Vengeance is MINE! Tierra Bella 2016

In 2008 I attempted my very first century (100 mile) bike ride. It was the Tierra Bella in Gilroy. The Tierra Bella is put on by the local cycling club there and had been a staple in the area for about 30 years. That year it was on April 19th, just 4 days after our big deadline at work. I ended up camping at the top of Henry Coe park the night before to get an early start and did not sleep well during the cold night at fairly high elevation. During the ride I "bonked" out around mile 60, meaning I pretty much ran out of gas. After a bit of a break at the top of the ride's big climb up Henry Coe, I rode back down the mountain and through to the finish line, but I cut out a 20 mile loop around the Gilroy Hot Springs.

I've always had a chip on my shoulder about not finishing this ride. So far, it's the only one that's beaten me. I started riding seriously in 2014 and have checked on the Tierra Bella every year to see if it was reasonable for me to attempt again. One year it was on April 12th. That's not happening. This year it was on April 30th. This was the best shot I was going to get to beat this ride. In February I registered for it and booked a local hotel room the night before so I would be as fresh as possible.

THe course opened at 7:00 am and I wanted to be starting at 6:45. I ended up starting at about 7:45 because the trip from my hotel room to the start line was a comedy of errors. I locked my key in the hotel room as I was leaving with one bag still left in there, decided I needed to stop at a store and buy a couple of things I don’t think I ended up even using, and missed my exit from the freeway to the starting line going about 10 miles out of the way. Then when I got I have all my repacking and pre-ride rituals that have to happen before I can even clip in and roll out. SMH. 

I was with the main group for the first half but got started falling behind up the climb to Henry Coe at mile 50. When I climb Mt. Diablo I can usually do it with just stopping once at the Junction campground for water, but I had to stop 3 times on the way up to Henry Coe. I forgot how steep it is. You're basically on the ridge line, so there are descents mixed in with the steep climb. I took a little longer break up there at the top than I wanted to. I felt tired, but strong. After a cup of ramen noodles and some other snacks I headed back down the mountain. 

After the decent down Henry Coe there is an ~8 mile flat section leading north and there was a nasty headwind. On mile ~70 this woman on an aero bike passed me on this stretch. I hopped on her wheel to draft her for a bit. I didn’t even bother offering help pull her at that point as she clearly had more legs than I did and I would have been way to slow for her. She pulled me for about 6 miles before I couldn't keep up with her anymore. 

During the final loops on mile ~80, I started noticing that the people riding my pace were starting to get rides in from the support and gear (SAG) vehicles. SAGs start rolling up on me fairly regularly now asking if I need anything or want a ride. No thank you! I gotta do this! I don’t care if I miss the meal at the end. I gotta do this. If you need to close the course you can have my wristband! 

Mile ~86 I came to an intersection with no route markers. This is never a good sign. I pulled over to check the route guide sheet and this guy in a truck rolls up with a bike in the bed. “You lost?” No. I’m good. “You’re on the Tierra Bella today?” Yeah. “Bad news, brother: you’ve got 8 miles of headwind that way” No, I already did that part. I’m on mile 86 headed back to Gavilan College. “Oh, then you missed Llagas. About a mile back you shoulda turned on Llagas.” *checks route* You’re right! Thanks man!

Tailwinds and adrenaline launched me past a few worn souls on the last 10 miles. The final tally was 104.8 miles, 6,643 ft elevation, 8:23:03 moving time, 10:56:11 total elapsed time. I got in about 20 minutes after they stopped serving dinner. Not bad for what amounts to about 5 training rides since the end of tax season. If there was an official finish line it was taken down by this point. I took a hobo bath in the men’s room at the sink and rode over to my truck, stretched, had a protein shake and changed right there in the empty parking lot.  

As I drove home I’m pretty sure I flipped the bird to the course. Vengeance is now MINE!!! I won’t have to do the Tierra Bella ever again!

