Giro di Peninsula (metric)

This morning I woke up at 5:45(!) to drive over to San Mateo for the Giro di Peninsula ride. I only did the metric century, which was plenty for me, with about 3000 feet of climbing overall. The principal climb was up Page Mill Road in Palo Alto. This is a popular climb on the peninsula, but it's very inconsistently graded with some steep portions. And although that's the only major climb I remember, I had the distinct feeling of going just slightly up hill for the majority of the ride. At the finish, the guy handing out t-shirts asked me how the ride was, and I said, "hilly". He gave me this look like, Duh.

I have a theory that I'm working on that roads on the peninsula are more inconsistently graded than the roads in the east bay. I have to do some research on that.

Anyway, the ride was well-supported, with an abundance of rest stops. There were FIVE rest stops for the metric route, which is a bit of an overkill in my opinion. I skipped the last one and probably could have skipped the first as well. I will say that the rest stops had delicious home made cookies, but not enough toilets. One rider at the third stop noted that the number of porta-potties were decreasing with each stop: first three, then two, then one. Strange to have so many rest stops but so few toilets.

Then at the end (at Bay Meadows Racetrack), the organizers hosted a real nice hot lunch, with different pastas, meat balls, sausage, lots of good stuff. Did I mention there was an Italian theme? Naturally, for the occasion I road my Dolce.

Animules: one deer standing in the middle of Crystal Springs Road; lots of horses
Distance: 62 miles
Time in the Saddle: 5 hours, 10 minutes