Tour de Cafes

I've written before about how cafes seem to be either the destination or the middle of most recreational bike rides.  Some cafes become "known" as being cyclist friendly and begin to attract even more cyclists as the years go by.  How does one "know" that a cafe is biker friendly?  Do you see bicycles parked every which way in front of the cafe?  Do you see a lot of people in colorful shirts and funny looking shoes?  If you answer yes and yes to a cafe as you ride by, then mark that shop and pay a visit next weekend.

Here is my list of independent coffee houses that I frequent on a monthly basis.  I don't include the chains like Schtarschmucks, Peatbog's, or Coffee Been There because, well, two reasons: 1) You may pass several of these on one bike ride, and that just seems unfair to the other guys, and 2) I'm a coffee snob.  Oh, I'll go in, and give them money, but I'd never go in by myself or if there's an alternative that I know about.  There's still that one time in Claremont that I went to Schmuck's just because this old dude and I were playing Stoplight time trial, and I saw him go to the independent up the street, so I went to Schmuck's.  I hate it when old dudes are faster than I am, but what you gonna do except train and keep in mind that they'll die before you anyway.  Let's see how fast they are then, huh?  Anyway, I'm being a little petty, but this is my opinion and my personality, so there you have it.

So, I've structured this tour as if I were planning a ride and the point was to hit each of these cafes.  I figure the ride would end up being about 65 to 70 miles, starting from Pasadena.  Hold on to your coffee mugs and if you start to shake, that's not rough road, that's just caffeine.  From Pasadena, we go east.

1. Mary's Market in Sierra Madre.  I have no idea how my buddy Mike found out about this place, but getting there is just as fun as having a latte and croissant.  Here's a few pictures of the entrance:

 

 

There's a neat little climb that deadends at a little dam, but you do have to watch your speed coming back down because that street is really a glorified private driveway.  There's Richard having fun with his brakes:

 

I'm that little bunch of dots behind Richard.

 

After coming down from the foothills of Sierra Madre, we enter downtown Sierra Madre, and stop at

2. Beantown.  Unfortunately, I don't have any pictures of this place because this place is kind of close to my house and I don't do a lot of hanging out there anymore. 

Update: 2006-03-25 - Pictures now available.  Check these out.

 

There's the brand new sign for the old coffee bar.

There's an old sign from the old coffee bar.

 

Well, take that hippies!  I wonder sometimes what Sierra Madre was like in the 1960's and if Bean Town was there at the time.  I'm not so sure I would have fit in.

But it beats the Schmucks that's on the corner where all the Montrose guys hang out after their ride.  The Montrose ride starts, naturally, in Montrose every Saturday, rides out to San Dimas and then back.  There are about 80 riders going all-out in a peloton at about 30 to 35 miles an hour.  Very cool to see them as they zip across Monrovia and Duarte.  Speaking of Monrovia, the old town there has the next cafe.

3.  Monrovia Coffee Company.  I had some pictures of this place, but I was there too early in the morning, and the sunlight at that angle washed out everything.

Update: 2006-03-25 - New pictures available.

 

Here's the view from an outside table.

Hmm...Ice Cream...

 

This place has some very nice tables outside to watch your bikes as you sip your latte.  After Monrovia, the next stop is in either San Dimas or Laverne, which is fine, since I think you should have enough caffeine in your system to last you til then.  They don't have any coffee at the next stop, but I like stopping there anyway for juice or fruit.

4. Starberry Farms.  This place is, for lack of a better word, cute.  I know, a manly man like me (ha!) should be able to come up with something better than that, but, the place is cute.  Take a look:

 

I wrote about them earlier during Christmas season. See? Cute!

 

Now, I've purposefully left out another cafe that you could get to before San Dimas, but it entails climbing Glendora Mountain Road and the coffee is not good enough to warrant a 35 mile loop with 2500 feet of climbing.  Their hot chocolate, though, is simply heaven, but that could be just the altitude affecting me.  I don't even know what the place is called except "MARKET & CAFE."  I took a picture of my Solvang ride buddies Jerry and David from last November, so you can see what the parking lot looks like if you go to my second to last blog.  From  San Dimas, we make our way to Laverne and our next stop.

5. Coffeeberry.  Again, Mike tipped me off to this place and I'm not even sure he remembers how he heard about it, but it's got prime location across the street from the University of Laverne.  Unfortunately, I'm usually there on a Saturday morning and that's where the college kids (and the eye candy) ain't.  See, real crowded:

 

 

This place is the destination for my 50 mile rollers ride, so when I tell my buddies that I'm doing my Laverne ride, they know there's going to be short climbs, rolling hills, "The Wall" in Glendora, and a latte and croissant in Laverne.  "The Wall" is conveniently placed at the driveway of St. Lucy's, the Church of the Open Door, run by Franciscans, which just cracks me up every time I finish that short, steep climb.  12 years of Catholic school, now you know why I'm a little strange.

