Strava: http://www.strava.com/activities/123118699
Since Adrian is a regular fixture during our lunch rides and had come out and represented team BRCM both in century outings as well as in some local crits, it only seemed appropriate to have a team ride in his honor now that he's moved on to another company. We had a good representation of the team coming out with Shannon, Todd, Mitchell, Noah, Vin, Hiroshi, Adrian (of course) and Gary (partial) donning BRCM black. Vince and Jeremy came out for the post-ride festivities at Casa Ranchero, so it was a great turnout for sure.
The plan was to meet at the restaurant and start at around 8 a.m. and head down to the base McDonald's and back. Shannon was already there when I arrived, and everyone else started to come in slowly one by one. We were a little worried that Adrian wasn't going to make it, but he arrived just a little before 8 fashionably late taking this honor away from Vin. Fortunately, it didn't take too long for him to get ready and about 10 after, we were all ready to go.
We started out together in a mellow pace, but Hiroshi seemed to be preparing for his half Ironman next week and immediately gapped everyone on his TT bike. He was well broken away by the time we reached the descent on Antonio Parkway where Vin flatted half way down. We were only 2.5 miles away and not even warmed up yet, but I suppose flatting early is better than flatting later on in the day. After an usually long time to take a flat, we were off again.
We cut through my neighborhood hoping to find Hiroshi, but he was nowhere to be seen. We even went by my house to check and make sure he wasn't there, so we just hoped to find him along the way. Fortunately, he heard us mention how Doheny was supposed to be our first stop for a bio break (although some took liberties during the flat fix). Just before we were going to cross the bridge to go across the wash and head down to the Doheny, he had called and confirmed he was there waiting for us.
We managed a very controlled pace heading down to the beach, which continued on after two more stops (one at Doheny and the other at the adjacent campground since the restroom at Doheny was closed). Even as we started off from the 2nd stop, we still kept a pretty comfortable pace as we got back on PCH heading toward San Clemente. It did pick up a little as there were others on the bike trail who had latched on and riling up those up front, but it wasn't a manic pace by any means.
I was hanging with Shannon who seemed to be taking it easy for the most part and hanging back, but he started picking it up and making the group work once we got on the road running parallel to the 5 freeway. I stayed in the back to keep it from being too much like a lunch ride since it was supposed to be a team ride where no one drops and rides alone. There was definitely enough people working in the group, so no need to ruin the dynamics that at the end of the day kept us together throughout.
Since we were moving at a pretty good clip heading down despite the winds, it didn't take long before we were all at the base checking in with the guard to let us through. This, however, led to another break just inside the base where people were fueling up. Shannon had come into the base but must have realized he couldn't continue further due to time constraints and ended up turning around at this point to head back after saying his goodbyes.
Todd and Hiroshi had taken off ahead of the rest of us, so we had to pick up the pace right away to get back up to them. When we caught up to them, Hiroshi, Mitchell, Adrian and Vin decided to keep the pace up and rode up ahead while Todd, Noah and I chatted and stayed together. We arrived just behind the others at McDonald's where we took another break.
Looking at the time, I realized we were pretty far behind as far as to be able to meet up with Gary, who was going to intercept us in San Clemente around 10:30 a.m. It was already almost 10:30 and we were still 20 miles out. To add to this, when we finally got going again, we actually had to stop before the Stuart Mesa climb since Adrian had forgotten his gloves and went back to get them. As we sat there waiting for him though, we saw some other riders on the other side including a female on a TT bike wearing a low neckline jersey saying hello to us. Now Mitchell is a fairly quiet person unless you ask him about bike parts, but we saw another side of him at that point. His excitement in talking about what he just saw was definitely unexpected but rather humorous. Who'd have thought?
After waiting for Adrian to come back, he goes by without stopping to get a headstart up the hill. I was hoping he would make it to the top since that would probably make the ride most memorable for him. However, I think he got passed before the top. Let's just pretend he didn't though as I'm sure that's how it was conveyed to his wife, Karye.
