California - Latigo Canyon & Piuma Mountain

Not many folks may remember the name Eric Bruins, but I guarantee that every guy that raced Cat 4 with NCVC in 2009 knows the guy. Yeah, he's the dude that goes up hills. Fast. He's the dude that rides tempo. Forever. He's the dude that just completed the 155-mile Climb to Kaiser. (Check out the elevation profile from his Garmin data.)

Thus, Eric was given the mission to shock my legs back into long-distance, hard-man riding shape.

Eric rode with GW Cycling and NCVC during the spring/summer of 2009 while doing a semester and internship in DC. Now he's back in Southern California after graduating from USC.

I had a business trip to downtown LA, so I took a few extra days off for the long weekend to visit Eric. Naturally, I had to find a way to ride with him.

I rented a bike from Helen's Cycles in Santa Monica. They hooked me up with a Cannondale CAAD9 equipped with Shimano Ultegra (DA 7800 rear derailleur), FSA Gossamer crankset, and MAVIC Aksium wheels. For a weekend of riding, that'll do. I'll probably post a review of the bike later.

On Saturday, Eric and his teammate Nick took me through Venice Beach and Santa Monica to the PCH, where we drilled it to Latigo Canyon.







We then descended the now-famous "Rock Store" slope used as a climb in the 2010 Tour of California. From there, we hit some valley roads to climb Piuma Mountain, which had some great overlooks (ahem) toward Malibu and the Pacific.









This fairly "normal" ride from the Santa Monica/Venice area totaled 78 miles over two mountains. Wow. Riding in California rocks.

More pictures from our other crazy rides to come...