Beyond Laverne is Claremont, but my group usually stops at the Schmucks that's down there.  Next time we're down that way, I'm going to insist on the independent that's up the street.  Okay, so now we make our way back west.  The next 3 stops are in South Pasadena and are all within a block of each other.

6. Kaldi's.  This was a frequent destination for our lazy Sunday recovery rides back when we started in Pasadena instead of South Pasadena.  This place is very popular with cyclists because there's plenty of outdoor seating, plenty of places to lean your bike against, and there's not a lot of cars to watch out for.

 

Cozy and Inviting

 

Velo Monrovia, ahem, Stan's Bicycles organizes their own Sunday ride and this is where they stop before turning around.

 

Look at all the bikes, look at all the coffee!

 

I love this place, not only because I've been coming here since high school, but because it's got personality, which is another reason I support the independent coffee house.  This is the place with the "wee" and "not so wee" cup sizes instead of those italian window sizes they have at Schmucks.

 

Better drink that coffee before the croc gets it all.

 

The next place is South Pasadena is just a block away, and is another place I've been going to since high school.

7. Buster's.  I'd mainly gone to this place for ice cream and coffee in the afternoons before I was old enough to cause trouble in bars, but sunning yourself on a Sunday morning and meeting friendly dogs is good too.

 

I should shut up and drink that coffee!

Okay, last picture, then I have to drink that latte.

Still not drinking that coffee.

 

And next, we cross the street and the metro tracks to get to the next coffee house.

8. Heirloom Bakery.  This place is the current start and finish for our Sunday recovery rides, because they serve brunch!  Well, they don't serve it very quickly, but the food is very tasty.

 

Come on in, but order the omelet before 11:30.

Look at the coffee carnage! Oh, the humanity!

Now that our bellies are full and the coffee's sloshing around, it's time to climb up into Altadena, but if you need a quick jolt after all that coffee and heavy breakfast fare, I know a little place at the Rose Bowl that can help you out.  But don't blink, or you'll miss it.

9. The 10th Hole Snack Bar.  Brookside golfers know about this place, and lazy walkers too, but this place opens at 8:30, so this is all I have to show you:

 

There was already a line, at 8:25.

 

Yup, I was there at 8:25, but they weren't rushing to open up.  I took an extra lap around the bowl, but when I came back it still looked like this.  So, no coffee jolt for me.  Finally, we hit our last spot in northern Pasadena, after working up an appetite by climbing our way up to Altadena and coming down Altadena Drive.

10. Cafe Culture.  There's the front door:

 

Only a mile from my house.

 

This place reminds me of this great place in Berkeley called Coffee Source, where they concentrate on the different kinds of beans that are grown around the world, not just some cheap blends of arabica and robusta.  I mean, what's up with that?  I want pure bean.  Don't tell me your dark roast is some Sumatra and Kenya blend when I know that over 50 percent of it is robusta, the same crap that's in instant coffee.  Okay, there goes my coffee rant.  Seriously, don't get me started.  I'm even worse about beer.

So, let's call that ride the Jittery Java Tour.  Guaranteed to get your heart rate up without even pedaling.

Willkommen til Solvang!

Well, I made it back from Solvang alive, but at times I felt like I was in a US Postal Service commercial: braving rain, hail, sleet, snow, lightning, and 40 mile an hour gusts.  But, it was only bad for about an hour out of the ride, but I'll get to that.  Let's start at the beginning.  First of all, here's a map of the Solvang Century route:

 

Solvang is in the lower right hand corner

 

I met my buddies Jerry and David at the start, but we left a little later than we wanted.  My parents were with me because they've never seen one of these "century things" that I do on these traveling weekends and wanted to see what it was all about.  Well, older parents always need a little bit more time for everything, but we got under way and left Solvang about 8 o'clock.

The first hour was great.  The route goes clockwise on the map above, so were making our way to Lompoc through one of the back roads.  We were feeling pretty good, starting to leave a few people behind us whenever we went up a small climb, and then David got a flat.  It was alright, but the cows were already up, and they were starting to get talkative.  I think they were complaining about those horses getting the best view of the riders:

 

The cows were somewhere up that road.

 

So, we got back on the road and not fifteen minutes later, the sky got really dark, and it began to rain.  Then we started to hear, "Ow, ow," from the riders behind us, then we figured out why: hail.  And not little hail either, marble sized hail.  Ice was getting into my helmet, building up on my thighs, hitting my cheeks and nose, and landing in my eyes.  Try steering a bike with one hand, the other shielding your face, on a slick road, avoiding other cyclists.  Not fun.  Well, ten minutes later, the hail turned into sleet, and all the ice that had been bouncing off my thighs, turned into a waterfall straight down my legs and into my shoes.  I didn't need to feel my feet anyway.  I mean, I'm clipped into the bike, so as long as I can feel my ankles, I should be okay.  Finally, the sleet turned into just rain, but the damage was done.  It was just above freezing, all the non-water proof stuff was wet, and we were not yet to the first SAG (Support And Gear) stop.

