Solvang Ride 11-15-09

Hello Everyone,

We enjoyed a great ride around Solvang today. Having the group split at Painted Cave and then re-group at the bottom of Stage Coach worked great. Everyone was able to ride at their own pace and we got the whole group back together before turning on to 154 with minimal waiting. We lost Kim McDaniel to the wolves with a double puncture but fortunately he had a ride waiting for him in Buellton. The weather was pretty much perfect and the danish's in Solvang were delicious.



Aaron Baker is a beast and I spent a lot of time drafting behind him and taking advantage of his strong ( and hairy) legs. Pete Clements got himself up and over the climbs and rode well. Alfredo showed up even though he raced on Saturday. It was nice to see David Larsen and Brett Harrison....at least for the first half of the ride. Total ride time for me was a little over 5 hours, covering 89 miles, 5,900ft of climbing and 1 very tasty apple fritter. We definitely need to do that loop more often. Great views, great roads. Rest up this week, because we've got a big, challenging, and otherwise AWESOME mountain bike ride planned for next Sunday which will include arguably the two best singletrack trails in the area....and plenty of climbing as well. So secure your fun-pass now!

See ya soon,

Matt

Solvang Report

Below is Matt's report and photos, but I would be remise if I didn't recommend you go read Mark Fennel's report on his blog as well. It has some very cool historical info. Good Job Mark

Hello,

We had a great ride in the valley today with just over 40 riders attending....not a bad turnout! It was nice to see Steve Otero back on his bike after his face-plant a few weeks back. We had a bunch of Mark Fennel's Platinum boys show up as well which was nice. We also had the pleasure of riding with a few "elite" level pros. Aaron Olson (formerly with T-Mobile now with Bissell/Priority Health), Kim Anderson (Formerly with T-Mobile now with High Road Sports), and Laura Van Gilder (Cheerwine) all showed up to ride with us which was very cool. Having pros on the ride always helps to keep the tempo under control.

The pace was steady but manageable for almost everyone. Big Bob Wilcher flatted a few miles in, but chased his ass off for the next 20 miles and was able to re-group. Other than that no mishaps that I'm aware of. Round trip for the ride was 61 miles, after the main ride a few of us also did the 15 mile TOC TT course. Then Aaron Olson also rode home! Capping off what had to be a 120 mile day....pulling the whole time!... Impressive. The weather was outstanding, cool and clear, the group was well behaved and full of interesting people to talk to....all around a great ride. Thanks to everyone who made it out. Can't wait 'till next time! See ya on the road...or on the trails!

Matt

Front Page News

A couple of the boys got a little love from the newspress as they rode the Time Trial Course up in Solvang! Matt you should get that growth on your stem looked at. Edhat also had some photos of the event you may want to check out. I saw some photos of our very own celebrity Barney and a couple other Chicken Ranchers in the pictures.

Amgen Time Trial Pre Ride

Hello,

This morning a few of us went with Dave to the "Ride the Route" ceremony in Solvang. It was basically a little presentation where they announced the route for the Time Trial Stage of the Tour of California, and you got to ride the course...... with a police escort.

We got to Solvang at 8:00 and then rode around for a couple hours until the festivities started at 10:00am. The weather was clear and cool and the roads are awesome. Everytime I ride back there I realize why so many pro teams go there for training camps. We definitely have to organize a team ride over there one of these days. We could invite Mark Fennel and his Platinum crew as well, it'd be fun to get a big group from SB to all meet up for a valley ride.

Dave got word from some people at the Santa Maria Times that they wanted to put a camera on somebodys bike and get video of the TT course, so of course he volunteered......me for the job. I was expecting some high-tech miniature camera that would be mounted on my helmet, or on my stem or something stealthy and cool like that. Instead I got a hand-held cam-corder duct taped to my bars! Check out the pictures...too funny! As if anyone was surprised, it fell off about halfway through the ride. Luckily I was trying to reposition it right at that moment and it basically fell right into my hand. So, I stuck it in my jersey pocket and kept riding. The look on the newspaper guys face when I rolled back into town without the camera on my bars was classic. Oh well. No harm....no foul.

We did get to ride with Pro rider Tony Cruz (formerly with Discovery, next year with BMC) which was fun. He was super cool, and by the end of the ride it was down to all the Chicken Ranchers... me, Dave, Brett, Rick, Dan, Barney, some Bike-Barn guy, and Tony Cruz. Not that we were going fast, a lot of the people who showed up were on commuter bikes and stuff like that. But, we had a great time and I look forward to doing more rides in the valley.....and watching the Tour of California! See you all on Saturday!

Matt