2015 California Coast Classic - 9-26-2015 to 10-3-2015

Day 0 - Registration and the Golden Gate Bridge

Eager to meet up with so many friends that I haven't seen in a year, I left for registration after dropping off Andrew at school. He helped me pack ;-)
I had gear for myself, two friends, and a box and a duffle full of Team Carter apparel I'm hoping to distribute soon.
I got to go into the registration area early because Amy Robertson challenged me to a chocolate chip cookie throw-down! To our knowledge we are the only ones who sell cookies as a fundraising tactic. Since we're both cyclists and inherently competitive, we naturally had to figure out whose were better... I manned the booth for a couple of hours at the start.

It was an anonymous contest, but between you and me, mine were in the blue plate on the left, hers in the green plate on the right. She used a little more granulated sugar and salt than I do. It was funny how seriously participants too their judging responsibilities! The polls were pretty even at the end so Amy and I called a tie after each proposing that the other should be the winner!

After manning the station for a while I geared up to lead a late afternoon ride over the Golden Gate Bridge. I ended up taking about 10 riders with me. Here's 6 of us that opted to go out to Fort Pointe before we crossed. Some continued up over to Hawk Hill and down and around the headlands with me. It was a very pretty ride. About 22 miles by the time all was said and done.

Some people like to cross the GG Bridge and do this ride in the morning to avoid the winds. Since the fog doesn't usually clear out until the afternoon I like to go late and just deal with the wind.

And here is where my first of two crashes on this tour comes into play: heading back as we were just about to cross the bridge again to get back, I was shuffling to get out of traffic. There was a drainage grate that I didn't anticipate and it didn't have the horizontal safety bars. My front wheel went right in at slow speed and my bike dump trucked me over the handlebars! Didn't flip or anything but I smashed my finger and my elbow pretty good. My front wheel wouldn't spin either. I though I had damaged it but once I calmed down I reseated the quick-release and everything was fine!

On the way back I had one more thing to show those interested: Lombard Street! I had never ridden down it before and was excited to do so. I took them up Hyde Street, a wicked climb that was easily the hardest segment of the whole tour! 25%  grade at one point! It was all in good fun though and the ride down Lombard was awesome!

Day 1 - San Francisco to Santa Cruz
Today's morning honoree was Christiana Powery. Christiana was 10 years old when she died of complications stemming from juvenile rheumatoid arthritis (JRA) and juvenile dermatomyositis (JDMS). Both are auto-immune disorders and are forms of arthritis. Check out here story here: www.alsotouch.com.
This is why we ride. In today's modern day and age no child should ever have to suffer like this. "Athritis" is an umbrella term for muscular-skeletal joint and connective tissue inflamation disorders that covers over 100 types of diseases and ailments, and they are all related. There are 300,000 kids like Christiana and Carter in the US; more than all the kids with juvenile diabetes, cystic fibrosis, cerebral palsy and muscular dystrophy combined. Yet very few people I talk to know about this. Why? Let's do something about it!

After celebrating Christiana, all 300 of us gathered for a picture and headed out for Santa Cruz! My whole family was there and got so see me off. They surprised me with signs made the day before.
This was a longer day at 85 miles, but very scenic. Too scenic, apparently, to stop and take any pictures! Sorry about that...

Day 2 - Santa Cruz to Monterey
This is a shorter day as we just have to go around the bay. It's about 50 miles from Santa Cruz to Monterey so I tend to be one of the last ones out of camp on this day. There's usually something that happens that makes it worth it. This time it was one of the riders son's dancing to the complete song of Watch Me (Whip/Nae Nae).
This is the only picture I can find of this day this year. I'm sure I'll get more soon. There were about 15 of us on the tour that raised over $7500. If you raise at least that amount they call you one of the "High Roller$" and give you a special high fundraiser cycling jersey. This was my first year as a High Roller thanks to your generous donations! By the end of the tour, my final fundraising total was just over $20,200 making me the 4th highest fundraiser on the tour!