We had expected to have a tailwind on the way back, but that just didn't happen. In fact, there seemed to be more headwind in some spots. While we didn't stay tight on the way back, we were all still fairly close together and managed to regroup again just after the fence at Las Pulgas.
We headed up toward San Onofre state beach together, and the group rotated to keep the pace up despite the winds. I did see Todd getting held out a lot and Hiroshi also doing some work on his TT bike, but they didn't seem to mind. I like the section just after the state beach opening, so I took the front to do some work. We picked up a couple guys who jumped in behind us where one seemed to try and take off up the final climb just before Trestles. I didn't know if he was going to pass Vin who had taken off, so I took off to make sure he didn't think he got the better of team BRCM. Not on my watch, son.
It was pretty hairy as we made our way through San Clemente, and of course Gary was long gone by this time. We were all over the road and I warned people how the folks who drive around there aren't the friendliest. Sure enough, there were a couple incidents as we made our way through there with the last one being where a truck wanted to make a right turn in front of us at Pico. Fortunately, we made it through unscathed.
We kept going and made our way to the bike path heading up to San Juan Capistrano, and there were a lot of people on the path given the Swallows day parade. However, we kept it safe and didn't race through it and continued to do so as we rode through my neighborhood back onto Ortega Highway.
On the base of Antonio, Todd had stopped to call Pam to let her know we were close so she can meet us. The rest of us continued on and started the climb up. I was hungry at that point, so I picked it up on the climb and made my way past Adrian (who was complaining about cramping at that point despite starting Shotbloks at the start of the ride) and up to the others who I rode up to the finish with. We saw Gary in the parking lot, and Todd, Noah and Adrian followed shortly. We chuckled how Todd was still able to reel Adrian in on the hill despite the phone call.
It was a fun ride, but more importantly, the post ride festivities was even more fun. Leslie, Pam, Karye (with Troy and Kai), and Lisa (with my oldest daughter and her boyfriend) came also to hang out, and Jeremy came with Nicole while Vince had daddy duties bringing Gage along with him for everyone to share. Thanks to everyone who made it out and made it a special team event, and good luck to Adrian at his new job. Hopefully, we gave him enough reason to come out and join us again for some future rides/races/lunch rides. Cheers!
Since Adrian is a regular fixture during our lunch rides and had come out and represented team BRCM both in century outings as well as in some local crits, it only seemed appropriate to have a team ride in his honor now that he's moved on to another company. We had a good representation of the team coming out with Shannon, Todd, Mitchell, Noah, Vin, Hiroshi, Adrian (of course) and Gary (partial) donning BRCM black. Vince and Jeremy came out for the post-ride festivities at Casa Ranchero, so it was a great turnout for sure.
The plan was to meet at the restaurant and start at around 8 a.m. and head down to the base McDonald's and back. Shannon was already there when I arrived, and everyone else started to come in slowly one by one. We were a little worried that Adrian wasn't going to make it, but he arrived just a little before 8 fashionably late taking this honor away from Vin. Fortunately, it didn't take too long for him to get ready and about 10 after, we were all ready to go.
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| BRCM Men in Black |
We cut through my neighborhood hoping to find Hiroshi, but he was nowhere to be seen. We even went by my house to check and make sure he wasn't there, so we just hoped to find him along the way. Fortunately, he heard us mention how Doheny was supposed to be our first stop for a bio break (although some took liberties during the flat fix). Just before we were going to cross the bridge to go across the wash and head down to the Doheny, he had called and confirmed he was there waiting for us.
We managed a very controlled pace heading down to the beach, which continued on after two more stops (one at Doheny and the other at the adjacent campground since the restroom at Doheny was closed). Even as we started off from the 2nd stop, we still kept a pretty comfortable pace as we got back on PCH heading toward San Clemente. It did pick up a little as there were others on the bike trail who had latched on and riling up those up front, but it wasn't a manic pace by any means.