The first stop was in an abandoned warehouse (at least it looked abandoned), so there was some shelter from the rain.  But not being able to dry out was the biggest problem for the next hour.  That fifteen miles from the 1st to the 2nd SAG stop was the worst I have ever felt on a bike.  I've already told you that my feet were frozen and the wet socks added weight that I didn't need, but I could deal with that.  The problem was in my hands.  My gloves were totally soaked and in that cold, they were not going dry out anytime soon.  I could no longer feel my fingers, I had to concentrate to flex them, and I also had to visually confirm where my fingers were to shift and brake properly.  An old mantra from my thermodynamics class from college crept into my mind: Evaporation is a cooling process.  Wet gloves with a 20 mile an hour breeze would cause some evaporation, but not enough to dry them out, because it was still raining.  So, frozen hands.  It got to the point where I welcomed every little climb, so I could get hot blood pumping into my hands.  But what was strange to me was that my right hand was doing much better than my left.  Remember, I've got 5 steel screws in the middle of my hand, and when it's cold, I can feel them in my bone.  But my left hand just got no circulation.  But the climbs offered no real relief because whenever I crested the hill, it was time for the descent, and at 40 miles an hour, the numbness returned very quickly: Evaporation is a cooling process.

The rain finally stopped during this hour, but there was snow on the side of the road.  We were in a higher elevation now, just getting past Vandenberg Air Force Base, so when it had hailed earlier, this part of the route had gotten snow.  My cold hands were such a distraction that I couldn't keep up a good pedal cadence, and I lost contact with Jerry and David.  I met up with them again at the 2nd SAG stop, but they were held up waiting for me as I was trying to get my cold hands dry and warm by sticking them underneath my armpits.  Then I began to shiver.  Just when I thought the rest of my day was going to be really uncomfortable,  my friend Jerry Rossiter walked up and said hi.

Jerry was driving one of the SAG vehicles for the Solvang Team in Training and had just seen some of the team members off and was about to get back into his minivan.  He asked if there was anything he could do for me, and jokingly, I said, "Not unless you can get the feeling back into my hands."  He said, "Wait, I've got just the thing."  HEAT VENTS!  Ohmigod, such pleasure and pain.  Pain from the nerves coming back to life, pleasure from the warmth and hot blood finally circulating through my left hand.  I told Jerry and David to go on without me, because I was definitely going to be a few minutes.  It was only 64 miles to the end at that point, and I do that kind of mileage by myself almost every Saturday, so I knew I would be okay.  But my gloves were still wet, and Jerry didn't have a clothes dryer in his back pocket, and as I began to think that the relief was only going to be temporary, Jerry said, "Here, put these on too."  Surgical gloves.  Oh yes, a mini wetsuit for your hands.  I was feeling great, and it was time to kick Solvang's ass!  Well, Solvang had something else for me, but I'll get to that later.

So, on to the 3rd SAG stop.  Along the way, I ran into the coach for Team In Training's Solvang Team.  Micah was sweeping and at that point, he was chasing down the "fast" group.  Apparently, the fast group was furthest back because they had already 7 flats along the way.  I had started about an hour after they did, and I was catching up with them in about 3 hours.  That's a lot of flats.  Sure enough, Micah and I found them on the side of the road, fixing another flat.  I said hi to my friends in that group and then took off for the next stop.  The 3rd SAG stop is traditionally the "lunch" stop because it's at about the middle of the ride, it's when you should have your heaviest meal of the day, and you should relax a little bit there before you move on.  I encouraged my parents to try and meet me there if they wanted to see me during the ride, and sure enough, they were on the best corner to see all the riders come in.  You see, we're from Pasadena, so we know how to stand on the sidewalk and look at things go by, thank you Rose Parade.  So I saw my parents on that corner, rode up to them and said: Hiya!

 

See Mom, not a popsicle!

 

And my dad was there too:

 

No Dad, I'm not normally this muddy.

 

Well, I also ran into a whole bunch of my riding buddies from the San Gabriel Valley at this stop.  My mom is still learning how to use her camera phone, so while I was commiserating with my buddies about the hail and the frozen hands, she took these shots:

 

Those are my legs at the top, that's Mike underneath all that gear in the middle, and that's the view of the Radisson's wet parking lot.

