Memorial ride for Glenn Corlew

I lost my father, Glenn Corlew, on Saturday morning. I needed to get tired and turn off my head, and at the same time, remember him. I decided to ride up Mt. Diablo as a memorial. Several of my supportive bikeforums.net friends joined me and my sweet wife for a wonderful ride. Thanks to you all.

Photo by Irene Hightower. I hope she doesn't mind.

The joy of hill repeats

When Dan (LanceOldStrong on Bikeforums.net) said we'd put a stone on the bumper every time we got to the top of the hill again, I thought he was being funny. But after three I had no idea how many we'd done and was glad for the pebbles.

As part of our assault on the California Triple Crown 1000-miles-worth-of-doubles jersey, we plan to attempt the Knoxville Double. We've got three doubles under our belts, but this one has a lot more climbing. To train we've decided to commit one night a week to pain, with no fun.

Our first effort was hill repeats up Avila Road in Bay Point, a dead end road that runs next to Highway 4 over the Willow Pass. Each .7 mile trip up averages just over 9 percent. We did eight. I tried to keep my heart rate above 90% max on each. During one silly "I'm in the tour" moment I was reading 99.

It sure wasn't fun, but I'm hoping it helps make my next double century a success. Because two weeks after Knoxville is the Bass Lake Powerhouse Double...

Mt. Hamilton

LanceOldStrong of Bikeforums.net and I had never ridden up the famed Mt. Hamilton. It's a classic SF Bay Area ride, so we figured we'd better get it done this summer. It was a stellar day, so sunscreen was in order. More is better, too much is just right.

The ride up is about 20 miles, with a couple of short downhill sections in the middle. The whole thing makes for just a bit over 5000 feet of climbing. Since the road was built to haul up huge parts for the Lick Observatory it never gets steeper than about a six percent grade. That makes for a very nice ride indeed. The observatory is old school UC Berkeley architecture. It makes you feel smarter just from walking through it. It's really a beautiful place.
The ride back down is a blast. It isn't as steep or as technical as Diablo, so you can feel almost like you're skiing it without thinking that you might miss a corner any second. The pavement was a delight, especially near the bottom, where it's baby-butt smooth. All in a all it's a very rewarding 40 mile round trip.

We're thinking about doing a future ride as a 100+ mile loop from Livermore, and up the back side. It's supposed to be a bit harder, and it's over 100 miles.

We were wearing our new Northern California gear. Our fans seem to love it.

New Northern California BikeForums kit

The kits I designed for the gang at the (take a breath) "BikeForums.net Northern California sub forum" finally arrived. With a lot of help from Tricia and daughter Erin I mailed out a bus load of USPS flat rate envelopes filled with jerseys, vests shorts and bibs. I ordered myself a jersey, summer jersey, long sleeve fleece jacket/jersey, bibs and knickers and was releaved when they came that I do indeed actually like the design.

Tricia got shorts and a jersey. I made photos of her after 25 fast miles in 90 degree heat and she's still talking to me.
Champion Systems did the work on the jerseys, and did a nice job. I particularly like their summer jersey, which has mesh bits that keep you cool, but doesn't look like mesh.

The kit is getting a pretty good review in the forums, and I didn't mail anyone the wrong size, so life is good.