Big miles weekend…

I hadn’t put in any really long rides so far this year and with an open weekend I decided to have a couple of days with solid miles. My Saturday ride was a well-worn ride with a little extra. Outbound while downhill had a headwind so it was a wash. I enjoyed the tail wind on the return leg and was riding hard for 60 or so of the 68 miles getting home in just under 3:45, of interest (at least to me) I covered 56 miles in 2:55 which would be a pretty solid Ironman 70.3 ride. For Sunday I decided to head out early, the objective was distance but at a sustainable pace. I was trying to simulate the High Rouleurs ride in April which has two big days in the hills.

I am always left scratching my head a bit when I need a long ride and I tend to default to tried and tested routes. This time I was looking for something new and came across a new route for the local Crusin’ the Conejo ride “Crusin for a Brusin” a double metric century so around 122 miles. Sounds perfect I thought. There was a good 30 miles of road that was new to me and a couple of familiar climbs thrown in for good measure.

I downloaded the file into my Garmin 810 and loaded up my bike for the ride managing to hit the road and the reasonably early (for me at least) 9:30. I had a pocket full of Lara Bars and Skratch and an USB battery charger. The first thirty miles took me out into the local orchards and it was a pretty route through the lemons and limes.

From there I rode through open arable farmland including the ever spooky sod farms, just acres of nothing except…grass! After a quick stop at the local missile museum I picked up PCH and had a headwind for the next 8 miles, so that sucked!

From there I turned inland on the first of the two climbs; Mulholland, this was my Everesting segment so nothing new here a quick descent down the new resurfaced Encinal Canyon and I was back on PCH for another 5 miles before turning back inland for the 9 mile climb up Latigo. Latigo canyon usually sucks it’s switchback after switchback and I have ridden it enough that it’s not a challenge it’s just a pain in the ass. That said I felt like I was happily cruising up, not crushing it but that wasn’t the objective.

After Latigo I should have descended Decker back into Westlake but I was getting conscious of consistent braking on the carbon wheels. They had already been a bit squeaky and the pads need reseating which will happen when the DuraAce upgrade happens in April. So with that in mind I choose to go back through Kanan and along through Westlake Village and from there the usual route home.

In the end I rounded up with just over 112 miles on the clock. By far not the fastest ride ever but my average Heart Rate of 112 was exactly what I wanted. So with that ride I also made my goal of a 300 mile week which put me back on track from a 2500 mile quarter.