2013 SMR 32

First ride of the season in tights and a light jacket.  Pretty cool on the way out, but it warmed up nicely.

JB's first ride since returning from Europe - he hadn't seen the fire damage.

One more week before Daylight Wasting Time begins - when it's light earlier in the morning maybe it won't be so cold at the start.

Hey - they patched Wounded Knee!

Gratuitous photo of biker chicks.

Here's an angle you don't see very often - on The Wall

Foxy's Fall Century - 50km Family Route

Fun day on the tandem with Diablo Daughter and her friend from the neighborhood on his MTB.

Nice weather, great folks.

2013 Foxy's Fall Century - 50km Family Ride from Diablo Scott on Vimeo.

2013 Veteran's Victory Velo - Devil Mountain Century

A wonderful ride put on by an organization that trains and educates wounded veterans to re-integrate into society and the workforce. 

I didn't think the battery on my Android phone would record Strava for the whole 100-miles, so I got this little back-up thingy... works great, doubles your phone life.

Bonus points if you can identify the mountain on my home screen.

First 50 miles went great - paced myself well over Diablo and up Morgan Territory.  Then played it safe going down the Plunge but soon realized I couldn't shift into my big chainring.  Turned out to be a cable housing split that I couldn't fix.  I was stuck in my little ring for the remainder of the ride so after the lunch stop in Livermore I decided to skip the Foothill Road section and take a shortcut back to the finish - saved me about 9 miles.

Wildlife Encounters: turkeys, hawks, and a peacock!

Really Diablo-riffic video to click on:

2013 Veteran's Victory Velo from Diablo Scott on Vimeo.

2013 Diablo Challenge Volunteer

Today I give back to the Diablo cycling community by volunteering for the Diablo Challenge and Save Mount Diablo.

My task was to load the backpacks and gear up in my truck and drive to the Summit where riders collected them after finishing.  Brought along Diablo Daughter and her boyfriend and they were a big help.

Local legend Nate English dusted everyone to no one's surprise, but didn't beat the time of the top Amgen Tour of California pro's.

Among the other riders was blog reader Curtis, who says a lot of the traffic to his BLOG comes from people clicking through from mine, so go check it out, read his inspirational story, see the Scott&Curtis selfie, and leave him a nice comment.

Rick rode with his Kovarus team and had a superb end to his racing season - I'll see him again next week for the veteran's century.

Low-production video of the events below:

Challenge from Diablo Scott on Vimeo.

2013 SMR 31

After 17,000 miles on my Klein, the brakes finally needed to be replaced.  It was easier than I thought and a very satisfying procedure.

No sense skimping on such a critical item... get the good stuff.

The pads have a little allen screw to hold them
in the holder thing.  Check out how much I've
been missing.

Old pad on the left, new pad on the right.  Had to loosen my
cable up to get the new shoes over the tire.

Wear indicators worn out.  Also, little bits of metal, and the rubber
is kind of hard making for sub-optimal performance.

Pad comparison.  That little screw nub doesn't appear
to have any function at all.

A little screw to hold the pad in the shoe, a bigger
screw to hold the shoe on the caliper, and a functionless
nub... pretty simple.

So new brakes installed and I had a luxurious braking experience today.

Diablo Shoutout to Ranger Carl

Burned manzanita (?) patch.

Diablo Shoutout to blog-reader Keith

Three porta-potties for 1,000 riders on tomorrow's Diablo Challenge.
Plan ahead challengers.

Some kind of running event on The Mountain this morning as well.

AnotherWallVideo from Diablo Scott on Vimeo.