Our 1st rides together

Yesterday we got out for our 1st group ride. We did a short 15 mile trip to Torrey Pines & back. Seeing us all together in team jerseys & lined up on the road was a very cool sight. Even more cool was the view of the valley as we went SCREAMING downhill towards the park entrance. The climb out was pretty extreme. We decided to go through the park vs back up on the road. The incline on the park road was very, very steep for the early going & tested everyone's legs pretty quickly. We all made it up though & we'll do another climb today.


Before that, we're doing an event at UCSD & presenting a lecture to a group of med students there. Tomorrow after dipping our wheels in the Pacific, we head out to LA on the official Day 1 of the journey.

I've tried twice to upload some video here, but the wireless connection here must be slow. I'll try again later. For any of you on Facebook, I'll try to load them there as well.

Later that same day... Ok, I was wrong. That climb was nothing compared to what we did today. We climbed Mt Soledad in La Jolla, CA. 1.5 miles of climbing & 850 vertical feet. It was completely lung searing, leg ripping tough! The view from the top though was incredible. The descent was tough too as the road was in poor condition & we all rode our breaks the entire way down. It was just too much to think about getting too much speed going.

For some early still pics, click here to see what I've loaded to Facebook. That's all for now. We leave here tomorrow at 6:30, 7AM. Time to shut down & check on my packing & my gear for tomorrow.

Steve