Pleasanton Ridge Bike Ride
Decided to try to switch things up a bit from our normal Alameda Creek trail / Coyote Hills bike ride. There had been an inkling to do either Pleasanton Ridge or Calavaras Rd, so this weekend we headed over to the Ridge to try our legs at climbing some hills. We just didn’t know it would be hill after hill after hill after hill.
I had hiked the Ridge plenty of times, either with Barb alone or with various friends and hiking buddies. I know that its an uphill climb (either hiking or riding) to the ridge. What I failed to remember was that once in the ridge, its just a series of up and down hills as you traverse the ridge. For some reason, in my minds eye, the rolling traverse was more rolling and less up and down, when the reality is that it IS up (mostly UP) and down.
Either way, Downing picked me up at 0730 and we were off to Pleasanton. We didn’t find out until we got to Niles Canyon that the road was closed for repairs or something. We saw guys trimming trees and stuff. So, we took the long way around and eventually made our way to Pleasanton Ridge Regional Park. Since we were somewhat early we had no problem finding parking. Soon we were saddled up and ready to ride!
Needless to say, its an uphill. An uphill right from the start. After about a quarter mile of up, we realized we probably should have stretched or warmed up a bit more before we started. After a while the trail did level out a bit so we were able to catch our breath. But an uphill climb is an up hill climb, and climb we did. After we pass through a cattle guard gate, we knew we were near the ridge. The rolling hills may be rolling when you are riding down them, but going up is a different story. Some were so hard that I had to get off and push my bike up a couple of times. Along the way we met a guy who was walking, that said he turns around at the gate up ahead and it works out to be a 7 mile round trip. So a three and half mile up hill followed by a three and a half mile down.
We couldn’t have picked a more perfect morning to try this ride. We were blessed with a little cloud cover as we made our way up, but other than that it turned out to be a sunny and bright fall morning. Saw about 25 BIG turkeys making their way through the hills. The view from the ridge was beautiful. We could see the windmills at Altamont Pass. The view of Mission Peak and the Sunol Regional Wilderness, could make you forget about civilization. Even the mighty 680 freeway looks small from our perspective.
We made our last uphill to the gate that the walker had talked about, and decided to turn around. In what was an hour plus up chug, would turn into a 7 minute downhill whirlwind. At one point, John and I stopped at the top of one rise because we knew the downhill was very steep. John took off and did great. I, on the other hand did not do great. The downhill was so steep at one point that I was trying to work both brakes so I wouldn’t be going so fast that I would lose control. I guess I over compensated on one brake or the other because I started to fishtail. I knew I was going down so tried (think I did anyway) minimize impact. Went down hard on my right knee, then did a couple of somersalts and ended up in a cloud of dust. There was a group of kids that were on the top of the hill that came running. “are you all right?”. By then I was up and dusting myself off, retrieving my cell phone and pocket knife that went flying, and (this time ) more slowly made my way down the rest of the hill.
Other than the fall, the rest of the way down was fun. There were a a couple of “bone jarring, tooth rattling, hold on for dear life” down hill sections, but for the most part if was smooth sailing all the way down. Only problem was, it was too short!! To me it seemed that for all the uphill effort, the downhill reward wasn’t that worth it. It was still fun!
It really wasn’t until we got back to the truck and were cooling down that I could take assessment of my crash injuries. My right knee took the brunt with a pretty good scrape. I could feel the other spots in body ( left shoulder left leg right calf) where I probably agrivated something. Could have been worse but it wasn’t. I have to admire the guys that ride their bikes up there. I saw one guy FLYING down the same hill that I crashed on. I think I’ll stick to the creek trail.
