I know this is late but I didn't get to writing this up until last
weekend (while sitting on airplanes missing the SF600k). Enjoy!

Ken

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When the routes came out, we were the only team planning on riding a
straight arrow route around the bay, starting in San Francisco and
finishing in San Francisco. While some would question how straight of
an arrow this is, we are in California, an area of sudden earth shifts
and other reality distortion fields. Think different (sic).

This is a ride that several of us had wanted to do and a fleche seemed
like a great opportunity to finally get on with it. Our route was 240
miles. After San Francisco, the controls were at the Bovine Bakery in
Point Reyes Station on the Marin coast, the Dead Fish Restaurant in
Crockett overlooking the new I-80 span over the Carquinez Straight, the
Safeway in Blackhawk, the Safeway at the Rivermark in Santa Clara, and
the Safeway in Millbrae on El Camino. We had an optional stop at our
house in Los Altos Hills, 50 miles from the finish. We traversed all 9
Bay Area counties: San Francisco, Marin, Sonoma, Napa, Solano, Contra
Costa, Alameda, Santa Clara, and San Mateo.

We were the Brooks Brothers, Charlie, Reid, Tom, Kitty and myself. We
only asked one question of prospective team members.

Our route took us in a clockwise circle. Charlie suggested the starting
point, the Velo Rouge café, one block North of Golden Gate Park and also
kicked in the route through San Francisco to the Golden Gate Bridge.
The finishing point, Kezar Stadium on the Southeast corner of Golden
Gate Park, was ordained by San Francisco Randonneurs’ RBA Todd Teachout.
Our route through Marin was based on the San Francisco Randonneurs’
brevets. Kitty put together our route through Contra Costa and Alameda
to Livermore with suggestions from Tom. I put together the route from
Livermore back to San Francisco, up the Peninsula, with suggestions from
Reid.

We arrived at the appointed time, 7:30 to 7:45am, in the drizzle, to
discover that the café opened at 8am. Undaunted, we waited outside,
passing time, until we could get the all-important starting time
receipt. Soon enough the doors opened and we each bought a second
breakfast and as an added bonus, we each got red bicycle stamp in our
brevet cards courtesy of the Velo Rouge.

By the time it was all said and done, we rolled out of the Velo Rouge at
~8:30, heading North to the Presidio in the drizzle. Spirits were high
as we joined the SF brevet route out of town, over the Golden Gate
Bridge and into Southern Marin on our way to the first control: the
Bovine Bakery in Point Reyes Station. The weather was forecast to rain
on the day but it was meant to be dry by the evening so when it stopped
raining in San Anselmo, we thought it would be temporary. The sky
looked threatening to the North and West, pretty much the direction we
were headed, but it remained dry all the way to the coast through light
winds.

I had put two sets of times on the route sheets. The first was the
times we’d need to leave each point if we were to carry a constant speed
for the entire 24 hours of the ride. The second was the leaving times
for each point to get us to our house in Los Altos Hills by midnight.
The first list gave a leaving time from LAH of 3am so if we were to
arrive there at midnight, we could take a full 2 hours off there, the
maximum allowed for any one stop on a fleche. Our late start from Velo
Rouge put us in a hole to begin with but 24 hours is a long time to ride
240 miles!

The Bovine Bakery is a favorite stopping off point in West Marin for
anyone who likes to eat and it didn’t disappoint. Coming 35 miles into
our ride, we were just warming up so our stop was a short 20 minutes:
just enough to buy and consume rolls, scones, coffee, etc. I picked up
a scone for the road as it was a long time to our next stop. Our
leaving time got us to only 15 minutes behind the schedule for riding a
steady pace for the entire ride.

Leaving Point Reyes Station, we continued to follow roads to Petaluma
familiar to anyone who has ridden the San Francisco brevets. Winds
continued to be confused. We had a brief bathroom stop at the Cheese
Factory and we had a few sprinkles in this stretch but soon enough we
were passing the Petaluma Safeway and venturing East into unknown roads.

There are only a few roads between Petaluma and Vallejo and none looked
especially attractive for riding. In the end, we opted for a direct
route following Highways 121 and 37. We had some great tailwinds
pushing us to the 121/37 intersection at Sears Point but besides that,
there was nothing to recommend that particular stretch of road: there is
a lot of traffic and some sections have narrow or missing shoulders.
Once we turned East on Highway 37, the traffic increased even more and
we encountered strong crosswinds (blowing sea foam off the Bay onto the
roadway at one point) but the shoulder was wide and it was separated
from the traffic by a rumble strip.