 

I never saw Jerry and David again, but I talked to them after I finished.  They stayed about a half hour ahead of me the rest of the way, which means that I stayed at about their pace.  I kept running into my friends at the stops and kept staying a little longer while chatting.  The climbing at the end of the ride was actually no big deal.  I guess the training on all the mountain roads during the last six months really helped.  But, there was one more thing that Solvang had to do to me to make it harder: I stopped being able to clip into my pedals.  The rain had turned all the stops into such muddy muck, that my cleats were totally jammed and frozen, that I couldn't clip in, and when I did, finally, I couldn't clip out.  I'm used to climbing these hills dancing on my pedals, but I had to sit down and push, not fun and not fast.  At the last stop, I couldn't clip out of my standing leg and almost fell over because I clipped out on my other side, starting cramping because of the cold and had to ask another cyclist to help me clip out.  It took that guy two hands to push my left foot out of the pedal.  I know speedplays have a lot of float, but that was ridiculous.  There was a climb right after that SAG and you could see the riders like little ants climbing that thing.  Normally, that kind of climb would not be a big deal because I'd get out of my saddle and stairmaster my way out of there, but I couldn't clip in, so I had to gingerly push down on the pedals, making sure my cleats kept contact.  No pulling, only pushing.  After that, I was able to clip in and it was all downhill from there, except for one messed up little ranch road, but it was okay.  Then we were all back in Solvang.  Here's a little photo montage of the finish:

 

Okay, one with everybody.

One more, just for you Mom. See, still smiling.

All back, safe and sound.

Needless to say, most of us were tired after that.  I heard some fun stories from people who went to the Chumash Casino that's near there, but that was at brunch the next morning.  Here's Alan and I playing checkers while we waited for our reservation:

 

It's okay Alan, you'll win next time.

So, we all ate big, and it was time to go home.  Some people hung out in Santa Barbara on the way back, others took a nap before saying "Farvel" to Solvang.

Loyal Companions

Well, gang, blogging here is going to be a little sporadic for the next week or so because I'm going to be very busy preparing for this weekend in Solvang. I'll be traveling too, so I won't want to use a computer until Sunday or so. That's right, this weekend is the Solvang Century, 104 miles of thigh-burning fun. This ride is given 5 out of 6 stars on the Bicycle Ride Director's Association of America's difficulty rating. Here's the elevation profile graph to give you an idea of what I'm subjecting myself to:

Wait, the climbing happens after 80 miles?

Yes, that is correct. Almost all of the 5000 feet of climbing on this route, happens after you've been riding for 80 miles. It's a good thing that cyclists are masochistic, otherwise we couldn't stand sadistic tour organizers. So, how do you make it through a hundred miles of torture? Why, with at least one good riding buddy, of course. I met up with one of my good riding buddies last Saturday in Bradbury:

Hay! Can I try some of that grass? Neigh?!

I always see this guy and his friend at the top of this hill in the Duarte, Bradbury area. But I'm talking about different riding companions. A good riding buddy will have about the same fitness and speed level as you have, will know your riding habits, will be able to talk you through the tough parts of the road, and has to have a good sense of humor. Unfortunately, my riding buddy from Palm Springs, Sebastian, had to cancel on Solvang, so I was looking at riding this thing by myself. Now, I've ridden 80 miles by myself, but the time you need a companion is anytime after the 75 mile mark. Honestly, for ten miles, you just want to quit. After you get through that, then the ride's only got 1 hour to go, and you can handle that. It's just the thought of 2 more hours of pain after 4 or more already. That's why you need to have a buddy.

Well, thanks to my cycling group on the web, I was able to find out that 2 of my other riding buddies are going, and I didn't even know. These guys are monsters on their bikes, and they're really going to push me. The last time we rode together was in November, climbing Glendora Mountain Road on the Saturday after Thanksgiving. Jerry and David let me tag along, keeping our little group together as we climbed 2200 feet in just 9 miles. Here they are on the backside of the climb, after drinking some very necessary hot cocoa:

That's Jerry on the left and David on the right.

So, I think I'm going to be okay, as long as it doesn't rain like the 5 day forecast says it will, with 19 mile an hour winds to boot. Could be a long miserable day. But it won't be so bad as long as the feet and the pedals are turning.

Catching Up, But Not Breathing Hard

Okay, it's been a while since I posted something here, but sometimes life gets in the way of writing about it, and I have to set some time aside to step back, breathe, and regurgitate that mess to you my loyal readers.  Well, I hope you guys think it's more than a regurgitated mess, but that's up to you to decide whether it's worthy of 5 minutes out of your own busy lives.

So, this week has been busy, so let's get right to it.  Some of my buddies decided to take up billiards again because of a broken finger received while bowling.  I like pool, my family has a pool table, and I also like anything where I get to aim at something and smack it.  I also like darts, frisbee, and archery.  I haven't picked up a bow and arrow in quite a while, but I still have fond memories (Oooh, pull it out quick, walk it off, it's a good thing you got that tetanus shot).  Take a look at Warren here, punishing those bad balls for being arranged all nice and neat:

 

Action Shot!

