Diablo Junction, Blackhawk, Danville Blvd - 40 miles

Just me and JB today and he had to prepare for his birthday party tonight so he didn't want to get done too late. We had discussed doing the summit so I ate an extra bowl of generic Cheerios and a banana for breakfast. On the way out to the mountain I came across a pretty large Leukemia Team In Training group and figured they would be riding with us but they turned east on Ygnacio.

It was already hot on North Gate Road by 8 am and I was feeling the effects even in my sleeveless Zoic jersey (X-mas present from my brother - thanks Clark). I had two bottles packed full of iced Cytomax and the coolness really felt good going down. Then JB announced that he was going to go down South Gate to Blackhawk and stop at a friend's house in Danville so I said I'd come with him. That would give me extra miles without having to suffer the heat on Summit Road.

There were not as many Death Ride types training today as I would have expected. Usually the Death Ride is cold and rainy so maybe it wouldn't have been good training anyway. We didn't hang around the Junction for very long and as I rolled down I got that great chill that happens when you're all sweaty and you suddenly get a blast of air to evaporate it. We set a sub-blistering pace through Blackhawk until we got to the end of Crow Canyon where JB turned off. I kept on going to Danville Blvd where there were hundreds of cyclists going south - some really big groups, a lot of smaller groups, and a lot of solo riders. I think it may have been some kind of benefit ride or something.