa Rita Creek road, but I also run pretty wide tires and pretty modern brakes, so I guess I'm cheating a bit in that regard.

I still love the day and encourage everyone nearby to try it out. The restrictions, in my opinion, add to the fun.


(Thanks again, Charlie and Ben!)

[cgolvin]

Originally Posted by mhespenheide

I still love that descent off Cypress down Santa Rita Creek road, but I also run pretty wide tires and pretty modern brakes, so I guess I'm cheating a bit in that regard.

I'm generally a pretty good descender (though with less confidence running 23s on dirt) …but Mark pretty much disappeared as soon as we rolled off that summit. If he didn't have a huge grin on his face while doing so it was only to avoid consuming a large amount of insect protein.

I second his recommendation, Eroica is a great experience.

[mhespenheide]

I absolutely had a giant smile descending Cypress mountain.





Mildly OT, but I thought during the ride that Cypress Mountain and Santa Rosa Creek Road were pretty enough to drive back up there, bring the big camera and tripod, and make some serious attempts at photography. Here's a few from last Friday and Saturday evenings, with the oaks sporting their new spring green leaves, backlit mosses, panoramas looking west from Cypress, and lupine. It's rare for us to get hills this green, so enjoy!







With the sun right on the horizon:


About 15 minutes after "true" sunset; the blues of the hillsides are lupine:


Lupine on Cypress Mountain:



//edit: dang, those are huge images. Sorry about that; I'll try to look into why they're so big.//

[Jad]

The light and the vibrant greens, oaks, and lupine are extraordinary. What a place to ride and see. Thanks for taking and sharing.