Joe lead the club ride today for Furnance Creek 508 training. Myself and Gary showed up. I think the warning in the ride description about the need for strong wheels, and winds, scared some people away. Joe’s wife, Rosa, was there to drive their SUV vehicle as a SAG. We would need that because there was only one place to get water. It turned out to be a 128 mile ride and very difficult. I had been out on these roads before but never tried to do it at the the speed we rode today. For some reason my legs felt like lead from the very beginning. It was a long, hot and hard day riding.

I brought back some Mavic wheels from Utah because they are strong (and on the heavy side). I put them on my older Trek bike and installed the aerobars, all on Friday night, after driving all the way home that day from Utah. I am thinking to take my older bike for the FC 508 so I wanted to test it out.

We started the ride in Hollister and biked first on Southside over to Tres Pinos, then highway 25 to Paicines, then turning left on the Panoche road. We did not stop until we hit the Panoche Inn where we got some water because Rosa had not yet caught up with us. We then headed further on toward New Idria. The road gets very rough out past that spot, with twisting turns and up and down. I tried to use my aerobars at times but it was almost impossible because it was so bumpy. There was some forest fire out there because we were being passed by many big fire trucks, from CDF. When we were almost to New Idria, we were stopped and could not visit the ghost town, I guess because of the fire. We decided to eat our lunch which we had loaded in the car with Rosa.  The image below shows the route we took (click to enlarge).

There The way back found the headwinds we expected. I felt wasted and didn’t attempt to keep up with Joe and Gary. I saw that they were drafting behind Rosa in the car so I knew that I would fall even further behind. About 6 miles from reaching the Panoche Inn, Rosa dropped back and pulled me in. Drafting behind a SUV, especially with the headwinds makes a hugh difference.

Back at the Inn I drank a couple of cokes and ate some more bars and filled up my water bottles.. Then it was the ride back to the start. Again I fell behind the othr riders and again Rosa dropped back later to pick me up. She said Joe was only 0.3 miles ahead so I drafted behind her until we caught Joe. The two of us drafted for awhile but then Joe dropped off, I guess because of the pace. It also took a lot of effort to draft behind the vehicle because you have to ride your brakes and pay close attention. I used the draft most all he way back to Highway 25, but we never to catch Gary. I then biked on my own and finally caught Gary, who had stopped at Tres Pinos. In went in the store there and bought a pint of chocolate milk. I could not seem to drink enough. I drank that right down and then Gary and I jumped on our bikes and went the final 8 miles back to to Hollister. It was now 5:20 pm, rather later for the miles we did, but it was a hard ride.

I found this information about the New Idria town on the website.

A part of a mercury extraction plant of the New Idria Quicksilver Mining Company.

The New Idria Mining Company was formed soon after the discovery of cinnabar (quicksilver ore) in southern Diablo Range of central California in 1854. The town of New Idria began around 1857 and about 300 men were employed at the mine by 1861. The first school opened in 1867 and the New Idria Post Office opened in 1867. In 1894, the New Idria Post Office dropped the word “New” and the town become known as Idria. The New Idria Quicksilver Mining Company closed 1974 and the town has since become a ghost town.

New Idria is a California Historical Landmark (#324) and home of the world’s first Gould Rotary Furnace. The Gould Rotary Furnace revolutionized ore processing technology worldwide.

The New Idria area is known for its abundance of rare minerals such as Benitoite, named after San Benito County. Gem quality Benitoite is only found in this area of the world.

Categories: Cycling Group Rides