Dee Sullivan Triathlete: Trip Report: Tour of California

Last year, George and I decided to head out to California to watch and ride some of the stages of the Tour of California. We had such a great time that we decided to do it again this year. We headed out on Tuesday, February 19th, day 3 of the Tour. We flew into San Luis Obispo which is a a great little city located South of San Fransisco and North of L.A. It's a great place to spend some time, especially if you are a cyclist. It's located on the coast and is far enough away from the bigger cities that it has a "quaint" feel to it, while at the same time having a feel of an eclectic college town. ART's Cyclery is the main bike shop in town and we headed there first to hear about the possibility of a group ride for the next day. Some of the guys in ART's remembered us from last year, and they told us about a group ride (that we did last year) going out the next morning. So, we headed out for a quick 2 hour spin to get the blood moving after a long flight and got ready to ride early the next day.

Unfortunately for us (and even more so for the guys in the race) the weather wasn't quite as cooperative as in the years past. Rain was on the forecast every day. Bummer... Wednesday morning we met up with the group at the park, despite the grey sky. We pulled up just in time and just as we were getting on our bikes, the group rode by us. We hopped on and chased the group, realizing that they were probably trying to "get rid of" the two visitors...no such luck! ;-) The group ended up being nice, for the most part and we rode North along the coast. Soon the rain came and we found ourselves riding back in a good downpour. Just a side note on the group ride...it was definitely "conversation pace". When I say "conversation pace", I mean that I was averaging 98 watts. Now, while I enjoy this type of ride sometimes, we were looking for a bit more on that particular day. After 2 hours, the rain cleared and George and I decided to keep going. I felt TERRIBLE...I knew something was wrong when I was being dropped and was finding it hard to hold 130 watts...not a good sign! So, we headed back and decided to visit Hearst Castle, an old historic mansion located just north of us. Hearst Castle is located on a beautiful spot of land overlooking the pacific.

Pool on Hearst Castle property.

You can only see the mansion with a Tour Guide, so that's what we did. About 20 minutes into this 2 hour tour, I realized why I felt so terrible on the bike. I was sick...nauseous sick and I did my best the remainder of the tour to keep my composure and not embarrass myself by getting sick right there! Long story short: Stomach Flu. Not only did I get it, but a bunch of guys in the Tour of California were dropping out with the same thing! Guess it was "going around Cali". The next day I was recovered from the terrible night...poor George was cooped up in the motel room of the Vagabond Inn with me as I got up to get sick periodically throughout the night...nice, eh?!

The next day was Thursday and the Tour was to see the finish of Stage 5 right there in San Luis Obispo. It was the longest day in the Tour (approximately 130 miles long). I was going to drive up 80 miles and drop George off so he could ride the last part of the stage in. Once we got up on the coast, the rain started. It was cold and it was rainy. George had the luxury of calling it a day...the guys in the race did not. The cyclists ended up riding the entire stage in the rain and 30+ mph headwinds. It was estimated that it would take them 4 1/2-5 hours to finish the stage. It took them 7 hours! Eighteen guys dropped out of the race this day. We watched live coverage in a coffee shop in downtown San Luis Obispo with a bunch of other people until the riders came close. Then, along with thousands of other people, we headed out and watched Dominick Rollin win with George Hincapie second. To put the day in perspective, Levi Leipheimer, the eventual winner of the Tour, described the day as, " one of the top 3 worst days on the bike". The stage was that brutal. Tough way to make a living...

Looks like snow, but it's rain falling as the Top 3 get their awards...George Hincapie closest to the Camera.

The next day was the Time Trial in Solvang. Solvang is an AWESOME place to ride. In fact, it's the place that Team Discovery and this year, Astana had their training camp. You can see why. Open roads, rolling hills and sweet climbs! We got a nice window of weather in the morning and headed out to ride "Foxen Canyon". George started pushing the pace right away and I thought to myself, "now how am I supposed to hang on for this ride"?! I did though...I hung on, sometimes cursing him in my mind for the constant steady hard pace that he pushed for the 2 hour 45 min ride (OK...he gave me a break for the last 25 min. of the ride). We ran into a group from ART's Cyclelry, but quickly left them in the dust. They did ride from San Luis Obispo, but honestly, it was a good strong pace and I don't know if they would have been able to match it regardless. We finished the ride, happy to get in an awesome effort in the beautiful hillside and just in time to walk into town and watch the Time trial.

Solvang is a perfect town for the TT. We watched Christian Vandevelde smoke the field. We thought it would be impossible for Levi to match it, but he absolutely shattered the time, by over 40 seconds! Amazing performance. One that he labeled as his "best TT ever"! Pretty sweet! After the TT, we walked around...got some autographs from the Rock Racing Team (Tyler Hamilton and Freddy Rodrigez), got a pic with Bob Roll (yes...did the dorky fan thing)!

Picture #1-Me watching the TT, #2-George Hincapie, #3-Chris Horner being interviewed by Bob Roll, #4-Geo and Tyler Hamilton, #5-Me and Bob Roll.

The next day was our last day (Saturday) to ride before getting ready to fly out on Sunday. We were still in Solvang and decided to ride up Figueroua Mountain. A huge climb that we only did part of the previous year. This climb is over 4000 ft. and 9 miles long. It's steep...it takes over an hour to complete...more like and hour and 20 minutes! As we started the climb we came upon some guys wearing "Carmichael Training" jerseys. It ended up that there were over 30 people involved with that group doing the climb. They had cars following them for aide and for moral boosting. It was good for George and I because it gave us people to catch, making the 9 miles go by faster! After about and hour of climbing, we thought we had reached the top. We got dressed preparing for the descent, went down for about 3 min and realized that we had to go up again...we still had about 20 minutes of climbing ahead of us! This cracked me mentally. I quickly turned " grumpy". Something about thinking that I made it and then having another brutal 20 minutes ahead of me really messed with my head! We did it though and it was a great climb. George and I climbed side-by-side and were able to catch a lot of the other riders on the mountain. The descent ended up being a nice break and we headed back to to hotel after about 3 hours on the road (half of that time on the Mountain)! The day wasn't quite done yet, as I still had a run ahead of me, and we both did a little swim in the nearby pool. A great way to end a trip that looked "questionable" from the beginning! We ended up taking advantage of the weather when we could and "rolling with the bad weather" when we had to, making the most of the trip. In all, a great time and some great riding!