Day 3 - Monterey to Big Sur

Today was Team Jersey day! This was the first year for Team Carter. That's me on the far left. The bald guy (he actually just has super short hair) a knights move up and over to the right (next to the guy in the American Flag bandana) is Jerry Davis. I met Jerry on the 2014 ride. He got involved because his grandson Carter was diagnosed with a painful form of arthritis when he was 3. Jerry and I became friends on the 2014 ride and decided we should form a team for Carter for 2015. After all, my boys are Carter's age. It could easily be them. I spent a ton of time designing our jerseys and kits and working out logistics with Jerry this year, and this was the moment it pretty much all paid off! We had about 40 riders with us this year and there's only about 24 riders here. Some people in the hotels didn't get the memo or decided not to come in for picture time. 2015 was the team's first year; we're going to beef up communication for 2016...

This is the day we cross the famous Bixby Bridge, which always lends itself to some great photo-ops! Here's me, my buddy James Smith from high school that I recruited this year, and our teammate Megan Bent reppin' Team Carter!

Then once you get to the top of that big climb you of course have to take another one...

 Little did I know that this picture at the top of the Bixby Bridge would be the last one taken of this helmet intact and my bike in this particular configuration....

Which leads me to my second wreck of the tour! Well, that's debatable because since the first one was on Day 0 it was technically before the tour and therefore doesn't count. So, there's a wonderful descent down and around after this climb, followed by another bit of a climb out of a little bay and then a descent into a little meadow area. It was on this meadow, this false flat down, that James and I were sprinting away and having a grand ol' time, when all of a sudden my sprint pressure hits what must have been a damaged tooth on my front chain ring (big gear) and my chain fell off completely. This change from full sprint pressure resistance to absolutely no resistance forced my weight forward and to the right at a catastrophic rate. During the weight shift, I turned my handlebars completely to the right, stopping the bike almost instantly and flipping me over the handlebars at somewhere between 25 and 30 mph. I launched off my bike and twisted in the air somehow, landing on my upper back and skidding for a while before my head hit the ground and blew out my helmet. After a couple of tumbles I stopped, shook it off, and pulled myself off the road. James was a little in front of me when all this happened and circled back to help me clear my stuff off of Highway 1.
Cars stopped and asked if everything was OK. Somehow, it was. We had our phones and the numbers for support. We waived traffic on and got our bearings. In about 5-10 minutes a support van had come and taken my bike to camp (we were only about 5 miles away at this point) and Jett, the one in charge of Iconic (our logistical support) had come by in a car to take me to the local clinic to make sure I didn't have a concussion. Somehow I escaped all of this nonsense with only an abrasion on my left knee and shoulder. My gear, not so lucky. My rear derailleur did it's job perfectly and snapped clean in half, my seat had a big gouge in in, my rear wheel bent like a potato chip, and of course my helmet is done for.
This is why you always, always, ALWAYS wear a helmet, kids.

So now that I'm back in camp I go see the mechanics. They say my bike is toast for another day and a half until we get parts and that I'm in the cars tomorrow. No! Come on man! The doctor said I could ride! I wanna ride! PUT ME IN COACH!!! Big Sur to Cambria is my favorite day! I can't miss tomorrow...

Day 4 - Big Sur to Cambria
Somehow the AMAZING mechanics on this ride arranged a switcheroo and my trusty steed for the day would be a 1979 Raleigh complete with tension shifters on the downtube! Have I ever ridden with tension shifters before? Of course not! Is that going to stop me? Of course not! And I got a loaner helmet from my teammate Tyson who couldn't ride today. I'm all set! I just have one last score to settle regarding the crash...

One thing I'm not interested in doing on this ride is having a car carry me. I'm an EFI rider baby! EFI stands for Every Fantastic Inch (or another F word of your chosing...). I have the issue of the car ride I got yesterday from the crash site to the health clinic and then back to camp. I have to ride every inch of this tour. I'm not going to let this little wreck stop me. Instead of turning south to go the rest of the route, I head north. I want to get back to that crash site to fully connect the dots on this tour. For some reason, my GPS tracker started the day at 5 miles, so when I looked down a while later and noted that I was at mile 7, I thought I may have passed it. James and the Jett both said it was about 5 miles out. I continued another mile or two and, not recognizing anything, and decided that I must have passed it. I don't mind adding 15 miles to today after a big crash, but I don't want to add 20. When I got back home I checked, and sure enough, I was .8 miles from the crash site!! CAN YOU BELIEVE IT?!?! So disappointing...

