Jun 07 2010

LA River Ride Century

Published by at 6:33 pm under Biking,Declan,Friends,Fun,Uncategorized

EDIT: Awesome! Kitchen just posted the Garmin log:

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/36057011

Time: 07:22:09
Moving Time: 06:02:09
Elapsed Time: 07:22:11
Avg Speed: 12.9 mph
Avg Moving Speed: 15.8 mph
Max Speed: 32.8 mph

I survived my second century ride, the LA River Ride!

That’s 100 miles on a bike… and I’m feeling all of them today 🙂 I really should have taken the day off of work, but I didn’t know I was riding before my Monday had already filled up with meetings. I was going to pass on this ride until I remembered that my buddy Tom lives right next to Griffith Park in LA where the ride begins. Tom and Jen just had a new arrival 7 months ago, Charlie:

Mobile Photo Jun 7, 2010 9 55 32 AM

Charlie’s the pudgy one with short hair… 😉 He’s a delightful kid who was a lot of fun to play with. So’s Tom! Sorry, Jen, I didn’t get a good picture of you… 🙂

Anyway, they let me crash on their couch on Saturday night after another buddy, Terri, cooked us a wonderful pasta dinner.

Sunday came too soon and I was up at 5am with cool SMSs from work friends wishing me well. I got outside and started putting the bike together:
IMG_0028

then waited for Kitchen to show up. Of course, he set his alarm wrong and was way late, so I biked the 2 miles over to the park alone to get my registration materials.

IMG_0032

The ride was well organized and I had my bracelet and cue sheet within minutes. On the ride over, I’d noticed that my bike computer was dead, so I borrowed a way-too-big screw driver and got it open in about 20 minutes. It all worked when I shifted the battery around, then promptly died again when I snapped it back into its holder. Damn computers… Kitchen has a fancy pants Garmin bike computer, so I’m counting on him to give me the route and all the stats. Well, I should say he SHOULD have one, but he left it in his car, so when he showed up at 7:30, we picked it up as we started the ride:

IMG_0034

Then we were off on this almost totally flat 100 mile ride! Except they forgot to tell us that the first 4 miles was a climb up the big hill in Griffith Park. That got the heart pumping, especially Kitchen’s as he was riding his brand new fixed gear bike! He had to zig zag up the hill, but he make it! Throughout the ride, people were very impressed with his bike and the effort. They didn’t know he had a motor hidden in the tubes… 🙂 not.

Once we were through the park, we got on the river path:

IMG_0036

The LA River is a concrete bank with water running at the bottom. It runs for miles and makes for a great bike path, but man, it’s kinda ugly. In some places, enough silt has backed up to support trees and bushes. I was surprised how much bird life I saw. Sand pipers, some kind of white hawk, kestrels, and ducks. It might be an interesting place to go up and photograph. I’ll have to go learn about why it was built the way it was. At the very least, many parts of it are a lesson in why to think about aesthetics when you design a city.

Mobile Photo Jun 7, 2010 9 53 56 AM

There are a lot of scary creatures in there too:

Mobile Photo Jun 7, 2010 9 53 43 AM

I liked these bridges:

IMG_0068

As a spoiled San Diegan, I mostly find LA pretty ugly:

IMG_0044

IMG_0043

Mobile Photo Jun 7, 2010 9 53 15 AM

but Seal Beach was pretty nice:

IMG_0059

Long Beach was the halfway point:

IMG_0054

A mess of bikes:

IMG_0052

Friggin’ hipster:

IMG_0077

More riding:

Mobile Photo Jun 7, 2010 9 53 56 AM

More posing:

IMG_0064

Then finally, after seven hours, it’s over!!!

Mobile Photo Jun 7, 2010 9 52 49 AM

Time to grab the tshirt and go find a shower!

Mobile Photo Jun 7, 2010 9 52 35 AM

I got some great support on Twitter and Facebook! Thanks for that!

2 responses so far

2 Responses to “LA River Ride Century”

  1. Jennifer Driessenon 08 Jun 2010 at 9:48 am

    Ooooh, I am so out of the loop – need to manage my Twitter announcements better. Isn’t that the same guy you rode the first one with? Looks like you had too much fun – if there’s anybody I’d like to do my first century with, it would be you. . . . someone who appears to know how to do it in style. . . congratulations, buddy!

  2. declanon 08 Jun 2010 at 9:53 am

    Thanks! Yep, Kitchen is my century wife…. 😉

    Do you bike? Let’s get you out there!

Trackback URI | Comments RSS

Leave a Reply