Wow–what a great day and a huge turnout of Descenders for the ride yesterday!  The weather was beautiful, very sunny and it warmed up nicely throughout the morning.

At the start we had about 20 riders.  It was tough trying to control so many riders down the bike path towards the coast.  We picked up Oleg as we headed to PCH.  Matt and Roman joined us again as well as new Rick, who rode well the previous day.  Sam Hodges was even out in his Descenders kit with proud father, Mike.  The group pace to PCH was comfortable for all.  Things started to pick up north of Cardiff with some monster pulls by the guys.  Bob P and Bryan Jones had to pull off at La costa while the main pack headed for Oceanside.  Just south of Carlsbad the pace quickened again, fortunately for me Bob R hung back to allow me to barely grasp onto his wheel.  We passed lots of riders and had a large group flowing fast into the harbor turn around.

After a short break, we headed back south with more speed.  We cruised through Carlsbad Village and surged past the power plant.  The slight incline at this point is always painful.  There was a light or two that helped keep us together as we all powered to the La Costa turn.  Strava noted a number of records from the La Costa sprint, average pace of over 29 mph, super fast!  The group stayed together until El Camino Del Notre where I was blown off the back and we were strung out heading to Lago Lindo.  Rick waited at the top to help sweep up us stragglers as we rolled into RSF.  I tried to sneak away on Stud Loop backwards and put in a failed effort as Matt, Voris and Oleg flew by me in the last half mile with others closing fast.  I again saw a handful of top 15 times in Strava from this segment of the ride, guys averaging 22-23 mph.

The group pulled to the bottom of San Dieguito Road and Oleg sped off to the west.  The rest of the guys climbed to Santaluz.  We regrouped by the side road entrance with Ernst, Farkas and Sheehan heading off north while the last 10 guys cruised through Santaluz and back to the 56 bike path.  We saw Mike and Sam near Westview HS on our way back.  I peeled off with about 67 miles of riding and 3,200 feet of climbing.

Great day to ride and be a Descender.  We are posting the ride for December in the next day or so.  I have attached a few photos from the ride yesterday and will upload a bunch more to the Shutterfly account.

Have a great week and see you next Sat.

Ride on-

Rob