The top image is the end of my route from Day 3 and the bottom image shows how far back I went on Day 4. Almost there! Oh well. Since I did have to double that mileage since I rode back to it, I'm going to give it to myself... LOL
Tuesday is easily my favorite day on this tour. This section of Highway 1 is second to none.
Here's my faithful steel loaner steed. This beast will carry me all of today and half of tomorrow.

And here's me grabbing a quick donut on the way back from my little detour. Donuts are kind of a running gag with my team. The "ultimate" riding food! Or something...

This is our biggest climbing day of the tour, which carries with it the best descents! What? You think this helmet is too small? Nonsense...

Day 5: Cambria to Oceano
Today we have a rest stop very close to the Brown Butter Cookie Company in Cayucos! Last year I promised them I would wear my Cookie Monster jersey there when I cam back. I gave Tyson his helmet back and borrowed one of Pete's extra helmets for the rest of the day. Here I am getting ready to leave Cambria! I'm excited because I get my bike back today at the rest stop at Wally's Bicycle Works in San Luis Obispo!

Here's Jerry and me at Wally's in SLO. A year's worth of hard work for Team Carter paying off!

Serious helmet hair here. You can get a good shot of my "beer-view-mirror" too! It's a little mirror housed in a beer bottle cap (I chose Widmer Heff) and mounted to your sunglasses with a bent bike spoke.
Wally and his family make homemade tomales for us every year! They are awesome! The mechanics said they could file the problem tooth on my big gear down for me, but I said I wanted a new ring. Wally said he didn't have any rings of that size in stock. Then he looked around, said "but that bike does!", and pulled it off a bike he had for sale right then and there! That kind of service is WAY above and beyond in my opinion.

AND I GOT MY BIKE BACK! Albeit with a loaner rear wheel and spending some money at Wally's to get it back up to par.
Getting into Oceano was relatively uneventful. The camp here is great. Right on the beach! Today's honoree was Andrew Poole. He, like Carter, was diagnosed at the age of 3 with JA and uveitis, a from of arthritis that is the leading cause of blindness in children. Arthritis robbed Andrew of being able to play basketball, his first passion, as a freshman in high school, but he's taken up a slew of other sports in it's stead! Including mountain biking (my first love)! He wants to join us on the tour as soon as he's 18.
He was telling us about a wreck he had riding his bike home from the shop. And he WASN'T wearing his helmet at the time! I had to bust him up for that one... That picture of my busted helmet above was actually taken today when I pulled it out to make a point. I think the point was made.

Day 6 - Oceano to Buellton
Today is a hot one, so I like to motor on this day. Rain on the farm backroads left them quite wet and muddy. This morning felt kinda like a cyclocross event.
One of our rest stops is at Zaca Mesa winery. My first year here I thought about how awesome it would be to have my chess buddy James with me, and sent him a picture asking "which hand?"

But this year he was here! So we got to play!

The Santa Ynez valley is really pretty. My wife was raised here. My friend John Dlugolecki took this picture of this cool tree.

Camp was at the Flying Flags RV campground in Buellton. It's a really great camp. Safe and sound after a long ride reppin' my college alma mater UW-Milwaukee on college jersey theme day!

This evening's youth honoree is Lillian (Lily) Hicks. Lily is a little firecracker! Her energy is amazing and the days she gets to spend with us on the tour are her favorite days of the year, including Christmas and birthdays! "Her riders" are her favorite people in the world! She talks about us year-round. I spent more time with Lily in 2014 than I did this year. She took a liking to me last year but grew out of it this year hahaha!

