Onyx summit and a sprint tri. That’s my weekend in six words. More? You want more? OK, fine.
Being that this coming Saturday is Breathless Agony, Kurt and I decided to head up to Onyx one more time. And honestly, it was a pretty uneventful ride. The weather was great. Traffic was average and no more or less crazy drivers than usual. Plenty of other cyclists out, probably doing what Kurt and I were: getting in one more solid ride before Breathless.
The ride time to the top was right around three hours. Not bad for nearly 40 miles and 7k+ feet of climbing. We cruised out of Redlands, through Damnation Alley (as it’s apparently known, this was news to me but that’s what another cyclist up at Angelus Oaks was calling the long, steady climb out of Redlands on the 38), rolled through Barton Flats and made the summit. Those last couple of miles up to Onyx were a little tough but nothing like the last time I did this ride.
If anyone reading this is doing Breathless this weekend, you’ll be taunted by mile markers for the last seven or so miles. Most are just silent, annoying reminders of how slowly you’re riding but there’s one in particular that is an awesome sight. Here’s the one you want to find:
39.36. That’s the magic number. That’s the one at the summit. Remember that number: 39.36.
And of course, the obligatory photo by the summit/elevation sign:
The ride down was no picnic, with a short climb near Jenks Lake and rolling hills from Barton Flats back to Angelus Oaks. I was feeling a bit drained but grabbed a couple of candy bars and a gatorade at the store in Angelus Oaks to refuel.
I also took along my GPS and here’s the track. Pay no mind to the elevation, it’s just flat out wrong. Total vertical was probably more in the neighborhood of 8k.
Sunday started way too early with me dragging my ass out of bed around 5:30. The plan was to get up at 5 but it just wasn’t happening. I headed west for Bonelli Park in San Dimas. Yep, that San Dimas. I told a quite a few people I was heading to San Dimas, and the general reaction was… “where?” Come on people, San Dimas. It’s probably the most well known line from a flick that helped shape my generation (OK, I’m reaching but you should know your Bill & Ted).
So yeah, the race. This was event #1 in the LA Triathlon Series, hosted by TriEvents. The weather had me at borderline freak-out status, hovering in the mid-50s. Talking to a few other athletes, the lake temperature was rumored to be a frigid 60 degrees. Being that I don’t own a wetsuit (that will probably change soon), I was now officially teetering on freaking out. Luckily, INCYCLE was there renting wetsuits. I put down my $25 and grabbed a suit. The suit fit well, which probably means it was a tad too big but it worked well for the swim. By the time the race actually started, the consensus on water temp was that it was close to 70, not 60. Oh well, the wetsuit only made me faster.
I felt great on the bike and had to consciously tell myself to take it down a notch a couple of times. I still had Saturday’s ride fresh in my head and didn’t want to shit the proverbial bed on the run. Nonetheless, my bike was still fast but I lost a significant amount of time in T2 wandering around like a lost child in a dark movie theater looking for my bag/towel/running shoes. The problem was that I had neglected to take note of any landmarks or mark off my gear in any way. Add to that the fact that the guy next to me had dropped his wetsuit with a red lining over my stuff and I couldn’t find anything. I felt like those guys combing the desert in Spaceballs. As a consequence, I spent just under three minutes in T2 while my competitors were in and out in just under a minute. Two minutes in a race this short is a big deal and it probably cost me one or two places in my age group. Oh well. That’s two weekends in a row I’ve spent learning lessons. Hopefully I’ll have my act together from now on.
The run was short but slightly hilly. Surprisingly, my legs felt good and I managed to knock it out in just over 20 minutes.
Total race time was 01:15:16 which put me at 4th in my age group and 20th overall. Solid. Official results with splits are here.
This was the first in a series of three tri’s at Bonelli (hence the title of this post). The next one is a bit longer and the third is Olympic distance. I’m still looking for that flawless race performance and, if I can get my head out of my ass during transitions, I think it’s within reach.
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