Riding your bike the weekend before Valentine's Day is likely not going to win you very many points with your loved one.
Nevertheless, it is the perfect time to test your form and see how kind or spiteful the winter months, and all of the food consumption that goes with them, has been to your pedaling power. So if your find yourself in rural North California on an early Sunday morning in mid-February then why not try the Velo-Love Ride.
Heading out of the Butte County Fairgrounds it quickly became apparent that the main point of struggle for this ride would be the ongoing battle with the wind. Any potential hardship was certainly not going to come from climbing. In fact, the route was pan-flat with just 587 feet of elevation gain and the vast majority of this climbing came on the short ramp mid-way through the ride.
The wind on the other hand, was unrelenting whenever the road turned to the west or the north, including the straight shot out of Gridley.
The most picturesque part of the ride came in the middle third of the course. Here, the road eased up through the winding roads to the south of the Sutter Buttes with a stunning view of the snow covered mountains on the horizon to the west.
As the route turned north towards Gridley, the large amount of rain that Northern California has enjoyed over the past month reared its head. A 100 yard stretch of the road had become flooded to a depth of roughly knee height. I had been forewarned of this at the ride's sign on so I was prepared to turn back if necessary. I had hoped to hitch a ride through the football field-length flooding with a kind farmer in his trusty pickup truck. Alas the aforementioned lack traffic made this an impossible prospect.
Perhaps the most understated gran fondo I have ever ridden - there can not have been more that 70 participants on the road, the grassroots nature, quiet local roads, and friendly feed stop on the Velo-Love Ride are a testament to the folks at Chico Velo's love of cycling.
If you are looking for a reason to get back on your bike as the winter starts to draw to a close or if you want to put those winter miles into practice, then the delightful Velo-Love Ride has a lot to offer.
The Chico Velo Cycling Club grew out of a loose-knit group of riders and became an official nonprofit standing in 1980. The club's first official organized ride drew 100 riders on a rainy day. Two and a half decades on, the Chico Velo Wildflower Century attracts up to 4,000 riders annually.
The Chico Wildflower Century is on April 30, with the two-day Unknown Coast weekend on September 16 and 17 completing Chico Velo's Century Series. The Challenge Fondo, normally held in September, will not occur in 2017.
0 Comments