These two pics above are from 2014, taken and processed by the great Kevin Schley! Lily has been "adopted" by team Also Touch as Ross is and always has been her favorite rider. This year Also Touch updated their jerseys and had an additional one made for Lily! She was sooo proud! That's her in the middle.

Well done, Lily! That jersey looks awesome on you!

Day 7 - Buellton to Ventura
This is a LOONG day! At just shy of 90 miles it's the longest day we have on the tour, but at this stage in the game we're feeling pretty good and pretty strong. I rode with James all day today. Riding with someone strong like James is wonderful because you can take turns "pulling" each other. On those long stretches it can be a real grind fighting the wind, but if you can get a couple of feet behind someone they can punch a hole in the wind for you and you save around 15% of your efforts.
Another gorgeous day riding by another gorgeous beach!

Today's honoree is Natasha. Natasha was 12 when she was diagnosed. She's in college now and rode with us on the tour last year. Her fiance proposed to her at one of the rest stops! It was really cool and my timing worked out so I got to see it! Natasha is awesome. She told us about having to go to school as a kid in a wheelchair just a short time after she was able to play soccer. She told us about her first time at the Arthritis Foundation's Camp Esperanza for kids like her. She told us about never previously being able to ride a horse because of her disease, but Camp Esperanza had side-saddles so that kids like her could ride a horse! She told us about the friends that she made there and that she still keeps, and about the experimental drug that was funded by the AF that has put her in remission (on and off) for the last 11 years!

Day 8 - Ventura to Los Angeles

Last day! I had to get a picture with Lee Ruttenberg, me, and Glenn Hopler. As far as we know, we are the only 3 CPAs on the tour. Too bad the sun was at a harsh angle!

It was wonderful having James on the tour with me this year! Sure, you get to ride with 300 of your closest friends on this thing, but it's really nice to bring one from home with you!

This was the first year that my whole family made the trip down to the finish line to see us come in! From left to right, back to front: Mom, my wife Kelleen, my brother's girlfriend Kristin, my brother David, Dad, my sister-in-law Claire, my wife's brother Dan (cousin Ellie's chair!), then in front my sons Owen, Andrew, and Wesley, and their cousin Alexa bottom right. All reppin' Team Carter and our 525 miles 4aCure!

Jerry and I cross the finish line with a couple of other riders.

The Fam! I think the boys are happy to see Daddy.

Carter was the official finish line honoree! His dad Brett had some very moving words for us thanking us for supporting the organization that has helped his son so much. A year and a half ago Carter was having trouble walking he was in so much pain. Now he can play T-Ball (the mention of which makes Carter light up like a Christmas Tree as you can see :-)) and he even got the game ball the previous weekend for getting a fat lip, tagging someone out at third, and hitting well! 

We were able to get a child's jersey printed up special for him given the circumstances.

Carter reminds me a lot of my boys. I'm so thankful that I'm lucky to have well children.

I think he remembered me. I dressed up as Spider-Man last time I saw him! I spoke to him for a bit and asked if it was cool if I picked him up. He nodded and Jerry snapped this picture of us.

Team Carter raised north of $200,000 in 2015 for the Arthritis Foundation! That's going to be a tough act to follow for us in 2016, but we'll do our best! Here's Carter accepting the #1 fundraising team award for us!

 Thanks again for your support! Your dollars are making a HUGE impact on these kids lives. I've seen it first hand!

We would love to have your support in 2016! If you have room in your charitable budget this year, please consider the Arthritis Foundation on behalf of me and Carter: ccc16.kintera.org/kyle

The 2008 Amgen California Coast Classic

Hello all!

Ok, I admit. This post is about 3 weeks late. For that, I apologize. I was busting my tail at work right up until the ride in hopes that I would have all my big projects finished so I could come back and have an easy couple of days upon my return. That did not happen. The 10/15 extended deadline took us by storm (blast all of you procrastinators!) and I haven’t come up for much air. After coming home from a 10 hour day I really didn’t want to sit down and type for any amount of time.

