The 2015 Heartbreak Double Century (Staff ride 5-20-15)
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| Heartbreak......looking down on the Lockwood Valley |
I have done this event many, many times over the years. This
event was born due to the closure of the Highway on the Tour of Two Forests
course back in the early 90’s when heavy rains caused a mountain side to come down
on Hwy 33 above Ojai.
In fact, this was the course Vince and I rode back in the 1993
wash-out of the Tour of Two Forests re-route. (It was early June and it rained
and sleeted on the ride. 250 started……22 of us finished. It was brutal to say
the least.)
It was closed for
many years and the organizers were forced to change the route of the event from
a Southerly approach to the Lockwood Valley and the Heartbreak Hill climb to an
approach backtracking out of Palmdale on the Tour of Two Forest return course
then adding the climb to Pine Mountain Club and Apache Saddle before the long
descent to Hwy 166 and then approaching Lockwood Valley through the CuyamaValley.
This year I did it as a self-supported staff ride with some
of the staff. This course is very remote so we had to plan our stops
accordingly.
I love doing staff rides now that I am older and not
concerned about pushing the clock. It is so much more laid back and fun because
we all try and stay together so no one is left out by themselves.
My plans were originally to do the ride this year on my
single bike but found out at the last minute that my double century tandem stoker Teresa Beck
was able to get the day off work.
We are both training for tough races this year on our single
bikes. You can’t ask for better training than on a tandem, especially on a ride
with climbing.
Maybe the climbs in
Utah this year won’t seem as bad on the Hoodoo 500 if I get used to riding such
a heavy bike in training.
Part One: Palmdale to Lebec/Frazier Park Mile 0 to 50.7
We rolled out of Palmdale about 5:15am with 6 of us. Teresa
and I on the tandem, Terri, Tony on his fixed gear bike, Rob and Joe. The
weather forecast was iffy so we were carrying a lot of extra cloths and food. I
used my rear pack on the bike and we were again carrying much more weight than
normal. (No problem……just better training right?)
We rolled up Elizabeth Lake Road through Lake Elizabeth and
Lake Hughs in the Leona Valley before starting the real climbing toward 3-points and the turn up
Pine Canyon Road.
It was amazing watching Tony climb and descend on the fixed
gear.
Pine Canyon is a really beautiful climb up to the “Old Ridge
Route”. Pines and Oaks and some really nice ranch properties up in that area.
Here is a video of us going through this really nice
secluded section of the event course.
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| The group climbing Pine Canyon |
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| Tony riding fixed on Pine Canyon with Rob to the left |
We dropped down the ridge route to Hwy 138 and Quail Lake.
From there it was up into Gorman.
So far the weather was pretty cold. It was warm on the many
climbs in Pine Canyon but the cool, mild headwind really helped out.
Unbelievably for a change, we had a tail wind going into and
through Gorman to Frazier Park. The riders on event day were not so lucky.
We stopped to re-supply at the Flying J store in Frazier
Park with water and food.
The middle part of the course from Gorman and back to Gorman goes through 5 counties.
LA, Ventura, Kern, San Luis Obispo and Santa Barbara counties.
LA, Ventura, Kern, San Luis Obispo and Santa Barbara counties.
From Frazier Park we started the long….long climb up to the
turn on Mil Potrero Hwy for Pine Mountain Club.
The wind started to switch on this climb and we had a head
wind which was actually pretty nice on this section because the sun tends to
heat this climb up. The cool wind really helped.
The clouds started to build now and it started to look like
rain up on Pine Mountain.
Teresa and I were really feeling good so far on the ride and
the pace was really nice.
Teresa had just
completed the Davis Double Century the Saturday before and here it was
Wednesday. I had done the Baldy Ski Lifts to watch the Amgen Tour the prior
Saturday so I was tired too. Coming into the ride we were both concerned that
we were not recovered.
We knew we had a really good descent coming up just before
the long climb to Pine Mountain Club.
Just as we reached the summit before the turn on Mil Potrero
Hwy, two big trucks made the turn. We both went “oh crap….. These guys are
going to slow us down on the descent”.
We stopped and took a little rest before starting down. We
flew down the first part of the drop but at the best part where we needed the
momentum to get up the first hill, we caught the trucks and had to slam on the
brakes…..on the uphill. We geared down and crawled up the hill which was about
10% grade. We then had a nice descent were we were stuck behind the trucks
again and on the brakes all the way.
