Club Member Spotlight

Solvang 2008 – Mark Neer and Susan Gibbs

On March 8th, Susan and I loaded up our bikes and headed south to “sun meadow,” more commonly known as Solvang, for the annual Solvang Century.  This tiny Danish community with a population of 5,352 is located in the Santa Ynez Valley, about an hour south of Paso Robles.  Solvang is home to bakeries, restaurants and merchants offering a taste of Denmark. 

Arriving in Solvang was a pleasure.  We drove past ranches of race horses and ostriches, not to mention acres and acres of vineyards.  The quaint downtown is speckled with windmills, colorful European styled buildings, and peppered with wine tasting rooms (remember the movie “Sideways”).  The entire town was over run with cyclists. Friday night in Solvang was a great venue to people watch while the excitement of riding in a new area continued to build.

Saturday morning we rolled prior to 8 a.m.  We weren’t too anxious to start much earlier as the valley was shrouded in fog and low clouds.  The ride out to Lompoc on Santa Rosa Road was crowded with the riders for both the full and half centuries.  Soon the skies cleared and so did the course; at mile 25 the half-century riders looped back leaving the century riders to complete our route to Vandenberg, Santa Maria, through Los Olivos and back to Solvang.  As with all rides, there were varying degrees of skill, experience and speed.  There were several sponsored teams who blew past us with very little etiquette for callouts. Team-In-Training riders had a large contingent that maintained a slower pace with a bit of squirreling up the slight roller hills.  Perhaps their aerodynamics were impeded by the cable car ornaments that adorned their helmets.  We even rode with tortoise and the hare, and also had a clown up experience passing by a real Bozo!!

We wrestled a head wind most of our northward route, but the wind was soft compared to the winds on Curtis’ Cal-Pal Special.  Rest Stop #3 at mile 60 was across the street from our hotel in Santa Maria.  The treat was to utilize our own personal accommodations and scarf down the chips we had stashed in the room.  Strange rest stop food choices for this ride – didn’t have any salty snacks, much less any V-8!  The last 40 miles were warm and sweet with the wind mostly at our backs. Foxen Canyon was filled with 20 miles of vivid shades of green grass covered rolling meadows with the road filled with dappled shade and shadows from tall, fragrant eucalyptus trees.   The “major” climb of the ride was out of the valley up to Ballard Canyon Road that set us up for a 35+ mph descent.  We flew past Fess Parker’s Winery (remember Daniel Boone) back into the middle of Solvang to the finish line.  

Susan and I had an absolutely fabulous, scenic, and swift ride.  101.5 miles, time 6:27, 15.6 average speed with maximum speeds exceeding 43.5 mph, warm sun, blue skies, luscious green hills and minimal traffic.  We enjoyed riding part of the Amgen Stage 5 time trial course too. A great way to spend a Saturday afternoon! 

 


Bicycling in Las Vegas – Wynn Kageyama


Wynn, Howard, and Dave overlooking Red Rock Canyon in Las Vegas. Photo by R Hulskamp.

Las Vegas, NV. Easter 2008.  This year's Easter ride is Las Vegas, Nevada.  I found the website and ride calendar of the Las Vegas Valley Bicycle Club.  A craiglsist.org search yielded up a number of number bike for sale opportunities on the cheap.

Bicycling in Las Vegas from The Strip is uphill in all directions other than south.  It seems that the grade is a consistent two percent, so even on what looks to be level, you are grinding at a low speed gear combination in one direction, and flying high in the other.

My first ride on Easter Sunday was the start point a few miles from my hotel.  An hour and a half later I arrived to find that I was thirty minutes late.  My guess is that is that the start point was more than 15 miles away, though it didn't look like it.  This would set the theme of cycling for the rest of the week in Las Vegas.

The casino building are large, the streets straight, and canyon walls to the west quite visible.  When I looked at them, they didn't seem to be that far away.  They are, and straight streets don't mean flat, they aren't.  So after missing the Sunday ride, I drove the start point on the club's Tuesday ride and nearly missed that too.

I did get a good feel for the community of Summerlin on the northwest of the city.  It's seems to be the best place to start your ride to Red Rock Canyon.  The Tuesday Club ride was a short 20 mile out and back, to the Red Rock Canyon Overlook as you can see from the photo above.  The overall climb was in the range of 2 to 3 percent with two short rollers packed in.  A worthy tip, ride early before the heat of the sun, wind, and dust gets kicked up.  The Red Rock Canyon area is as good as it gets and the local bicyclists know it.  Anyway, these guys don't dawdle, and if I figure to guess they get faster each day in the week.  Thumbs up.

I know what you're thinking, what about that bike.  Remember last year I was in Hawaii, I got my twenty dollar mountain bike and sold when I left for the same amount.  That was a pipe steel Roadmaster.  This year's craigslist.org find was this GT Palomar with “real” aluminum rims, and 21-speeds, recreational level Shimano components.  All good'nuf stuff.  Forty bucks, including two decent helmets.  Aside from the blipped out rims, bent skewers, and other minor noise, this bike was safe.  All I added was my gear, pedals the usual stuff.  Unfortunately, I couldn't find a buyer for the bike so, I brought it home.  Bike for sale $120, see Wynn.

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