Couple that with the Xbox 360 my buddy let me borrow last week with Star Wars and Batman games, and there you go…

So here it is!

The ride was awesome. It was just incredible. I can’t wait to do it again! All I had to do for 8 days was ride my bike. That’s it. Breakfast and dinner was catered, and quite substantial, and each of our rest stops (at least 4 official ones every day) were packed with food. You could stop and get a real lunch if you wanted to but you didn’t have to if you didn’t mind biker food. People who had done it for years had their favorite lunch stops each day that they hit like clockwork every year and it was fun to join in on that a couple of times.

I’m not much of a picture taker. I got a couple but relied on everyone else’s cameras. You can check out the official ride pictures at www.californiacoastclassic.org. There’s a link at the bottom for “2008 Ride Photos”. I’ll include some of them here.

I had my Garmin working the whole time in hopes to show you maps of our route, but I was using a lap setting on it that treated the whole ride as one big trip and the graphs only keep the last 150 miles of data. If I knew that little fact I would have broken the trip into separate runs every day. Now I know for next time. Oh, well.

Mark was the only unicyclist this year, so I got a bit of notoriety by association. He’s a machine! He rode every single day this year. He maxes out at about 65 miles a day so he cut out some of the miles on our 85+ days. He’d generally leave about an hour before us. There were about three days when he made it in before me!

Day 1: San Francisco to Santa Cruz

Here's everybody

and a zoom:

We started out with breakfast at the Hardrock Café.



That’s me and my dad in the back on the left. The guy getting food on the right was Gary (I think) and he had a Super Grover jersey. I wore my Cookie Monster jersey day 2. Another guy named Therri (pronounced like Terry) had a Bert and Ernie jersey. Jerry Kruse, a guy I trained with and one of the most awesome and amazing people in the world, has a Kermit the Frog on a bike tattoo on his calf. Next time I want to put together Team Muppet.

It was wet and cold in San Francisco. There were a couple of really steep decents in the city that, since the streets were wet and my bike was heavy with my little seat-post pack (more on that later) really concerned me. I really didn’t want to crash on the first day out. That would’ve been super-lame. When we got into Pacifica a heard a car horn honk and a “KYLE BERG!!!”. I turned around and my friend Katie (who lives there) was making a trip to the grocery store and spotted me! That was really cool.

So we chugged along. It was about a 90 mile day. It should have been 87 miles but I followed a couple of wrong signs when I got to Santa Cruz. It turns out there was another event that happened that used our same shade of green for their markers. Oops!

Day 2: Santa Cruz to Monterey

This day was alright but not one of the prettiest days we had. We went a little farther inland than I thought we would. Here’s a picture of me in my famous Cookie Monster jersey. People really loved this.

My friend Justin made a bunch of Cutters jerseys for his riding crew a while back. If you haven’t seen Breaking Away this won’t make much sense to you. Breaking Away is like a cyclist’s Rocky.

A bunch of people I was training with formed Team Also Touch and made some really cool jerseys. Dwight’s (third from left) daughter died of complications from arthritis when she was 11. “Also touch” were the last words written in her diary. Check out www.alsotouch.com for a very touching story. I plan to do the ride again in 2010 and I’m gonna ride for Also Touch then.

This was a 60ish mile day. Other than windy, it wasn’t bad at all. I had lunch in this great hole-in-the-wall place in Moss Landing. Grubbin’ seafood! I had clam chowder in a bread bowl.

The Great Jerry Kruse.
I rode with him and his crew for most of the day today. We took a couple of off-track scenic routes and long lunch breaks, not to mention being the last crew out of camp! A very chill crew indeed! I rode with them until lunch, and bolted after that. There was a really big climb into camp and when I got there Mark was unpacking with a big smile on his face.

“You look very chipper! Have a good day on the uni?”

“Yeah! And I beat you in!”

That you did, Mark. I’ll give you that!

