Cruisin' Cronan

After blowing up the call out HCF, but still deciding nothing, six riders met at the mosquito lot. Everyone had unique expectations for the evening, and no two plans were the same. As B, Cappy, and I tried to convince NoHandle that we first and foremost wanted to ride as a group, he stubbornly maintained that he and Bambi had scheduled a date ride and we weren’t welcome. Until Bambi rolled up with a crosser instead of a niner, showing that he had switched camps.

The consensus building exercise that followed was awkward and slow. Eventually, NoHanlde got into his new Cannondale shorts (which Cappy openly coveted), all the bikes were unloaded, tire pressures adjusted for what would mostly be a road ride, and we embarked, as described by Safety:

B, Captain, Bambi, Nocar, No Handle, and I gathered for a 6:30PM launch out of the mosquito lot. THTH and I were on 29ers while other piloted cross bikes. In short, we took 49 out towards Cronan Ranch with some dirt on the way. We rode around Cronan, and other trails by the boat launch off 49. Then we headed back stopping in Coloma for some food at a local convenient store. We got back to mosquito after 11PM.

The entire trip (not including about half a mile after leaving the gas station [I forgot to start the GPS]):
-38.31 miles
-4 hours 21 minutes (not including a rest stop or two)
-4976 Feet of climbing
-8.8 mph average speed (including break/s I think)
-39.2 mph max speed

Highlights of the night (for me) include: B’s chain falling off fourteen times; Cappy declaring that we would not cross Hastings Creek because that would involve too much time not riding; frogs everywhere; finding the Sutter Center Market still open at 9:30 with the proprietor openly amused at a pack of spandex clad customers filling up on snax and micheladas; cornering Safety off the back on the long climb home and peppering him with work related questions which he breathlessly answered; rousing Xteric from his house by shouting from the highway like juveniles in a street gang; longriding everyone else as I spun the thousand foot climb home.

Watch for a callout in the near future. Cappy plans on making his not-safe-for-Tuesday fantasy ride an official long ride production, complete with realistic distances and ride times.