We exited Highway 37 on Wilson Avenue (after Mare Island) and rode along
the gentrifying waterfront of Vallejo to the new Carquinez Bridge. The
bridge has a great pedestrian/bicycle path on the Western side of the
bridge and our second control was easily accessible, just on the other
side of the bridge.

We had a sit-down lunch on the outdoor deck at the Dead Fish restaurant
overlooking the bridge, 92.6 miles into the ride. We were able to wheel
our bikes almost to the tables. The restaurant was very accommodating
to our desire for continuously flowing water and prompt service and we
all enjoyed hearty meals. We arrived at the restaurant at 3:30pm and
left at 4:25pm. This leaving time put us ahead of the constant speed
schedule (which would have us leaving the restaurant at 5:17pm) but
behind the midnight in LAH schedule (which would have us leaving the
restaurant at 3:47pm).

The next section of our fleche is a popular route for East bay riders,
taking us over hills, through refineries and then down through Pleasant
Hill, Walnut Creek and Danville. Kitty was our guide through this area,
pointing out the sights (e.g., Rivendell), and ensuring that we didn’t
get lost as we hopped on and off the Iron Horse bike trail. Once we
left the bayshore, the winds moderated significantly. We arrived at the
next control, the Safeway in Blackhawk, mile 122, at 7:05pm, not long
before dark and were back on the road at 7:40pm after putting on warmer
clothes and getting ready for dark. Our leaving time continued to be
between the constant average speed time (leaving Blackhawk at 8:18pm)
and the midnight in LAH time (leaving Blackhawk at 6:18pm).

Darkness fell not long after leaving the Blackhawk Safeway as we left
population and turned left into the hills taking us to Livermore. It
was quite dark by the time we arrived in Livermore, passing over
Interstate 580. At this point, we missed a right turn onto Stanley
Avenue. It isn’t clear how this happened: on the map, Stanley appeared
to be a major road. We found Stanley Eastbound but the right turn at
this intersection led into a fence. Perhaps the roadway was under
construction? Unfazed, we continued South and turned right onto
Vineyard, which took us to Pleasanton where we rejoined the scheduled route.

We had very little traffic since leaving Livermore and the trip up
Calaveras was no exception. We split into two groups with Charlie and
myself charging up ahead and Kitty, Tom and Reid following behind. We
stopped and regrouped twice at the top of the two climbs up Calavaras.
Near the top of the second, we encountered maybe 6 cars, racing at high
speeds, heading towards Livermore using both sides of the road. They
barely missed Charlie and myself coming upon us as we rounded an inside
corner. Lucikly, they safely passed the rest of our party a little
further down the road. After regrouping, we rode together to the next
control, the Safeway at the Rivermark in Santa Clara, following the
return route of the Mount Hamilton Challenge.

We arrived at the Rivermark Safeway, mile 174, just before Midnight. We
clearly weren’t going to make it to LAH by Midnight! However, knowing
that our house lay only 16 miles further down the road, we made a quick
stop and left the Safeway at 12:20am. From the Safeway, we took a
direct route along mainly residential roads to Los Altos Hills. There
was almost no traffic and since most of the traffic lights were fitted
with cameras, they saw us coming and changed as we approached. Thus, we
made pretty good time along the well lit roads of Silicon Valley,
arriving at our house in Los Altos Hills, mile 190, at 1:45am.

I had suggested that we leave LAH by 2:30am just in case we had some
difficulty on the route up the peninsula. When we arrived, everyone was
outfitted with large trash bags to sit upon and I set to work on
breakfast. After taking care of his “needs,” Charlie took over cooking
the sausages and then the scrambled eggs, while I got everything else
out and set everyone up with bagels and cream cheese. I’m not sure if
anyone managed to nod off for a brief nap, but everyone enjoyed a hearty
very-early-morning breakfast and we were back on the road at 2:55am,
still a few minutes ahead of the constant-speed time of 3:09am.