 

Remember, last weekend got rained out, so I could actually afford to stay up late and do normal hanging out stuff instead of going to sleep at 10 PM.  But because of all that rain, and that it's still technically winter here in California, a new layer of snow showed up in the mountains I climb on my bike during my daily rides.  See if you can find the snow covered mountain top in this next shot:

 

Me and my shadow.

 

Now, normally, I would have posted something about the snow and how the sun is setting later again, so I can ride after work instead of on my lunch break (yes, I rode on my lunch break, obsessed I tell you!), but that would have happened on Thursday, but my boss had other plans for me for that night: schmoozing with a vendor and his local network of clients.  Now, this wasn't one of the printing industry's usual vendors, whose profit margins are so slim, it's usually just enough to buy you donuts when they come for a visit.  This particular vendor has a suite at the Staples Center, so I had to go to a Laker game.  I know, poor me, going to business meetings late at night after having been up since 5 in the morning, and, of all the the luck, having the meeting downtown.  Well, at least there was a floor show.  Here's the stage:

 

Not TOO bad of a view from here.

 

And here was the conference room:

 

All this and chips too!

 

So, that was a late night.  The Lakers put down the Sacramento Kings by 21 points, and I got to see a fight in the pricey seats right below us.  A Kobe fan was grappling with a Mike Bibby fan.  What I liked too was how Mike Bibby got the loud boos, but the loudest boos came when the referees were introduced and Steve Javey got the worst of it.  Awesome!

I mentioned that the sunset comes later these days, so on Friday, I was able to go a little further on my climbing ride than usual.  The usual is stopping in the middle of Morris Reservoir, but this ride, I got to the dam that fills it up:

 

San Gabriel Dam, the bigger one.

 

I also satisfied a personal goal with this ride: I climbed the whole thing in my big front gear.  For those who don't know, road bikes have more than 9 or 10 gears because they can switch gears, either 2 or 3, up near the pedals.  This gives the cyclist 18 or 20 gears, or 27 or 30.  All these gears are necessary depending on the terrain and how fast you want to go.  The big gear is supposed to be for speed, not climbing, but for strength training days, I try to ride the big gear because, plainly, it's harder.  So, I felt like a stud, yeah!

Friday was a busy day for special foods.  An adjacent department had met an incentive goal, and I had promised them a Sushi boat for lunch if all the quality control checks came back positive.  And they did (I was sure I wouldn't have to dish out for the sushi, but I guess the incentive worked).  So, a big platter of sushi for lunch.  Then a little bit later, we had the office cake for Mike's birthday, which is this Sunday.  There he is, cutting the grub:

 

I'll have that big piece here, and you guys can fight over this itty bitty piece.

 

Our officemates were anxious to fight over that itty bitty piece (I'm kidding of course, I ate the big piece ;) ):

 

Cut that cake already!

 

And, as always, Jenni has to add her special sense of gravitas to every occasion.  Thanks Jenni!

And finally today.  I rode 80 miles today, mostly climbing, in preparation for the Solvang Century in a couple weeks.  Starting from Pasadena, I climbed Salvia Canyon, Lida, Glenoaks in Glendale, the hill next to the golf course in Griffith Park, Barham, Mulholland Drive, Sepulveda Pass, Chevy Chase in La Canada, and finally Sierra Madre in Sierra Madre.  Here's the view of the Hollywood Bowl from Mulholland Drive:

 

I would have shot the Hollywood sign, but there were stairs involved. I was doing enough climbing already.

 

I was a little tired after all that.  According to my altimeter on my bike, all that was over 4400 feet of climbing.  Not bad.

Weathering it

I'm sure most of you have figured out that cycling is classified as an outdoor sport.  Let's all have that "duh" moment, but when most of us hear the term "outdoors", we think camping, trails, trees, backpacks, and boots.  I certainly don't think of skin tight clothing, padding in private places, and shoes that only work when clipped onto a primitive machine.  The clothing for cycling is very specialized, much like football, soccer, or skiing.  But cycling and skiing are called outdoor sports while football and soccer are called field sports.  When you ski or cycle, the terrain is wide open.  Sure, there's painted lines for road cycling, but those lines aren't really for the bikes, they're there to make sure cars stay where they're supposed to be.

But the main problem with outdoor sports, besides the colorful shirts, strange hats, and weird shoes, is that they are outdoors.  Outdoors means weather: too hot, too cold, too windy, too rainy, too foggy.  All these things can happen outdoors, all of them even in the same day for those of us in Southern California.  That's what happened to me this weekend: I was reminded that my main hobby is an outdoor sport because of rain.  I got rained out on Saturday and I didn't want to chance it on Sunday.  My rides usually start out early in the morning, and that's when the rain was happening.  Both days, the rain stopped around 8:30, but the roads were still too dangerous by 10.  I mentioned that I got rained out on Saturday and I just didn't want to get back on the bike after things had dried out.  Sunday was stupider.  The rain again stopped around 8:30, but the clouds threatened all day, even though it never rained again.  So I called off my ride, but if I had chanced it, there would not have been a problem.  Oh well, hindsight's 20/20.  Besides, I rode 107 miles last weekend, I deserve a break.  At least that's how I justify my laziness to the guilty voices in my head.