Day 3: Monterey to Big Sur

This was a cool day. They opened 17 Mile Drive to us! I’ve driven down it before but I’ve never ridden down it. You see a lot more on a bike. 17 Mile Drive is where Spyglass golf course is, which if you’re not a golfer is a really fancy course that costs about $34 million to play half the course. It has huge houses on it where a bunch of stars have houses, and by “houses” I mean “sprawling mansions”.

I saw the Bid-a-Wee motel, which is a place where my grandparents used to spend the winters. There was a really great place a couple miles from camp where you could get a brew and soak your feet in the COLD creek. It felt awesome!

I got into camp and set up everything for both me and Mark. The night before he got in so late he had to rush to get set up before dark and get into the showers before they shut down. That’s no fun. I figure if he’s busting his butt on the uni I can at least set up his tent. Plus, while I was in there I’d steal his iGo so I could charge the Garmin!

The sacrifices we make…

Day 4: Big Sur to San Simeon


Two-Turn-Tuesday! Turn left out of camp onto Highway 1, ride 65 miles, turn right into camp! Totally my favorite day. This stretch of Highway 1 is right along the cliff-side beach the whole way. This was also the biggest climbing day so it gave a lot of people some difficulty. Jerry had us training on a lot harder climbs than this, so I had no problems. I liked it, but when I ride I like the big climbs that pay off in fast descents. Mark did all but a small section of the last big climb this day. He is a machine.

Camp was on Hearst beach, “right across the street” from Hearst Castle (you could kind of see it in the distance if you knew where to look). The beach was gorgeous and I went for a swim in the ocean. It was freezing cold in my little biker shorts but well worth it.

I had a big revelation at camp this night. We were halfway through the ride at this point and my favorite pieces of gear were getting dirty and “needed” to be washed. I told Mark I was going to try and do laundry tonight. I asked if there was anything he needed washed and he gave me some shorts. I got into camp at about 3:30, then I had to stretch, then I had to set up my camp then I had to set up Marks camp then I had to charge the Garmin, then I had to take a shower. Now I gotta get some food and do laundry. It’s 7:00 and the last van back from laundry leaves at 830. Not enough time! Oh my God there’s a huge line! I know, I’ll wash my favorite shorts by hand and throw them in with someone elses drying! Brilliant! Sorry I can’t do you laundry, Mark. I love you but not enough to hand scrub the butt-sauce out of your spandex. Drying’s done. Grab the shorts, catch the van, go back to camp. Set out clothes for tomorrow. These are my new Arthritis Foundation shorts, but I don’t recognize these black shor- OH CRAP I GRABBED THE WRONG SHORTS!!! Stupid, stupid, stupid!

Woah, Kyle. You need to settle down. Big time. This is not a big deal in the least.

I had a realization that I am a crazy busy-body. This shorts thing was really bothering me and the only reason I could come up with was that I had nothing to worry about and that was freaking me out. Breathe. Relax. Calm down.

So I think I’ve got an idea for a tattoo. In high school and college everyone was getting inked and would say “what would you get, Kyle?”. I’m sure I didn’t know, but I knew if I did get one it wouldn’t be in a binder in a tattoo parlor somewhere. It would have to mean something. It would have to remind me of something.

I may not have mentioned this but I wrecked coming down Diablo on September 6th, two weeks before the ride. I busted up my helmet and tore up my left side side. My shoulder looked like Westley’s in the Pit of Despair from The Princess Bride. I even managed to slightly dislocate it. It was hot and I was tired and there was a sharp turn at the top that I came into too fast. Had I been on my game I probably could have leaned deep and took it, but not that afternoon. I couldn’t stay on the road and wiped out on the gravel in the shoulder of the road. There was a 15 mph turn sign that I didn’t even see.

So here’s the tattoo.

Just a blank Caution sign. Slow down. Watch where you’re going. Pay attention. Breathe. Stay calm. I could write in it with a permanent pen if I needed to convey a message. When I have kids someday and I’m in no mood for they’re crap I can write “Grumpy Dad” in it in pen. I could draw a squiggly line in pen if I was feeling silly.

