At 78 years old, this may have been the most interesting ride yet. I started the yearly Figueroa Mountain challenge thing in 2021 at the age of 74. I had done bike rides over Figueroa before, but this was to be tied to my birthday. Each year I knew that I would have less strength and stamina than last year, so I would have to ride smarter, not harder. Each year I have came up with different strategies to accomplishment that. Everything from new gear ratios, hiding water so I don’t have to carry it, to new rest break plans were used. This year I used all of those, and I developed a method of starting after I stopped in the middle of the 1st steepest climb. I used a pole I previously left there for balance, and it would only work once, but that was enough.
I did have problems on this ride, that I knew was slowing me down. I tweaked my left hamstring two months ago. I tried everything, but it never seemed to fully heal. At 78 my body doesn’t repair itself very fast. I thought it would be good enough. After about 2 miles of climbing, it seemed to be tightening up a bit. I tried protect it as best I could, and stopped more than usual. My bike also had a problem. Some where around 10 miles it started making an unhealthy metallic clicking sound with each pedal rotation. I spent time trying to locate the problem, but never did. I did a lot of things to the bike, and eventually I fixed it, but I felt I wasted a lot of time. When I finally arrived at the top, I met a group of interesting bikers, and talked with them for a while.
All of the above led me to believe my time would be very slow compared to previous years. I decided I would try to make up a small part of that time on the way down. At the end of the ride, I discovered my time was not only faster than last year; it was the fastest EVER, by a large margin. The climb to the top was about average, but the ride down was super-fast. There were reasons for that.
I had installed hydraulic breaks on the bike. They provided super stopping power. I felt confident going fast because I knew I could stop fast. I only stopped once to cool the brakes. I did not stop for the normal pictures at the water crossings. There is a 3-mile dirt/gravel section that is normally so rough that it is a slow go. Maybe because the fire activity required a good road for fire vehicles; but this year that section had been gradated very smooth. It did not slow me very much.
The previous 4 years, I was so tired at the end, I could only drink 1 beer at the brewery in Los Olivos. This year, I had my normal two.
Since it is the exact same route each year, the pictures below will not look new. I did, however, include a few pictures I took with the drone the previous day when I hid the water. The purpose of this web site, however, is to document things, not show pictures. I document what happened each year so when I get old, I can remember back when I was young.