But can't you cycle indoors on a trainer?  Yes, you can.  This kind of exercise program is called spinning, where you lock your bike onto a machine that allows your back wheel to spin as pedal, you can control the resistance, and pedal hard and fast.  I say you can, because I can't.  Why not?  I hate them.  I really, really hate trainers.  Really, really, honestly, really hate them.  It's not even rational.  Okay, so there's gotta be a story here, right?  Yes, of course, there is.  I have not been on a bike trainer since April 29th, 2004.  That's the day I broke my hand which eventually required surgery.

Now, most of my friends say that I should come up with a better story about my bionic hand and cool scar, but honestly, I like the ridiculousness of reality.  Plus, there were witnesses, not just to the lameness of the accident, but what a tough little bugger I am when it comes to pain.

I did not learn how to ride a bike until the year 2003.  I did not own a bike until the year 2004.  That's the same bike you see in all the pictures I've posted here.  I had not broken a bone in my entire life until April 29th, 2004.  That is the day I got my first clip-in pedals installed on my bike to be fitted.  Mike and Warren were with me.  We had just ridden 42 miles with my plain old pedals, and we went to the shop where I had bought my bike.  After 3 months, they, and I, felt I was ready to clip in to my bike.  The pedals were installed, and as the sales guy and Mike were chatting about our ride, I attempted to clip into the right pedal.  It just was not working, and I began stomping on the pedal to get enough force onto the clips.  Bad idea.  I stomped and finally felt the shoe clip on, but I had stomped so hard, the bike had become unbalanced on the trainer.  Well, I tried so hard to clip on to the pedal, there was no way I was going to learn to unclip in the second it was going to take for me, the bike, and the trainer to hit the ground.

Mike and the sales guy were standing to my left side, and I was falling to the right.  They both literally had that "Nooooooh!" moment in slow motion as they saw me topple and crash into a rack of little kid mountain bikes.

I usually remember my falls, the pain of joints hitting the ground in awkward positions, but this time, all I felt was my hand being bent in a way I had not felt before.  Oh, there was pain, but to Mike, Warren, and the sales guy, they could not tell how badly I was hurt by my reaction.  My two middle fingers got caught in the spokes of a wheel, and were bent at a strange angle.  Even though I was in a lot of pain, I knew they were dislocated, so I pushed them back into their sockets and felt them click into place.  I thought the shifting I felt in my hand were just the knuckles grabbing the bones again.  According to my surgeon, that's probably when the second break occurred.

I immediately went into shock, but never having been in shock, I didn't know what was going on.  I began to sweat and the world became very bright.  The sweat happens because of a whole mess of adrenaline being pumped into the blood stream so an injured animal can ignore pain and either run away or fight its attacker.  The pupils of the eye dilate in the presence of adrenaline.  I picked myself up, after learning how to unclip from the pedal while lying on the ground, asked for some ice or at least the bathroom, and ran cold water over my hand.  At the time, I thought that I had at least sprained it while dislocating the fingers.  After ten minutes, while drinking some water and flexing my hand, the brightness went away, I got back on the bike, and finished fitting my pedals to my cleats.  I never cried out in pain.  All I said was, "Whoa," right before I pushed my two fingers back into place.

That night, I wrapped my hand in an ace bandage, iced it, and thought everything would be okay the next day.  Well, bruising started showing up in my other knuckles the next day, so I went and got x-rays.  My doctor was surprised that I had waited over 24 hours to get looked at and asked if I was taking any pain medication.  Just advil, for the swelling.  Well, he said, I'm giving you an appointment at the orthopedic center so they can set the bone, but they won't do anything until Wednesday.  I broke my hand on Sunday.  My hand was immobilized in a splint, and I was told to keep it elevated.

On Wednesday, I saw the orthopedist, they saw the x-ray, and the doctor immediately gave me back my co-pay, told me she could not set the bone with how badly it was broken, and set up a new appointment with a hand surgeon an hour from then.  When doctors start giving your money back, you know it's bad.

I then went to the hand surgeon, he saw the x-ray, made me curl my hand a few times, and then he said that I had two options.  I could let it heal how it was, but the break in the third metacarpal was such that my middle knuckle was already shorter than it was supposed to be.  Also, if I let the bone heal without setting it properly, I would always have a piece of bone sticking into the middle of my palm.  That's when I said, "Cut me doc, I can take it."  He recommended surgery to put screws in the bone, at the most two, which would never come out, but I would have a perfectly set bone and full mobility to my hand.  You see, the break was at such an acute angle, twisted in a spiral, that there was no way to set the bone externally.  Here's a picture of the hands of the bone, so you get a better idea what was going on.