It would go on my left shoulder where the skin is all white from the crash. I’m gonna sit on it for a couple of years and see if I still like it.

For the rest of the ride I didn’t worry about wearing the same ride clothes again if they hadn’t been washed. I’m sure I won’t get sick from dirty clothes for the next couple of days before we get to Solvang. I’m sure I’ll live.

Day 5: San Simeon to Pismo Beach.

This was the wackiest weather we had the whole trip. It started off freezing cold and people said it was going to get really hot in a half hour. I packed up the big seatpost bag with my gear and left. This was my usual strategy. I’d load up this pack with stuff I thought I needed and then once it got hot I take off my leg warmers, leaves, jacket, whatever, strap it to the pack and give it to the sag wagons to haul into camp for me. Then I could ride into camp light and swift!.

Today it got hot at about 10:00. I shed my layers and turned my pack over to the sag. Then a half hour later, BAM! The cold front came back in and I was freezing! I wasn’t the only one. At the next stop a couple of people asked if we could get our gear back. They made arrangements to drop it off for us at the halfway stop about 7 miles up the road.

At the halfway stop I grabbed my leg warmers and my new Arthritis Foundation jacket, a lightweight PVC windbreaker that didn’t have much insulation but kept the massive amount of energy I was producing in the jacket. Gold!

This was all I kept for the rest of the ride. I could take off the leg warmers and and jacket, roll them up in a little ball and keep them in my center pocket on the back of my jersey if I needed it for later. This was the magic combination!

I stopped at the hot springs and soaked in the water for about an hour before finishing the last 5 miles into camp.

Mark got in before me on this day, too.

Day 6: Pismo Beach to Solvang.

This was the hardest day for me. I started off the day without eating much and got under-caloried and under-hydrated. Once you’re there it’s hard to get back to where you need to be. This was a hot, dry ride, and it zapped me pretty bad. On the plus side we stopped at a winery with a huge chess set in the yard. Wanna play? Pick a hand.

This was a big day for Mark. He works in Solvang and had a really big turnout for his ride in. We went back to his and Robin’s house that night and slept in real beds and woke up to clean clothes the next morning. Does life get better?




Day 7: Solvang to Ventura

This was another long day. I got stung in the head by a bee while riding! That was an experience. The poor little bastard got caught in my helmet straps and sting me in the temple. That wasn’t fun, but no big deal.

At checkpoint, I head one of the big mucky-mucks from Amgen, Jeff Bass, talking about this awesome seafood place in Santa Barbara. Later on, I took the liberty of inviting myself to join him and his crew at the place. Turns out Jeff’s a gozillionare who made his first couple mil from selling a software company he started in college while earning his second doctorate maximizing his benefits from the GI bill from serving in Vietnam … A very interesting guy, as you may imagine. He was kind enough to buy me an ahi tuna melt (very yummy…) and when we tried to pay him back he said “if the money’s burning a hole in your pocket donate it to the Arthritis Foundation.”


Day 8: Ventura to Santa Monica

Here we are! All done. This last day was pretty mellow. I waited for Mark at lunchtime but got impatient and headed off. It turns out he rolled into lunch about 3 minutes after I left. That figures!

So I rode in by myself, about an hour or two after the main group did. I was hoping to stop about a half mile before the finish line, but I came through without really realizing that I was done. Kel went to got find my brother, so they didn’t see me. Robin said “go around the block and come back!” so I did. This time to a much grander welcome which gave me some time to pose and celebrate. After hugs and the like I went back to look for Mark and escorted him in. Three times across the finish line. I guess I like attention.

Here's Kel, me, and my brother Dave.

A fighter escort:


and the whole gang:

Thats Lisa/Bethy on the left. She's super awesome! Drove out all the way from Carona to see me finish. I guess crossing the finish line 3 times was to give her more bang for her buck! Then Dave, me, Kel, Kel's mom Robin, Kel's brother Dan, Mark (Kel's dad) and Claire, Dan's wife.