Alpine Loop Ride Report
2 March 2013
by Rob Verfurth

It was another beautiful day in San Diego County and the Descenders were trying to cover as much of it as possible. The Alpine loop takes us from the Poway area east and south to the bottom of Harbison Canyon, back through Alpine with a detour out to El Capitan reservoir before climbing out of Lakeside on 67 back to Poway. Guido and I met early on the Black Mountain corner and rolled over to a very quiet Spring Meadow. We decided to ride to Garden road and wait for the main group. There were others that came to Spring Meadow–Geoff, Jeff S and Oleg, who chased us to the start.

We had a large group by 8m, 13 riders in total. There were a number of new faces and some who have not ridden in the recent past. Jeff is a new rider from the PQ area. Matt Davis was out, as was Rick, the local constable. who was always super strong in past rides. He now has a new Cervelo so look out! Hodges joined right as we were about to roll. He introduced us to our latest team sponsor. Mike can provide more details.

The group climbed Sycamore Canyon to SPP with Bernie and Geoff on point. As we climbed SPP, we picked up Matt Baab who had ridden from La Mesa up 67 to join the ride. We did a partial regroup at the top of SPP before surging down the 67 towards Lakeside. I snapped a spoke at the top and had to abandon the ride. I wobbled home but still managed to get in 26 miles.

Oleg was snapping more great photos so he can provide a full ride report and send many pictures. Here are a few photos.

Ride -on-

Rob