 

 

The third metacarpal is right in the middle and it was snapped like a chicken's drumstick.  They couldn't operate for a week, because they had to wait for the swelling to go down, so for another week, another splint, and I could now feel the bones grating against each other because the swelling was going down. *Shudder*  Well, the surgeon's one hour surgery and one to two screws at the most, became a ninety minute surgery with five screws stuck in the bone.  During the surgery, the doctors found another break, and had to get my parents' okay that I would probably agree to more screws.  I'll tell you at another time how I was still getting calls from work while I was getting prepped for surgery, even taking a call while I was tying my medical robe with one hand.  Try not to leave that image in your head for too long.  Surgery was fun, even that last little shot in the butt to make me "feel relaxed."  I closed my eyes with a big splint on my hand and woke up with a bigger splint on my hand.  All in all, I only missed 3 days of work.  I was just a little groggy the day after, and vicodin is fun drug to have in your system.

Rehab was great, like going back to preschool, playing with blocks and putty.  But what sucked was no exercise for 4 months.  Not being on the bike, even for a rained out day, reminds me of those 4 months.  And the scar on my hand reminds me why bikes are for the road, not for spinning in place.

Tour de Palm Springs Eternal

This weekend I rode the Tour de Palms Springs Century, 102 miles of desert road fun.  Because I rode to the start and back to my hotel from the finish, it was really 107 miles, but let's back up and start the story on Friday.

I took some pictures from my daily ride, which I did not neglect, but I had a new ride buddy who wanted to get his legs warmed up for the ride the next day.  Michael from work followed my wheel on our flat course as we looked at views from the Santa Fe Dam like this:

 

That's not smoke is it?

 

Yeah, that actually is smoke from a brushfire in Rancho Cucamonga from last week, but look how clean and clear the rest of the sky is.  Nice.  Oh yeah, the public utility finally finished that solar panel substation:

 

"Solar energy is a pipe dream." Homer Simpson

 

Eh, not so much Homer, but every little bit helps.  So, Mike got so jazzed from his little taste of bike heaven, that he blew himself out doing the 65 mile version of the Tour, but I'll come back to that.  We had a small caravan forming (two cars) after work, that was Mike and me in one car and the Cotas and Christina in the other car.  But before the trek started, I had to start carboloading.  Thank you Domenico's for taking orders by phone:

 

Appetizing, no? Uh, no.

 

Sometimes food is not about the taste, but the fuel.  Let's just say the garlic bread helped, and I had no problems with my glycogen stores the next day.  Wait a sec, I mentioned Mike and me in one car, but there should have been another name.  Yes, where was Warren?  Unfortunately a family situation arrived on his doorstep the night before and his weekend plans were dashed.  And that's all I'll say in polite company.

So, bring on the traffic!  Thousands of cars, on the same stretches of freeway, all going in the same direction, yay!  We had to stop at Del Taco for bathroom breaks, bad food but lots of calories, and a cup size that went past large and headed straight to Macho.  I am not kidding, Del Taco's "large" is called the Macho.  While waiting for people to order, I took this picture.  Yes, I'm obsessed, but just look at the picture!

 

Pretty, pretty gears.

 

We got to Palm Springs around 9-ish, just as our other friends were receiving their food at the restaurant we were supposed to meet at, but knew we couldn't, hence the downing of the Macho.  But we still got to hang out for  a bit, I drank a glass of red wine, and we enjoyed our friends' company as we caught up and strategized for the coming ride.  We all went to bed too late, but that always happens at these organized ride events.

Saturday morning, 4:45 AM, yowza that's early.  Unfortunately that's only a little bit earlier than I usually wake up for work.  So, not so much of a problem.  I woke, I showered, I dressed, I got my bike stuff together, and rode to the start, which was two and a half miles away.  Start time for the full century was 7 AM.  I got to the start and met up with my ride buddy Sebastian at 6:55.  Sebastian and I did our first century together last summer, and I had not seen him since August.  I could not believe it, but work schedules and lives of the employed being what they are, it was not too hard to understand.  I'm just glad he told me he had shaved his beard, otherwise, I would not have recognized him.  He looked like a baby!  As if I should talk, but the only way you could tell that I was the older of the pair was the jaded shield of cynicism that lay behind my eyes.  Ha, I kill myself.  But really, we look like the same age, you'll see later, but I'm 32 and Sebastian's 23.

So we rolled out with a mass of people.  Helping us start was the Palm Springs High School Marching Band.  Did I mention this ride was a big deal to the whole community?  TV cameras, retired sports personalities, cheerleaders and pageantry teams, and winter formal queens and her courts were all present. Cheesy, but the dirty old men, me included, did not mind having the high school girls checking us out. 

