mini triple crowns

This weekend I went for what I guess was the first real training ride of the year. The weather was perfect for riding. The sun was out, but it was not hot. There was a bit of wind, but not too much, in fact it seemed like just enough to make the ride a bit challenging.

I rode with Ray and Richard from the Sac small group for the first time. They’re both pretty into biking and are interested in doing century rides. That’s pretty awesome, because it seems like over the years I’ve been slowly losing riding buddies, and with Jiro scheduled to graduate this year it would be harder and harder for me to find people to go on century rides with.

We rode out to Steady Eddy’s in Winters, which is the typical weekend ride destination for most Davis bikers. It’s probably my favorite coffee shop, not just because it caters toward bikers, but because the food and desserts are pretty good and because the place has its own unique vibe. The only minor gripe I have with the place is that the prices are a bit high.

One thing I like to do when I’m there is look around the room and see the jerseys that the different bikers are wearing. Sometimes I see jerseys from century rides I’ve done, and sometimes I see team jerseys that I recognize. On Saturday I saw this older Asian guy wearing a California Triple Crown jersey. That’s a jersey I hope to own one day. Owning one of those jerseys means that you’ve done three double centuries in a year. Double century–that’s two hundred miles in one day. At my pace that’s probably upwards of fifteen hours of riding. I’m not sure I can handle that yet.

But that’s totally fine. I’m not in any hurry to get that jersey. When I took a look at the California Triple Crown website, I noticed that most of the people who’ve done it are over fifty. So yea, definitely not in any hurry.

Until then I have my mini triple crown that I’ve been doing for the past few years. It’s basically been a goal of mine to do three century rides per year, although some of them have been metric centuries (65 miles vs the normal 100 miles). This year I’ve decided that if I’ve done a ride three times, I will buy the ride’s jersey as a sort of trophy to hang on my wall.

This year that means I’ll probably end up buying three jerseys. I’ve done the Tour of Napa and Foxy’s Fall Century three times already, so I’ll buy those jerseys when they’re available, regardless if I do the ride this year or not. I’ve signed up for the Strawberry Fields Forever ride, it’s my third year doing that ride, so I ordered the jersey for that one. I think the jersey is kinda fruity (which I guess makes sense since it’s a fruity ride –bwahaha that was lame…) so it won’t get worn, but it will hang on my wall as a trophy to my mini triple crown.