Scripps Poway Highland - 71 miles

Another great ride today! The radio team got there early for our immunity challenge: guess the number of calories in the container of gels. There were 8,000-and-some. Pat Thomas guessed the closest and will be safe from elimination this week. Congrats, Pat!

The ride up Scripps Poway seemed a little easier this time around. We did pretty well sticking together as a group up until the first sag stop. I just have to say...that had to be the best sag ever! We were treated like royalty. Fruit kabobs!!! Awesome! One person was filling my water bottle while another was handing me food while another was spraying me with sunscreen. And cheering on top of that! Need some lens cleaner for your sunglasses? Yep, they had that, too. They think of everything! Loved it!

We continued on up 67 and spread out a bit with the climb. Yes, I'm still working on my climbing. ;-) We were chit chatting away and soon enough were at Highland Valley, where I *assumed* we were supposed to turn. Ooops. I led a small pack of five on the wrong route! We were supposed to have done a loop off of 67 before reaching Highland Valley. Instead, we continued on and by the time we figured out what had happened we were almost at the next sag stop.

Got a nice tour of the Rancho Bernardo Community Park as we looked for the stop and wondered if we'd cut so much of the route that we'd somehow beat the sag team. Nope. If we'd gone a little further we would have seen them straight away. More fruit kabobs and sag love and our little pack of five was off again.

Everything was wonderful until....pfthfthfthfthththtssssssssst. My back tire blew. Took about two seconds to see the culprit...a two-inch nail had nicely implanted itself foot first in my apparently not-so-impenetrable kevlar reinforced tires. Good thing I'd just watched that tire changing video! Thankfully, I didn't have to rely on it completely because Pat and Randi rolled up and Pat finished off the job in short order. Thanks, Pat!

A few of us talked fundraising in the parking lot after the ride. It would be so great if each one of us in the contest could raise the $10K and be able to do the ride. I think we can do it if we all put our noses to the grindstone. Either way, the contest marches on. The next elimination will be on Wednesday and two of us will get the axe. I'll post more details when I have them. Keep your fingers crossed for me. =)