I could not wait until we hit the windmills on the course because that's where the first hills are, and that's where the chaff starts to separate from the wheat.  Otherwise it's just too dangerous.  We had people falling over at stoplights 2 miles from the start because of being nervous with all those people around.  That used to be me and I scared myself out on the road.  Once the mass of riders started getting spread out, we could breathe easier.

Sorry, I've got no pictures of the windmills.  It was hilly, and I was enjoying the climbing and the passing of the pokies.  The road also seemed to be the new jackrabbit graveyard.  I passed 3 very large poor bunnies on the side of the road.  Sebastian and I stayed together until we got to the hills, but then the billygoat legs took over and I didn't see him again until the first rest stop.  Next, a definition: SAG stop - Support And Gear.  These stops had all the important necessities: food, mechanics, fluids, and port-a-potties.  Here's the masses enjoying the grub:

 

Funny hats, colorful shirts, uncomfortable shoes: My kind of club!

 

Of course, the food and the drink is important, but here's where all the hanging out and resting really happens at a SAG stop:

 

Hey, that guy on the right isn't doing what I think he's doing, is he?

 

So, it was mainly at the SAG stops that I would regroup with Sebastian.  He's strong on the flats and the downhills, but hummingbird hearted billygoat over here likes any road with an upward angle.  For the first half of the ride, I barely saw Sebastian.  After each SAG stop, at the first roller, I was gone.  I tell you, rolling hills are great for light climbers like me.  Because, it's on this kind of terrain that I can go paceline surfing.  The trick to riding fast, if you're not that strong of a rider, is to find a group that is just a little stronger than you, sprint to catch its tail, and draft at the back or the middle of the group.  And that's exactly what I did.  I usually look for some strong tandem bike group, but I couldn't find any, but this strong cycling club was slowly passing me as I cruised up an incline, and I thought, "Here's my Maverick wave!"  I ramped up to catch them at the top of the hill, and caught the tiger by the tail with my teeth.  Now that was a wild ride.  Half an hour's worth of Indian pacelining at 35 miles an hour.  Normal pacelining is when the leader of the line peels off the front and his second then becomes the leader.  Indian pacelining is when the guy at the back sprints to the front to become the new leader and slowly keeps increasing the pace with each new sprint.  This pace line was dripping with testosterone, so there was no way that I was going to avoid my turn at the front.  After I did, I was done in, and I lost the tiger's tail when I went to the back of the line.  But, man, that's what the training is for, to keep up with those guys a little longer each month.

So, then it was lunchtime, and time to just get home.  No more proving one's cycling worth, just pedal and hang with your buddy and whoever else you pick up along the way.  The SAG stops were actually more enjoyable this year because each stop had live music provided by a local high school band.  The lunchtime SAG featured a band director from my generation,  because he was making his poor band play Bohemian Rhapsody, Offspring, and Billy Idol.  Yeah, really, that was my reaction too.  This SAG stop at mile 71 featured this band playing jazz standards in the shade:

 

The band is behind all those screaming fans, I mean, their parents.

 

Well, what about the ride conditions?  What was the road like?  For the most part, the road was great, not crowded with cars, and offered great views of the high desert mountains and the desert, along with whatever walled-in communities they keep building out there.  Like this shot:

 

So crisp, so clean!

 

Here's me, kind of enjoying the scenery:

 

"I hope this turns out, because I almost dropped this camera."

 

And so, Sebastian and I made it back to the start about 8 hours after we started, but only 6 hours actually riding our bikes.  Except for horribly cracked roads between mile 75 and 87, the last half of the ride was drama free.  We did see some injuries on the road: I saw the aftermath of a crash and Sebastian saw the ambulance take her away (I was about 20 minutes ahead of Sebastian at that time, thank you pace line gods!) and there was another pickup along the cobbles of the Coachella Valley.  But we avoided flats and injuries, which made for a very enjoyable ride.  Sebastian did get some sun though.  Don't laugh too hard, because my tan line was worse, and there is photographic proof, but you won't see it here.

 

Looking good Sebastian!

 

Obviously, we survived, kicked it poolside and hot tub, er, side, and relaxed a bit before a whole mess of mexican food found its way inside me along with a couple of margaritas.  Overall, a great day.  So, how did Mike do?  Well, he told me he cramped, and had to granny gear spin his way home.  This is what happens when you start out too fast.  I actually felt this happening to me among the windmills in the first 20 miles of the road.  I had so much energy and felt so good, I wanted to blast those rolling hills, but I knew that I had 85 miles to go, so I toned the machismo down and let those triathlete guys go ahead of me.  Grr, I hate it when I get passed on a hill, but sometime you have to take the longer view and accept the level of your abilities.  When you find out how to do that, please let me know too!