Diabolical Holidays to all my blog readers!
Today was a good ride, sunny and calm except for that last half mile before the SGR Kiosk where there are always easterly winds.
I was up late last night watching a Xmas movie and looking at neighborhood lights so I didn't have a lot of energy... but a Diablo ride makes everything better.
Wildlife Encounter: three turkeys just above the Tire Poppers.
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| Windy section starts here. |
A warm December morning. One week before Christmas and I barely needed my windbreaker.
Got that front derailleur thing figured out - dozens of chainring changes and they all went smoothly.
Had a Holiday Jazz playlist on the Diablo speaker... motivated me to take it easy.
Met JB at Junction and then we rode to Juniper. It was a Spare the Air day and once we got into the good air we could see the smog layer really well down below.
Wildlife Encounter: coyote on Crow Canyon Road. Big booger.
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| Coyote encounter |
We've been having COLD nights, so I over-dressed this morning. Charlie wanted a late start and I didn't need much arm-twisting.
We met at Tire Poppers and I needed to tweak my front derailleur; I threw the chain off the big ring twice on Saturday and I over-corrected after the ride so now I was having trouble getting it into the big ring, but I had my multi-tool and took a guess how far to unscrew the doo-dad device and it worked out pretty well.
He started talking about his recent bike fitting and maintenance but it wasn't long before he was too far ahead of me to hear what he was saying.
Caught back up past Curry Point where they had a road block for tree trimming. The guy there said no trees had fallen down, they were just doing preventive maintenance.
JB rode in at Junction and we all made old man talk for a while.
Last night was COLD, but this morning was pretty nice.
Wildlife Encounter: one deer in Blackhawk.
Had a late night Friday, so I started off a little sleep-deprived. I set a slightly lower pace than normal and did fine. JB came from the North and gave me a bottle of home-made hot sauce for X-mas... good stuff - made with a peck of pickled peppers.
I had the Diablo Bike Cam set for night mode left over from watching the holiday events last weekend - so the colors and exposures are off on these photos... complain in the comments.
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| I restrained myself from making a stupid comment about this guy's losing his stoker. |
Welcome winter!
JB agreed to do Juniper with me so I didn't go down the North side and waited for him at Junction. It rained overnight so things were sloppy, but only a very slight drizzle and thick fog affected The Mountain.
Looks like The Park bought some new EV cars - this one at Junction was a Bolt, but it had a flat tire.
I felt pretty good - knee didn't complain too much and I found my pace for extended climbing, so that NYD Summit should be achievable.
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| JB talked about college football and bowl games... I pretended to understand. |
