449 km

For my October 200km I was busy on the day of my club's Winters 200km brevet (I worked the ride instead) but with so many local permanents to choose from, I still had lots of options. I chose the route that started the closest to my home, RUSA Permanent #555 . I happen to know quite a bit about this route, including it's genesis. Bruce Berg, the permanent owner based the route largely on a club ride with the Grizzly Peak Cyclists, the Berkeley to Davis route . I've liked this route from the first time I ever rode it with friends from the GPC, and I've always felt it had an element of adventure to it. What adds that element is that the route is not an out and back or a loop route. It's a one way route. Return is almost always by Amtrak, which when the group is big lends an opportunity for everyone to get a chance to talk to other riders that they may not have ridden near all day, or when the group is small a chance to compare notes on the day. What sets the Berkele...

It's funny about all the things that can crop up to complicate a seemingly simple plan to ride ride at least one 200km a month for twelve consecutive months. My own plan began before I was aware of it, when in June of this year I realized I had a string of six consecutive months with a 200km brevet completed in each month (Jan-SFR 200km, Feb-SRCC 200km, March-SRCC 300km, April-SFR 400km, May-SFR 600km, June-SFR 230km). An ambitious plan A did not get met, and plan B had to be put into effect. August's 200km permanent came off with out much drama, but then September rolled around. There were grand plans for high mileage for the month of September, and completing the SFR Russian River 200km was plotted for the 2nd weekend of the month. Not one, but two big obstacles arose to put the kibosh on that plan. On what was to be an easy 95 miler with a handful of fellow SFR riders, an oddly placed car stop in the parking lot near the Peets in Petaluma interrupted my ride in a painful...

In Northern California, we brevet riders are lucky in that we have four 'local' clubs putting on brevets which gives us lots of options. There are no less than 24 brevets on the tentitive calendar, a sortable table can be seen here as well as the static one below: Tentative 2010 Northern California Brevet Schedule Club Date Distance Start Location San Francisco Randonneurs 1-23-2010 200km Golden Gate Bridge 2-6-2010 200km Golden Gate Bridge 2-27-2010 300km Golden Gate Bridge 3-27-2010 400km Golden Gate Bridge 4-3-2010 360km+ Various 4-25-2010 200km San Rafael 5-22-2010 600km Golden Gate Bridge 6-12-2010 230km Rodeo, CA 7-17-2010 115km Golden Gate Bridge 10-09-2010 200km Rodeo, CA Santa Cruz Randonneurs 6-25-2010 1000km San Jose to Oxnard 7-24-2010 200km Santa Cruz 8-7-2010 200km Santa Cruz 8-21-2010 300...

I began this blog first as a place to record my notes on my attempt on PBP 2007 and going forward as a place to note my progress toward preparation for the 2011 version of Paris, Brest et retour . One milestone on the brevet season would be completing the Super Randonneur series of 200, 300, 400 and 600km brevets. I was able to complete that in late May when I finished the SFR Fort Bragg 600km. Not being the sharpest knife in the drawer, it took me completing the June Davis Nighttime Brevet before I realized I had a string going and another marker of progress was underway: one half of the RUSA R12 award . HAWKS, Rob | San Francisco Randonneurs | 905030 Cert No. Type Km Date Organizing Club / ACP Code Medal RUSA-P03830 RUSAP 114 10-03-2009 San Francisco Randonneurs / 905030 n/a 278244 ACPB 200 01-24-2009 San Francisco Randonneurs / 905030 N 279233 ACPB 200 02-28-2009 Santa Rosa Cycling Club / 905048 N 285105 ACPB 200 04-26-2009 San Francisco Ran...

The Bay Area pretty much has only two seasons, each with plenty of variations, but it's really just the Rainy Season and the rest of the year. The rainy season by most estimations begins on November 1st and depending on who is defining it, runs through the end of January or sometime in April. Today's storm is therefore just a bit early. Sometime overnight, the rain from this storm began and we can usually tell the nature of the storm by which window the rain splats against. This storm has wind and rain coming from the south-southeast and it seemed pretty mild then given the weather alerts. I got a late start out the door on my commute to work, and riding though my neighborhood the storm didn't seem all that bad. Lots of twigs and leaves on the roadways, but otherwise not much. However, as I made my way south toward Emeryville, the wind and rain began to intensify. My preferred route takes me along the Bay Trail and around the west side of Golden Gate Fields race track on ...