Hey there! After just 2 more sleeps, I will start the Tour de Los Padres Tour route, 237 miles. My goal for this ride is to do a big training block, enjoy some long rides for three days and sleep a somewhat normal-ish amount. The route changes every year, and this year will be somewhat different, and somewhat familiar.
My training hasn’t been great to be honest. I had a tick bite early this year that created a 5 inch in diameter angry red patch with a black spot in the middle. Of course I went to a doctor, and of course they just immediately prescribed the usual lyme disease-preventing antibiotic called doxycycline. So, after not getting sick for the past 5 years, I got sick twice after that. Apparently this antibiotic is notorious amongst antibiotics for killing beneficial gut bacteria. Sigh. I guess that is better than getting lyme disease. Anyway… my training volume has been relatively low, my FTP is at an all-time low, and my CTL (chronic training load) is like, in the 40’s right now, and usually is between 70-100 at the start of events. So this should be interesting. Being 3 years post-menopausal hasn’t been helping either. At least I’ve been consistent in the gym.
I made a plan for where to sleep each night based on how long I want to ride, not wanting to be on a high point and be cold, not wanting to be in a low point and get dew all over, and not wanting to be too “out there”, where mountain lions and bears are roaming at night. That doesn’t leave a whole lot of choices. So, I’m planning to find a place to camp in a field out the back of the fire station near the bottom of Boulder Canyon trail the first night, which should be only 73 miles, but requires a monstrous 15000′ of climbing. This is a lot more than I want to do really, but the trade-offs are, camp at the top of pine mountain (which might be cold). Or camp before the climb up pine mountain (which would make my next 2 days a bit long).
The second night, I plan to camp at Bluff camp, 86.5 miles/10,500 feet, and then finish on the 3rd day with a relatively gentle 73 miles and just 6700 feet.
On the bike, I have a new custom frameback and rear top-tube bag from Dispersed! Other than that, it’s the usual setup – a trusty 8 year old ultralight bivy from Borah gear, 20 degree quilt, a sleeping pad and even a pillow. I think it will be quite cool this trip – so I will have a puffy jacket and a light rain/wind jacket and a Mountain Hardware Airmesh fleece. I plan to carry all of my food (pretty much) for the 3 days, although I will still stop at the New Cuyama market to get extra snacks and drinks. You’d be surprised how many animal products are in things that don’t need them, like milk powder in lime flavored chips. It’s just a lot of label reading and disappointment at re-supplies for me. It is a lot of weight to carry at the start, with all those big climbs though.
So, I have some trepidation for this effort, but I also signed up because I love this route, this backcountry and its remoteness. I’m looking forward to seeing familiar faces, too!
And that’s it! You can follow all the riders on MAProgress.
I will be sure to report back – we’ll see if my plan worked, or didn’t 🙂
