Steve's Mountain Bike Page
Turlock, California

Annadel State Park, Santa Rosa, CA
February 5, 2011

Today Cohenfive and I had a fantastic ride at Annadel State Park in perhaps near record temperatures in the mid to upper 70's. And except for a few muddy spots here and there the trails were surprisingly dry for this time of year. We have been getting a bit faster lately so I decided to add several miles to our usual 25 mile slowpoke route: up Richardson, South Burma, up Marsh, down Schultz then up Lawndale. We then turned around and went back down Lawndale, up Schultz and Ridge, down South Burma and upper North Burma, across Live Oak to Orchard and down Cobblestone. For the first time ever I forgot my water bladder. But we managed to scrape together about 30 oz. of water for me to carry in water bottles. Knowing it would be really warm I was a bit distracted for the first 2 hours thinking about the situation. But I'm sure Cohenfive would have shared his water with me should I appear to be dying.

The old saying "use it or lose it" was definitely in effect today. Riding Ft. Ord and Auburn the past several months has caused me to lose some of my already meager technical skills. I felt very uncomfortable on some of the rockier sections. On the other hand, using the legs and lungs the past few months made this one of the easiest aerobic rides I've ever had at Annadel. Some of the climbing, e.g. up Lawndale was quite easy. Cohenfive may be the only person I know that rides less than me, but he still smoked me most of the way. He also took most of the photos today. Below are some of what I took.

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