Day 2: First Day of Riding

(click to enlarge. Gil is in the 3rd row, 2nd from the left - the cool guy in the sunglasses.)

Dad's emailed comments: "Quite a day. Amazing! The tour has actually started! Really exciting this morning. Less exciting as got into hills and temperature rose."

He called Mom and I around 4 pm local time (7 pm for those of us on the east coast), soon after getting into the hotel, showering, and taking in lots of food and liquids. Said it was really exciting to start this morning (see photo of him and his bike on/in the Pacific Ocean). He sees the benefits to doing a supported ride already - about half a mile from the beach, the cable to the bike's derailer (his words/terms; don't ask me) broke at the top of a steep little hill. The hired "sweeper" at the tail of the group radioed the van with the bike mechanic, and they got it fixed in about half an hour - much faster than he could have on his own. His friend Tom H (who did a training ride w/ Dad on 4/23) waited with him (voluntarily - the sweeper and van were w/ him as well). By that time everyone else was about six miles ahead of them. Rode through Animame (sp) and some hills at the 50 mile point, where he and Tom caught up with some other riders. Today's ride was 78 miles. Temp on bike thermometer rose to 97F at one point. Arrived at the Comfort Inn (nice pool, nice palm trees) at 3 pm.

He reports that he didn't do a great job of keeping up with the sunscreen on his face, so in the other pictures he sent us he's kind of red. "Naturally, to make things better I had to go out to the pool and lounge around with folks at the hotel. Arms and legs ok. Will do a better job tomorrow." (I'm thinking that the sunscreen issue is pretty self-punishing, so he'll learn pretty quickly to remember to reapply. Hopefully he won't be starting out too burnt - right before the days riding through the desert, where the sand will reflect - since he doesn't generally tend to burn. He'll probably tan over pretty quickly.) They'll ride through Palm Springs about halfway through tomorrow's ride, then into the desert for two days. Tomorrow is 85 miles, with the first half being generally uphill. Temp expected to reach almost 100. He and Tom are looking forward to riding with the group of people they planned to ride with today. He reports that everyone is psyched and a little anxious; then there's the really big day of 116 miles across the desert. Fun!