We grunted up the final hill to Pine Mountain Club for our
next stop for re-stocking at the store. We took a long break there before the
final climb to Apache Saddle at mile 71.
The final climb up to Apache Saddle seemed almost effortless
as we just spun the pedals in a low gear. We seemed to get there in no time.
Part 3: Apache Saddle to Ventucopa Mile
71.1 to 103
Now came the fun part on the tandem. A nearly 21 mile drop
down to Hwy 166.
It was not all descending though. There are a few spots on
the way down where the road goes up and very steeply at that. There were a few
12%+ sections in there but it was mostly down hill.
Here is a video of this nice section of the ride.
We made a left turn and then had about 6 miles of gradual
desent and mild tailwind to Hwy 33.
We were now in the Cuyama Valley. This valley is a beautiful
river valley with the town of Ventucopa right in the middle of it. This would
be our lunch stop.
We notice while gradually climbing through this valley that
many of the crops seemed abandoned. We were thinking that it much be a lack of
water due to the drought. Pretty sad looking out there.
One of our riders, Rob, had called the little restaurant in
the town called “The Place in Ventucopa” to find out if they would be open for
us between one and three. They had agreed and we had a great lunch there before
heading out. They were really nice people and I would highly recommend them if
driving Hwy 33 to Ojai from the 166.
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| Tony was tired |
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| Tiger clowning around as usual |
Part 4: Ventucopa to Lockwood Valley and Heartbreak Hill. Mile 103 to 126.7
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| Cruising up Lockwood Valley Road with Rob. The ominous cloud up ahead is where Heartbreak is. |
Now came the toughest part of the ride, as if it has not
been tough so far.
With all the climbing we had done so far and the miles in
our legs we had to do the very long gradual climb up the Lockwood Valley.
The Lockwood Valley road starts off relatively flat and usually with a tail wind and it is often very hot at this point. You get no cooling from the wind because it is behind you.
This year we had a very cool tail wind up the valley which
kept us nice and cool. It was not easy by any means though.
It is about a 10 mile climb and the road slowly starts to get steeper and steeper until you
get into the mountains again and can see the cut in the mountain miles up ahead
which is Heartbreak Hill. This is what made this ride famous. It can be a
grueling climb especially on a tandem because it keeps kicking up and is not
very forgiving as it tops out at about 12% just before the hairpin turn and
final climb to the checkpoint.
There are 3 summits in this tough section of the ride. Heartbreak which
is called Wagon Road Summit at elevation 5,140 feet, then comes Lockwood
Summit at 5,516 feet and finally Owls Barn Summit at 5,525 feet, ( the highest of the three although it does not seem like it. )
After each summit there is a nice descent but you know what that means……..what
goes down must come up!
The weather was really looking threatening up on the
mountain. It was getting cold too as we went over the summit.
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| Climbing Heartbreak Hill |
Part 5: Heartbreak to Frazier Park. Mile
126.7 to 150.7
As soon as we started the descent off of Heartbreak Hill, it
started to rain. The temperature dropped very quickly to 42 degrees in the rain
and it poured for about 20 minutes. We stopped and put our rain jackets on
before we descended and started the next climb up to Lockwood Summit. (My GoPro also died from battery drain in the cold. I was hoping to get video on the rainy descent and climbs.)
Lockwood summit is a long climb
but not as steep as Heartbreak. It really felt good and smelt amazing after the
rain on this climb. We reached the summit, which is actually about 400 feet
higher than Wagon Road Summit, fairly quickly. One more summit to go before we
would be dropping back to Frazier Park.
We had a great and long descent to our next climb. It’s a
gradual descent and not technical but it was cold and we got chilled. We
planned to put on all our cold gear at the top of the next summit because by
then it would be really much colder.
We had a steep kicker just before dropping slightly to the
climb up Owls Barn. This area has a nice mix of ranches and what looked like
old homesteads. There is a cool sign near one of them that depicts a couple of
cowboys napping. It’s pretty cool.
Below is a pic I took of Teresa at the sign on event day. (We went on a
ride before working the event in the opposite direction on course up to
Heartbreak and back.)
The climb up to Owls Barn is not too hard and we got to the
summit pretty quickly. We stopped with Terri and put the rest of our cold gear
on.
The others were up ahead since they climb much faster.
We flew down to Lake of the Woods where we saw the guys
munching at the store there. We did not want to stop there since we didn’t want
to cool down before the long descent to Frazier Park.