The route up the Peninsula was one well known to local cyclists:
Foothill Expressway, Canada Road, Skyline Road. On this uneventful
morning, we were surprised by a brief reprise of drizzle but I had never
been on these roads with so little traffic. Of course, I had never been
on them in the dark, much less at 4am! We dropped off Skyline at
Trousdale (where a direct route to San Francisco would put you on 280
for a short while). After a great descent, a left turn took us onto El
Camino, into Millbrae and to the 22 hour control: the Millbrae Safeway,
mile 219.5, 18 miles from the finish. We arrived at 5:30am so we needed
to pause for 30 minutes before getting our 22 hour receipt but this
quickly passed, inside, because it was chilly (50F) outside.

The last leg began with a major climb back up to Skyline after we
finally left the Safeway at 6:08am. It wasn’t especially long but it
was very steep, climbing up Larkspur! After passing under 280, we
joined the San Andreas trail back to Skyline, a left turn onto the Great
Highway, a right onto Lincoln and finally to our destination: Kezar
Stadium. The sun came up on us as we rode along Skyline, the wind
picked up and we encountered the first traffic since Livermore but those
barn doors were swinging wide by then. Monitoring our distance and the
time, we adjusted speed so we didn’t arrive too early or too late. The
final right turn on Lincoln from the ocean was straight into the sun so
we stopped one last time to change sunglass lenses to dark but we
arrived at the destination at 7:51am, 23 hours 51 minutes after the Velo
Rouge café opened.

We weren’t entirely sure where we were to meet Todd for the finish but
Charlie guided us to the most obvious place and there he was, with his
rabbit ears and Easter eggs! After a round of congratulations, a
recitation of the ride’s events and pictures, Tom went off with his wife
while the rest of us rode back over the Velo Rouge café for another
breakfast with the same folks who had served us 24 hours earlier. After
regaling them with tales of our exploits and another round of pictures,
the party was over. Charlie and I rode back to his house, I tossed my
stuff in my car and then drove back to Los Altos Hills.

We had a great ride: no flats, no mechanicals, one detour, one close
call (on Calaveras). All the controls were open. Food was great! A
little bit of drizzle, a little bit of wind, a bit cool overnight.
Everyone got along well and spirits seemed high for the whole trip!

Learnings:

We had fun together: we had all been doing at least some of the San
Francisco brevets and, looking at the ride times, we were pretty evenly
matched (+/- 10%).

After last year’s fleche, where we felt under the gun to complete the
ride after a leisurely first part of the ride, I felt it was important
to not act as though we had “all the time in the world” to complete the
fleche, hence the time goals on the route sheet. This helped keep us
rolling and gave us some idea what our time budget was like. It also
gave us the motivation to not dawdle at controls: something that is just
too easy to do.

All the controls were open when we were there. This was important to
check: last year we found out that our 22 hour control (a Denny’s) was
closed on Easter Sunday morning. Who would have thought that? With
that in mind, I called the Santa Clara and Millbrae Safeways (both
normally open 24 hours) to ask whether they were going to close: both
said no but nevertheless it was a relief to see the lights on when we
arrived.

The stop at our house 18 hours into the ride was very popular and the
choice of food, sausages, scrambled eggs, and bagels along with fresh
brewed coffee was very welcome. I should have also had V8s and juice in.

Local knowledge was extremely useful. Except for the route from
Petaluma to Vallejo, our route was cobbled together using some of the
favorite routes from the various team members. This kept us “on track”
and led to a quick recovery when road construction eliminated one
stretch of our proposed ride.

Todd had given us a starting time between 7am and 10am. We had set 8am
as our starting time even though we didn’t actually set off from Velo
Rouge until 8:30 (our receipts said 8:05 to 8:10). We could have
actually changed our starting time to 8:30 on the fly but since we said
we were going to start at 8am, I thought we had to start the clock
running at 8am. In the end, this didn’t make the difference between
finishing and not finishing but we could have hung out at our house for
another 30 minutes.

The final stats for the ride are:

distance: 240.93 miles
time: 23 hours, 21 minutes
riding time: 18 hours, 22 minutes
climb: 10669 feet (Kitty said her computer gave 13000 feet)
max temperature: 81 (! must have been sitting the sun somewhere)
min temperature: 45
average temperature: 57
average speed: 13.1 mph

The ride profile is available (at least temporarily) at:

http://www.bigsurwireless.com/ken/profile.pdf

I can also provide a route sheet if anyone is interested...