I was hanging with Shannon who seemed to be taking it easy for the most part and hanging back, but he started picking it up and making the group work once we got on the road running parallel to the 5 freeway. I stayed in the back to keep it from being too much like a lunch ride since it was supposed to be a team ride where no one drops and rides alone. There was definitely enough people working in the group, so no need to ruin the dynamics that at the end of the day kept us together throughout.
Since we were moving at a pretty good clip heading down despite the winds, it didn't take long before we were all at the base checking in with the guard to let us through. This, however, led to another break just inside the base where people were fueling up. Shannon had come into the base but must have realized he couldn't continue further due to time constraints and ended up turning around at this point to head back after saying his goodbyes.
Todd and Hiroshi had taken off ahead of the rest of us, so we had to pick up the pace right away to get back up to them. When we caught up to them, Hiroshi, Mitchell, Adrian and Vin decided to keep the pace up and rode up ahead while Todd, Noah and I chatted and stayed together. We arrived just behind the others at McDonald's where we took another break.
Looking at the time, I realized we were pretty far behind as far as to be able to meet up with Gary, who was going to intercept us in San Clemente around 10:30 a.m. It was already almost 10:30 and we were still 20 miles out. To add to this, when we finally got going again, we actually had to stop before the Stuart Mesa climb since Adrian had forgotten his gloves and went back to get them. As we sat there waiting for him though, we saw some other riders on the other side including a female on a TT bike wearing a low neckline jersey saying hello to us. Now Mitchell is a fairly quiet person unless you ask him about bike parts, but we saw another side of him at that point. His excitement in talking about what he just saw was definitely unexpected but rather humorous. Who'd have thought?
After waiting for Adrian to come back, he goes by without stopping to get a headstart up the hill. I was hoping he would make it to the top since that would probably make the ride most memorable for him. However, I think he got passed before the top. Let's just pretend he didn't though as I'm sure that's how it was conveyed to his wife, Karye.
We had expected to have a tailwind on the way back, but that just didn't happen. In fact, there seemed to be more headwind in some spots. While we didn't stay tight on the way back, we were all still fairly close together and managed to regroup again just after the fence at Las Pulgas.
We headed up toward San Onofre state beach together, and the group rotated to keep the pace up despite the winds. I did see Todd getting held out a lot and Hiroshi also doing some work on his TT bike, but they didn't seem to mind. I like the section just after the state beach opening, so I took the front to do some work. We picked up a couple guys who jumped in behind us where one seemed to try and take off up the final climb just before Trestles. I didn't know if he was going to pass Vin who had taken off, so I took off to make sure he didn't think he got the better of team BRCM. Not on my watch, son.
It was pretty hairy as we made our way through San Clemente, and of course Gary was long gone by this time. We were all over the road and I warned people how the folks who drive around there aren't the friendliest. Sure enough, there were a couple incidents as we made our way through there with the last one being where a truck wanted to make a right turn in front of us at Pico. Fortunately, we made it through unscathed.
We kept going and made our way to the bike path heading up to San Juan Capistrano, and there were a lot of people on the path given the Swallows day parade. However, we kept it safe and didn't race through it and continued to do so as we rode through my neighborhood back onto Ortega Highway.
On the base of Antonio, Todd had stopped to call Pam to let her know we were close so she can meet us. The rest of us continued on and started the climb up. I was hungry at that point, so I picked it up on the climb and made my way past Adrian (who was complaining about cramping at that point despite starting Shotbloks at the start of the ride) and up to the others who I rode up to the finish with. We saw Gary in the parking lot, and Todd, Noah and Adrian followed shortly. We chuckled how Todd was still able to reel Adrian in on the hill despite the phone call.
It was a fun ride, but more importantly, the post ride festivities was even more fun. Leslie, Pam, Karye (with Troy and Kai), and Lisa (with my oldest daughter and her boyfriend) came also to hang out, and Jeremy came with Nicole while Vince had daddy duties bringing Gage along with him for everyone to share. Thanks to everyone who made it out and made it a special team event, and good luck to Adrian at his new job. Hopefully, we gave him enough reason to come out and join us again for some future rides/races/lunch rides. Cheers!
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