We told them that we were going to grab some dinner at the Carl’s
Jr. in Gorman.
We flew down the hill in a cross wind at close to 50mph.
Part 6: Frazier Park to Palmdale. Mile
150.7 to mile 202
We made the right turn to go up Tejon Summit in Gorman,
Elevation 4,144 feet.
Down we went on Gorman Post Road to our stop at Carl’s Jr
for some fatty food to keep us warm.
I had a big fat burrito which was really good. As soon as we
ordered the rest of the group showed up except for Tony on his fixed gear. We
saw him fly by. He had eaten up at the last place and didn’t want to stop.
As soon as I wolfed the food down I started to get the
chills. I didn’t get it. I was not very cold when I came in and it was nice and
warm inside. I was still wet from the rain underneath my jacket and from
sweating on the climbs.
Teresa mentioned something that I did not think of before on
other occasions where this happened to me on cold rides. All the blood went out
of my extremities and toward digesting all that food I put in my stomach, so
for the moment, my engine was concentrating on engulfing the new fuel and not
going toward warming me up. (Stands to reason)
After our long break for dinner, we hit the road.
As soon as I started working hard on the bike, I immediately
warmed up and had all kinds of energy. The human body’s metabolism is an
amazing thing.
We flew through this section with a tail wind until we hit
the little hill before Hwy 138.
Left on Hwy 138 we went and then turned right on The Old
Ridge Route. Up up up we went again for a long climb up to Pine Canyon Road
once again, but this time back-tracking in the opposite direction from our
start in the morning. We could see the bright flashing tail lights of everyone
up ahead on the single bikes as they moved up the hill.
We turned on Pine Canyon one last time. We had a cross wind
out of the south which was kind of strange. Terri kept saying that it was
creepy up there the way the trees were rustling in the wind. We had an
absolutely beautiful setting crescent moon with Venus visible and very bright
just next to it. A spectacular evening. (all I could think was…….how many people get
to experience this type of thing in their lifetime…….just amazing!!)
We continued very carefully on the descents on this road in
the dark as we remembered places where there were rocks and sand from the
morning run through there. We made the final climb and then made it to the
summit.
We now had a great descent back down to 3-points.
As we were descending a giant bat almost hit me in the face.
He was going for my helmet lamp I think. He veered off at the last second. That
was CRAZY!!!
We turned right on Elizabeth Lake Road for the final climbs.
We now had a long slog of up but just took it easy. We stopped with Terri at
the first summit for a bathroom break out in the middle of nowhere.
Down we went on a real nice descent until we reach the final
very tough kicker. It was then mostly all downhill for the rest of the ride
into Palmdale.
We saw Tony up ahead on his fixed gear climbing up that
beast of a roller. We passed him toward the top and then waited for him and
Terri. That was a tough 12% grade so late in a double century.
We pretty much rolled together the whole way back kind of
leap frogging each other.
We rolled in to Palmdale after a very long day at around
midnight.
We all had a great
ride together and a lot of fun. Thanks guys and gals.
Thanks go out to Tiger
for being her upbeat, positive, self at the stoker position. An absolutely stellar
job Teresa after finishing the Davis Double on the single bike just 4 days
before. Thanks to Rob,Tony, Joe and Terri for the camaraderie!!
Below is the computer data from the ride:
https://connect.garmin.com/activity/780454957
| Distance: | 201.15 mi |
| Time: | 15:37:49 |
| Avg Speed: | 12.9 mph |
| Elevation Gain: | 17,733 ft |
| Calories: | 7,327 C |
| Avg Temperature: | 56.3 °F |
Details
Timing
| Time: | 15:37:49 |
| Moving Time: | 15:36:47 |
| Elapsed Time: | 17:59:56 |
| Avg Speed: | 12.9 mph |
| Avg Moving Speed: | 12.9 mph |
| Max Speed: | 54.1 mph |
Speed
Pace
Elevation
| Elevation Gain: | 17,733 ft |
| Elevation Loss: | 17,802 ft |
| Min Elevation: | 2,277 ft |
| Max Elevation: | 5,868 ft |
Heart Rate
| Avg HR: | 134 bpm |
| Max HR: | 254 bpm |
Zones
% of Max
bpm
Temperature
| Avg Temperature: | 56.3 °F |
| Min Temperature: | 42.8 °F |
| Max Temperature: | 86.0 °F |
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